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Revision as of 21:21, 21 June 2007 by TakKendrick (talk | contribs) (SuggestedEdit more info on licensing.)
The GNU Operating System, Free Software, Free Society
Founded in 1983, GNU (pronounced guh-noo, like "canoe") is an organization which develops a free software operating system, the GNU system. This system is qualified as Unix-like in that it works much the way that Unix does, but is built as free software and does not contain any Unix code. (Giving rise to the recursive acronym for GNU as meaning "GNU's Not Unix").
The GNU operating system is developed under the "GNU Project," with programs released by the project being called GNU packages of GNU programs. The basic components of the GNU operating system include the GNU Compiler Collection (GCC), the GNU Binary Utilities (binutils), the GNU C library (glibc) and the GNU Core Utilities (coreutils). A variant of the GNU kernal, Linux is now widely used by a variety of operating systems, including the Macintosh Operating System, known as "OS X".
In addition to the GNU/Linux kernal, GNU is known as a fierce proponent for free software, claiming, " 'Free software' is a matter of liberty, not price. To understand the concept, you should think of 'free' as in 'free speech', not as in 'free beer'." Included in their ideas of free software are the users' freedom to run, copy, distribute, study, change and improve the software.
GNU Licenses
As part of their free software movement, GNU developed several free licenses allowing for the release of software and documentation for their works and derivatives. While written for GNU, the General Public License (GPL), Lesser General Public License (LGPL), and GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) have found use in various unrelated projects as well and are among the earliest available licenses for freely distributing and sharing software and documentation.
- General Public License (GPL) -- Used by most GNU programs and, according to GNU.org, by more than half of all free software packages.
- Lesser General Public License (LGPL) -- Is used by a few of the GNU libraries. According to GNU.org, this license was formerly known as "the Library GPL" but the name was changed to discourages use because they found more people used the license when they ought to have been using the GPL.
- GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) -- is designed for use on a manual, textbook or other document to assure that it can be copied, distributed, modified and used commercially or noncommercially. The most common place outside of the GNU that the GFDL is uses in Wikipedia, the GFDL is the license used for all their content.
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- 59 Temple Pl, Ste 330
- Boston MA 02111 US
Contact
- Free Software Foundation
-
- +1 617 542 5942
Additional Information
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External Links
- Alexa: Gnu.org