this post was submitted on 10 Sep 2024
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Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).
Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.
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We're talking about a kernel whose user-visible error messages have historically included things like "lp0 on fire" . . .
The 'printer of fire' error used to be a legitimate and important concern. Ye olde printers really could light their paper on fire under certain circumstances and they would typically be huge devices in dedicated rooms rather than something right next to your system. Letting people know to check on it when specific things went wrong probably saved a few buildings from burning down with people in them.
It was a legitimate but extremely rare concern with some early printers, yes (Wikipedia points out a particular early laser model from Xerox, plus an experimental machine from 1959, as printers that have legit caught on fire, but also points out that there is no known report of one of the old industrial-sized line or drum printers ever catching fire from friction despite it being a hypothesized failure mode). Thing is, those printers were, I believe, all obsolete by the time the Linux kernel was written. So the "on fire" error message is not likely to have been congruent with reality for any machine actually running Linux.