from Hacker News

The early days of Linux (2023)

by stmw on 3/2/25, 12:18 AM with 136 comments

  • by linuxhansl on 3/2/25, 6:17 AM

    Fun. I started using Linux at 0.98 (forgot the patch level), in 1992.

    Had a modem and connected to a lot of bulletin boards. I felt very much a like "WarGames" hero, calling phone numbers and all :)

    I still remember the day when I used ppp to connect to the actual Internet for the first time. After a lot of trial and error, I finally pinged www.linux.org, and it resolved the hostname and returned the ping. I was silent first, and all I could say then was "whoa".

    Oh fun times. :)

  • by qwertox on 3/2/25, 5:49 AM

    It's odd how Linux has become the only stable thing in this world. You turn it on and you know that over time it will only become better without any bad intentions.

  • by klysm on 3/2/25, 3:46 AM

    It’s a weird feeling to be young enough to never have experienced a world without Linux, but be close enough in time to its creation that many of the people involved are still around. My entire professional career has mostly revolved around it in some capacity. My entire life even since age like 12? It’s pretty crazy to think about the impact it has had on my life

  • by imiric on 3/2/25, 1:54 AM

    > More importantly for the future success of Linux was that the X11 system was ported to it, making 1992 the year of the Linux desktop.

    I'm glad that's finally settled. :)

    Great read!

  • by jasoneckert on 3/2/25, 2:14 PM

    I remember the early days of Linux well. There was quite a bit of interest for it at the University of Waterloo in the mid 90s, but there was also a lot of talk of issues getting it to install, or getting it to run stably on certain systems (albeit not uncommon for any OS at the time). Those were the days of having to know how to compile your own kernel and fight with XFree86.

    Linux distributions like Red Hat really squashed those concerns within a short time and made things much easier on all fronts. Their documentation was also excellent.

    By the late 1990s, Red Hat was as common as Solaris, AIX, and IRIX at the university, but most still considered it inferior to Solaris. And now, RHEL is the main *nix system used there (a few use Debian).

  • by qingcharles on 3/2/25, 3:34 AM

    TIL: Linus is a Swedish speaking Finn; and those are a thing.

    This sound has lived rent-free in my head since 1994:

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Linus-linux.ogg

  • by LorenDB on 3/2/25, 1:57 AM

  • by infp_arborist on 3/2/25, 9:51 AM

    For the biggest part of my life it seemed that all these technical accomplishments were the work of untouchable geniuses, but reading this story is also very telling about the value of long-term friendship and financial/societal stability to support each other's explorations.

  • by linsomniac on 3/2/25, 2:42 AM

    One thing I often think about in the early days of Linux is it's competitors. The article mentions "commercial Unix was so expensive it was easier to write your own". Which is largely true.

    However there is also Coherent Unix. I remember adverts for it as the full back page of so many magazines of the day, for $99. I always was on the fence about buying it. One of the big drawbacks of Coherent was that it didn't have any networking.

    Then, Linux came out, and it was shockingly shortly after that that Linux surpassed Coherent, and Coherent vanished seemingly overnight.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coherent_(operating_system)

  • by udev4096 on 3/2/25, 9:25 AM

    There's this amazing documentary on linux, from 2003. It's called Revolution OS. Highly recommended! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k0RYQVkQmWU

  • by susam on 3/2/25, 11:10 AM

    > The first Linux distribution was also started in 1992: Softlanding Linux System or SLS. The next year, SLS morphed into Slackware, which inspired Ian Murdock to start Debian in 1993, in order to explore a more community-based development structure. A few other distributions would follow in the years to come.

    And follow they did! The Great Linux Distribution Timeline at <https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1b/Linux_Di...> presents an impressive graph of the countless distributions that descended from Slackware, Debian, etc. This graph is still actively maintained by the community here: <https://github.com/FabioLolix/LinuxTimeline>.

  • by dang on 3/2/25, 3:05 AM

    Discussed at the time (of the article):

    The early days of Linux - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35557848 - April 2023 (224 comments)

  • by ggm on 3/2/25, 7:30 AM

    Was used to using pdp11/vax based systems moving to Suns and other workstations, and for a number of reasons the initial launch floppies of linux felt "under cooked" compared to the BSD systems also being released for larger Intel chips with MMU. But, the killer side of this was the linux code ran on smaller Intel boxes, probably a little better than Minix did.

    when 386BSD got it's act together, it became less apparent but very quickly impetus got behind the distro "scene" and Linux took off like a rocket.

    Those first early days, no real network stack, minimal desktop support, it was line-and-ball. Mainly, I think the BSD lawsuit/licence issues was the negative energy source in BSD occupying the ground.

    I had an IBM PC/RT at the time running the 4.3bsd port which was just lovely. But such clunky hardware. PCs were coming into their own and IBM didn't want to keep playing in multiple OS and had AIX coming through and the ROMP chip was getting old. Once graphics display cards on PCI emerged along with decent cheap ethernet cards, and then ethernet on the motherboard I think it was game over. (although for obvious reasons most people's experience of network was modem on serial)

  • by zidoo on 3/2/25, 5:19 AM

    “ We had all the overconfidence of 20-year-old second-year university students.” - and this is how you change the world

  • by indigodaddy on 3/2/25, 2:18 AM

    lwn.net - Such a beautiful website, just kind of perfect on mobile. Anyone know if it's using a commonly known CMS? builtwith doesn't glean much..

  • by pjmlp on 3/2/25, 10:47 AM

    > The term "open source" was coined and IBM invested a ton of money in Linux development.

    A relevant key point regarding why Linux actually took off, versus other UNIX clones.

    And how that eventually came around with Red-Hat's acquision and its influence on GCC, GNOME, Wayland, RPM,... contributions.

  • by Philpax on 3/2/25, 1:33 AM

    [2023], but that doesn't matter much. Fantastic article! Great to see what development was like at the start - I'd always heard anecdotes, like its humble beginnings and the MINIX argument, but I'd never had context for them before.

  • by relistan on 3/3/25, 8:17 AM

    I had the minimum machine to run Linux 0.95 on: a 386sx16 with 4mb of memory and a 40mb drive. I actually had only 2mb but I recall Linux installed but barely ran. I upgraded it with SIPPs so I could run Linux properly. It was incredibly fun to have a Unix box on my desk in high school. But actually, I’ve built a 30 year career on that experience. A heartfelt thanks to Linus and all the contributors who have (so far!) supported this project.

  • by ylee on 3/2/25, 2:09 AM

    I knew the very basics of the story, but did not know/hadn't put it together in my mind that kernel 1.0 appeared in mid-1994, and not somewhere in the 1991-1993 timeframe as I had vaguely assumed. Certainly, the Red Hat Linux 2.1 (kernel 1.2.13) I installed in December 1995 (making my home 100% Microsoft-free ever since) felt pretty feature-complete.

  • by DeathArrow on 3/2/25, 7:25 AM

    >More importantly for the future success of Linux was that the X11 system was ported to it, making 1992 the year of the Linux desktop.

    Yet some people await for a second coming.

  • by sgarland on 3/2/25, 3:21 PM

    Great read. My first Linux distro was, I think, Slackware, around kernel version 2.2 - 2.4. I played with a _lot_ of distros; I think Sorcerer was the most esoteric. I settled on Gentoo, as one does, and spent more time compiling / breaking / fixing than I did using anything. I eventually valued stability over bleeding-edge, and have happily been using Debian ever since.

  • by chem83 on 3/2/25, 6:59 PM

    From the linked Wikipedia article on Tannenbaum x Torvalds debate: > but 5 years from now everyone will be running free GNU on their 200 MIPS, 64M SPARCstation-5

    I find it interesting how academic circles back then were really not betting on the longevity of x86.

  • by segmondy on 3/2/25, 4:12 PM

    It's amazing how good and stable it got really fast. I was able to install it and use it with X and for everything in 1994 while still in high school. It's been my only OS ever since and set the path for my career and life.

  • by openplatypus on 3/2/25, 7:50 AM

    Slackware 3.6/4.0 back in 1998-99 Never forget.

    The joy of startx command working (sometimes)

    Fun times.

  • by samiv on 3/2/25, 7:44 PM

    Oh, I thought it's still the early days considering that just the other day the whole system went into a death spiral where everything graphical slowly ground to a halt and then froze completely and I had to pull the power cord. Or considering that building my project in debug (yes, bog standard CMake debug build with GCC) causes a complete kernel hang about half the time and I have to pull the power cord again.

    Linux (as in the kernel + whatever user space you choose) is about 90% done. Now it just needs the other 90% to be taken care of to move beyond alpha....

    "The year of the Linux desktop is always 10 years from now" ;-)

  • by homebrewer on 3/2/25, 4:21 AM

    See also, by the same author: https://liw.fi/linux20

  • by hnthrowaway0315 on 3/2/25, 3:44 AM

    Such an inspiring read! Thanks for writing and/or sharing. One of my many future hermit projects is to hack on an early version of Linux.

    ------------ Please ignore just jotting down for future myself ---------------

    (Actually I want to study Win NT more than Linux as it brought me good memories, but Win NT was designed as a mature product from the beginning, and even the leaked 3.5 source code is way too much for me.)

    I checked the version history and 0.11 seems to be a good start. Reasons:

    - There is this book (https://download.oldlinux.org/ECLK-5.0-WithCover.pdf) which follows the style of Lion's Unix v6 book and uses the 0.12 kernel as reference;

    - 0.11 doesn't have a virtual memory or a virtual terminal, and they are among the software I'd like to implement;

    - 0.11 does have the basic stuffs so I assume it is not too difficult to set it up with QEMU and QEMU-gdb;

    The list of software to implement in mind:

    - a Debugger (I'll probably use QEMU-gdb, but if I can write a simple step-in debugger maybe it makes it a bit easier to dogfood? Still too early though as there is no compiler on it)

    - a Virtual Memory system (following the MIT xv6 lab, maybe a bit more advanced as I will complete the MIT xv6 labs before pursuing this venture);

    - a Virtual terminal (not sure how much I can implement, maybe just a basic one with limited control sequence support);

    - a USB driver (not sure if it's possible for 0.11, I have never written a driver before);

    - a mouse driver (again probably too difficult for me);

    - a LOT of CLI programs as warm-up. Basically simpler versions of modern ones (less switches);

    - a text editor. I never liked the key layout of emacs or vim so this is going to be my own thing. I care a lot about moving caret around without using a mouse;

    - a very basic GUI system. Nothing fancy, just something that can show windows and some widgets. Maybe don't even care about multiple windows. Showing one window with a menu and some buttons probably needs a lot of effort;

    - a compiler/linker of a simple language (can't dogfood without an editor, a compiler, a linker and a debugger I think)

    Preparations:

    - I need to complete all MIT RISC xv6 labs;

    - I need to figure out how to write drivers for USB and mice;

    - I want to investigate how X11 and Win32 GUI were implemented and figure out the architecture;

    - I need to figure out how to write terminals and text editors. There are tons of tutorials online so shouldn't be too tough;

    - I need to study compiler theory, just continue reading Crafting Interpreters should be good enough;

    - I need to figure out a comfortable development and debugging environment;

  • by tonnydourado on 3/2/25, 5:07 PM

    > My name is Lars Wirzenius, and I was there when Linux started.

    "I was there, Gandalf. I was there 3000 years ago" XD

  • by 9front on 3/2/25, 5:02 PM

    We will always have Linux, the kernel, but the desktop experience is being sabotaged by Microsoft with WSL.

  • by baskint on 3/2/25, 4:07 AM

    early 90s, i286 story reminded me purchasing my i386 SX (4 MBs RAM, perhaps 20 MB HD), running DOS 5, then DOS 6 could not afford the DX edition for some reason. i286s were just phasing out then. amazing how linux started. thanks for sharing!

  • by initramfs on 3/2/25, 7:45 PM

    bookmarked.

  • by linwangg on 3/2/25, 2:58 AM

    It's fascinating that the name 'Linux' was actually chosen by Ari Lemmke, not Linus himself. Details like this highlight the role of community and serendipity in the history of open-source software.

  • by helpfulContrib on 3/2/25, 6:23 PM

    I was 22 years old, hacking away in Progress 4GL, maintaining data centers across the country using a combination of Quarterdesk DesqView and "Remote Control", which gave a way to control a keyboard/mouse/monitor over a modem connection.

    Every field office had 2 or 3 PC's dedicated to the task of providing a "remote terminal" to our development team, so that we could dial in remotely and do administrative things to the Progress 4GL database server that was running on another dedicated system for the task, usually a fat Novell Netware server with 4 or 8 "huge" disks of 640Megabytes dedicated to the databases.

    It was my job to monitor the rows and rows of PC's on our side of things, that were used for remote admin.

    Honestly, I despised this job.

    I'd spent most of the 80's learning C and Unix programming - my first Unix machine was a MIPS Computing Magnum pizzabox running risc/OS. $15,000 worth of machine, sitting on my desk - but yet I still had to walk down the corridor and hack around on cheap DOS PC's just to get things fixed across the country in some hellish New Hampshire closet.

    At least it paid me well.

    Well enough that I could go to the regular PC Computer swap meets out in Pasadena every weekend or so, and buy myself the parts needed to build a "decent computer for home" - a 486 with 8Megabytes of RAM, a few hundred megabytes of disk space. A CD-ROM drive, maybe a high-end video card and monitor capable of 1025x768 and 256 colours. A modem, so I could work from home, run my own DesqView instance, have my own multiple-terminal connections to all those troublesome field offices.

    I'd also make regular (weekly) jaunts to The Opamp Bookstore, in Hollywood - one of my favourite places in all the world. It was there I'd wandered into the "Unix" section and seen some magazines and books on the MINIX operating system, and it was there that I learned about the rise of Usenet as a place to get to meet other hackers, C programmers, Unix nerds. It was also where I'd get my 2600 Magazine fix, monthly.

    One day, I got my home PC finally built, booted, and running. I connected to my mailserver, wnsnews.com .. checked my mail. A fellow operator had sent me a message "Check out the minix-list, they're talking about a new unix-like kernel you might be interested in..."

    So I subscribe, and lo and behold, there it was - the link to ftp.funet.fi, Linux in its very early stages. It took me about a day to download it, about a week to figure out all the various floppy disks I'd have to make to get the drivers for everything set up, and a whole weekend of faffing around to get things installed alongside my Desqview setup, on a brand new hard drive.

    I was hooked. It didn't have everything - X11 wasn't ported yet - but it had just enough for me to port some of my own C code, see that things could actually work like my MIPS pizzabox, albeit on my cheaper 486, and .. maybe .. someday .. someone would port "Remote Control" or even the Desqview terminals, to this brand new 'Linux' thing.

    Some months later, in the middle of being shut down entirely by my fellow grey-beard programmers, who wanted me to stop fiddling about with all the spare parts in our "Remote Control" room, I learned about this brand new Linux 'distribution', Yggdrasil.

    A trip to OpAmp book shop, and there it was: the bootable floppy and the full Linux filesystem, included on CD, to turn any of our machines into a working Linux system - with X11 onboard! And, probably working, if I chose our SVGA card settings right! What a revelation! I could use my home 486 as a decent terminal for my pizzabox! I could use telnet to get into the Novell servers across the other side of the country! I could endlessly annoy my grey-beard associates with the idea that "Linux is the Future, man!", over and over again, until they finally lock me out of the Novell server and decide I was only good for Unix things, as punishment, because as they knew full well "Unix is Dead, man!"

    Well, the decades have rolled by, and what a death it is. Linux is everywhere. I have used it every day since that first post on the minix-list I noticed, the one about funet.fi. I've made a living with it, and I've done amazing things, boring things, mundane things, and normal things. "Netware is Dead, Man! Desqview is Dead, Man! DOS is long gone, man!"

    Well, alright, MIPS Computing didn't last long, and that pizzabox was well and truly (sadly) de-commissioned. But, with the profits I made in SoCal during the 90's, putting Linux to work from my own little consulting office in One Wilshire, I bought all the SGI toys I could want .. and I still have them.

    Curious, though, that I mostly use Apples' Unix as a front-end to access them all, heheh ..

  • by looofooo0 on 3/2/25, 3:27 PM

    They confusing Linux and GNU/Linux in that article.