1. Welcome to Linux

An operating system is the low-level software that schedules tasks, allocates storage, and handles the interfaces to peripheral hardware, such as printers, disk drives, the screen, keyboard, and mouse. An operating system has two main parts: the kernel and the system programs. The kernel allocates machine resources—including memory, disk space, and CPU (page 1143) cycles—to all other programs that run on the computer. The system programs include device drivers, libraries, utility programs, shells (command interpreters), ...

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