Building Embedded Linux Systems, 2nd Edition

Chapter 1. Introduction

Linux was first released into an unsuspecting world in the summer of 1991. Initially the spare-time hobby of a Finnish computer scientist by the name of Linus Torvalds, Linux was at first accessible only in software source code form to those with enough expertise to build and install it. Early enthusiasts (most also developers themselves by necessity) exploited the growth of the Internet in the early 1990s as a means to build online communities and drive development forward. These communities helped to build the first Linux software distributions, containing all the software components needed to install and use a Linux system without requiring users to be technical experts.

Over the next decade, Linux grew into the mature Unix-like operating system it is today. Linux now powers anything and everything from the smallest handheld gadget to the largest supercomputing cluster, and a nearly infinite range of different devices in between. Examples of the wide range of Linux use abound all around: digital TV receivers and recorders such as TiVo, cell phones from big names like Motorola, Hollywood’s huge Linux “render farms” (used to generate many of the recent CGI movies we have seen), and household name websites such as Google. In addition, a growing number of multinational corporations have successfully built businesses selling Linux software.

In many ways, Linux came along at the right moment in time. But it owes a lot of its success to the work of projects that ...