this post was submitted on 10 Apr 2025
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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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Except doesn't this replace their old tool? So, its not really fragmenting anything if its replacing an existing project.
Fragmentation isn't great, but it can be beneficial in some cases too. I've contributed to a number of projects.
Over the last 20-30 years, I've seen plenty of projects fail, and new ones take over.
If you take a look at arts/eaudio and the other sound servers of 20 years ago. All failed, because Pulseaudio consolidated and killed them eventually. Now, Pulseaudio is on its way to getting killed by Pipewire. And one could argue its a waste of resources.. but, the changeover is actually super awesome (for JACK)
One other good example of the fragmentation argument was Xfree86. Lots of people argued against Xorg at the time, and ultimately, Xfree86 died ages ago. If you asked me 20 years ago, I would have said KDE was dead, but now Gnome and KDE and carved out VERY different products, that suit very different people. Both are awesome in their own way
Everyone was freaking out when devFS got deprecated. But, udev was an amazing replacement
Linux is evolving FAR quicker than Windows or MAC (mac OS has barely changed in a decade). And, many ideas introduced in linux are stolen by Windows and Apple.
At the end of the day though, sometimes a rewrite is needed of things. What really matters is that it doesn't fragment the desktop experience (and, it won't in this case)