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The Debian Project is an association of
individuals who have made common cause to create
a free operating system. This operating system
that we have created is called
Debian GNU/Linux, or simply
Debian for short.
An operating system is the set of basic programs
and utilities that make your computer run. At
the core of an operating system is the kernel.
The kernel is the most fundamental program on
the computer and does all the basic housekeeping
and lets you start other programs.
Debian systems currently use the Linux kernel.
Linux is a piece of software started by Linus
Torvalds and supported by thousands of
programmers worldwide.
However, work is in progress to provide Debian
for other kernels, primarily for the Hurd. The
Hurd is a collection of servers that run on top
of a microkernel (such as Mach) to implement
different features. The Hurd is free software
produced by the GNU project.
A large part of the basic tools that fill out
the operating system come from the GNU project;
hence the names: GNU/Linux and GNU/Hurd. These
tools are also free.
Of course, the thing that people want is
application software: programs to help them get
what they want to do done, from editing
documents to running a business to playing games
to writing more software. Debian comes with over
18733 packages (precompiled software that is
bundled up in a nice format for easy
installation on your machine) — all of it free.
It's a bit like a tower. At the base is the
kernel. On top of that are all the basic tools.
Next is all the software that you run on the
computer. At the top of the tower is Debian —
carefully organizing and fitting everything so
it all works together. |
