Android already runs on 1 Billion devices which is basically Linux…
At which point? It takes only the Linux kernel. But kernel is the least important part from practical usage perspective. Everything else is different, the bootloader (no GRUB or systemd-boot), screen compositor, sound system (not a Pipewire or PulseAudio), package format, init process, shell, even the standard C library (Bionic instead of glibc).
There are projects to run Linux on phones (see: wiki.postmarketos.org/wiki/Devices), but it takes huge about of reverse engineering and work.
In the early 90s I was running a BBS on DesqView over DOS and was annoyed by the limitations. My older hardware didn’t have grunt or RAM (SIPP at $50/MB) to run OS/2 like the big dogs. I also had nearly no money (grad student).
I started experimenting with MINIX, and from there to linux. IIRC I started with Slackware, flirted with Red Hat, then found Debian and it was true lurve. Since that time I’ve generally run servers on Debian stable and workstations on Debian testing.
So much stability and reliability, while modern packages. Just using Debian or Mint (Ubuntu LTS with an outdated Desktop and opinionated theming) is not a solution for a good experience, as you need updates.
Btw I broke every other Distro before, so I ended up on Fedora Kinoite
I was in college. I was talking with a classmate how I tried to burn this OS called Linux that I heard of on TechTV, bit the stupid disc never worked. I leaned how to properly burn iso after that. Pretty sure he showed me some copy of Fedora or Mandrake, maybe SuSe. Didn’t care for Fedora, bit found this other one that seemed real interesting everyone was talking about, Ubuntu.
I’ve dabbled with Linux here annd there since 1999 when I installed Caldera Open Linux 2.2 on a pos desktop I had at the time.
Caldera ran pretty well on that machine for about six months, until the machine up and died. IIRC, the motherboard fried.
My next foray was around 2007ish when I had a dell laptop that was struggling to run windows. I was also interested in tinkering, so I installed Ubuntu for the first time. I think it was Hardy Heron (8.04).
I ran that for a good year or so, until the charging port on the laptop took a shit, but I didn’t really get deep into Linux. I just used it for general computing.
My next computer was a MacBook Pro 2009 13”. This began a long relationship with Macs and macOS that continues to this day, though I am far less enamored of Apple and macOS now than I was in the past.
What was great about Macs and osx/macos over that period was that by and large it did what Apple promised. It just worked. The hardware was powerful and reliable, and the software let me get my work done (photo and video production), and so I had no desire to use anything else.
During this time period I also built a windows pc dedicated to live streaming as part of my production work, which is relevant, because about four years ago, right before the pandemic hit, I quit photo and video production.
So I had this pc sitting around, and I once again decided it was time to give Linux a spin, and now I’m all in. For three years running, that pc has been my home server running Ubuntu (just updated it to 22.04). With that server I’ve really been learning about Linux, and it’s been a lot of fun.
I’d love to put Asahi on the m1 Mac mini that is our main household computer, but my wife wouldn’t be too happy with me if I did that, so I’m still using macOS. I spend a lot of time at the terminal, often working on the server over ssh, but also just working with my files locally.
Since macOS is bsd based I’ve run across a number of cli tools that work just different enough from their Linux counterparts. I found that frustrating and confusing, and decided I wanted consistency in my cli tools. Since I can’t install Asahi, I found Multipass and installed that on the Mac mini. So now I have an Ubuntu vm with my pertinent local drives mounted to give me a consistent experience with shell whether I’m working on the server or working on the Mac.
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