Feliços 27 anys GNU!

Ahir, dia 27 de Setembre fa 27 anys, Richard M. Stallman, el pare del programari lliure, anunciaba a Internet el començament del desenvolupament d’un nou sistema operatiu basat amb Unix i totalment lliure.

Gràcies a aquesta decisió avui dia podem gaudir del sistema operatiu GNU, que tot i que encara no està complet, combinat amb el kernel Linux fa una molt bona parella, la finalització del sistema acabarà amb la creació de Hurd (el kernel de GNU).

Sens dubte, aquell 27 de Setembre de 1983 va marcar un abans i un després en la història de la informàtica, i per això cal donar un gran reconeixement a Richard M. Stallman i el seu sistema operatiu, que és diu GNU/Linux (de moment) i no Linux com es sol confondre.

Us deixo aquí el comunicat que va fer:

Free Unix!

Starting this Thanksgiving I am going to write a complete Unix-compatible software system called GNU (for Gnu’s Not Unix), and give it away free(1) to everyone who can use it. Contributions of time, money, programs and equipment are greatly needed.

To begin with, GNU will be a kernel plus all the utilities needed to write and run C programs: editor, shell, C compiler, linker, assembler, and a few other things. After this we will add a text formatter, a YACC, an Empire game, a spreadsheet, and hundreds of other things. We hope to supply, eventually, everything useful that normally comes with a Unix system, and anything else useful, including on-line and hardcopy documentation.

GNU will be able to run Unix programs, but will not be identical to Unix. We will make all improvements that are convenient, based on our experience with other operating systems. In particular, we plan to have longer filenames, file version numbers, a crashproof file system, filename completion perhaps, terminal-independent display support, and eventually a Lisp-based window system through which several Lisp programs and ordinary Unix programs can share a screen. Both C and Lisp will be available as system programming languages. We will have network software based on MIT’s chaosnet protocol, far superior to UUCP. We may also have something compatible with UUCP.

Moltes felicitats GNU!