101
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[-] boonhet@sopuli.xyz 1 points 18 hours ago

Linux distros are free to choose which standard libraries and toolsets they use. Android has chosen not to use the standard GNU coreutils or glibc, they instead use toybox and bionic.

There are other distros that use for example musl and busybox over glibc and coreutils. Ubuntu is also looking to replace coreutils with a new rust version that isn't copyleft. There are also multiple init systems out there so you can't say that systemd must be used to consider something a Linux distro. Etc.

I'm wondering, what exactly about Android doesn't count as a Linux distro to you?

this post was submitted on 15 Aug 2026
101 points (86.9% liked)

Linux

67024 readers
827 users here now

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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.

Rules

Related Communities

Community icon by Alpár-Etele Méder, licensed under CC BY 3.0

founded 7 years ago
MODERATORS