Is Linux really not standard?

[Bucky Ball]

Without meaning to be offensive, the answer to this question is a bit of a no-brainer, and therefore the thread should be moved to ...

Thread moved to Recurring Discussions

Get a Linux kernel, of whatever flavour, and build your own. Then call that standard ... that won't change. This has nothing to do with Ubuntu or what Canonical might decide to do. Linux is not Canonical ...

The responses and results of the poll so far tell the story ...

[Jay Nnib]

I think that standardization is needed but not in the same way. One should develop a linux operating system that is flexible enough to support any environment. I mean why waste this much human resource on the name of separate distro when they can develop a single, powerful OS. Linux must have many colours for the users to choose from but that should not mean a complete migration from one OS to another.

[monkeybrain2012]

I don't understand the question. Linux is what it is because of the open source development model and the freedom philosophy. How do you make developers to work on one or a few 'popular' distros if they have their own ideas? I think this is Linux's strength rather than weakness, the question is like "do you think democracy is too chaotic so may be dictatorship is a good idea?"

The fragmentation of Linux is an exaggeration. If commerical software houses want to support Linux all they need to do is to release a tarball or a .bin file and chances are it will run on all Linux platforms, they don't need to package for n distros so there is already a standard(e.g Matlab). "Fragmentation" is often cited as an excuse for not supporting Linux, but it is only an excuse.

[weasel fierce]

I've bought dozens of games for linux, most of which simply have a tarball with a generic binary. I click the icon and it runs. No fuss.

[krishna.988]

The answer to your question "Is Linux really not standard?".. NO that is the greatest USP of LINUX..