Pre-Linux development
To understand how Linux got started, you need to understand Unix. Before Linux, Unix was a well-established operating system standard through the 1960s into the 1970s. It was already powering mainframes built by the likes of IBM, HP, and AT&T. We’re not talking small fry, then – they were mega corporations selling their products around the globe.
If we look at the development of Unix, you’ll see certain parallels with Linux: freethinking academic types who were given free rein to develop what they want. But whereas Unix was ultimately boxed into closed-source corporatism, tied to a fixed and dwindling development team, eroded by profit margins and lawyers’ fees, groups that followed Linux embraced a more strict open approach. This enabled free experimentation, development and collaboration on
