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this post was submitted on 26 Aug 2025
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Linux
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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.
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I feel like in Linux any distinction between "OS" and "something else" would be arbitrary, except, perhaps the example of the AUR vs regular packages in arch, or maybe the universe repo in Ubuntu. Why would you want a whole different system for managing those packages?
It’s not so much about a second package manager as it is about having a base system and separating extra software from the base system.
Moving extra packages out of the base system allows the extra packages to be updated quicker. Fewer things get frozen when the stable point in time distro release is tagged. This also helps the base as it can move without having to worry about every piece of software in the repos being compatible with the changes.
The concept exists as 3rd party repos. However, most aren’t setup to be as cleanly separated as ports are.
You're not really "managing" the OS files, you're just applying patches and upgrading to new releases. All the interesting stuff (from the user perspective) is done using
pkgon FreeBSD andpkg_*on OpenBSD; it's with those you install your packages like the DE/WM, web browser, CLI tools, etc.There's a couple of benefits to splitting these. Makes it easier to "reset" the system to its default state and makes it impossible to accidentally break the OS (you can't accidentally remove any critical components like the kernel).