I mean, you could recreate it. Just burn some old distros on a cd and get one of tgese old white pc
this post was submitted on 19 Apr 2025
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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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What a lot of people forget is that in the early days of Linux there was no software that targeted it. Everything you would want to run on Linux was intended to run on something else like Solaris, BSD, AT&T Sytem V, SCO, AIX or something else. As a result, Linux APIs were the most generic flavor of Unix possible. Almost every thing meant for a Unix would compile and run on it and there was rarely a dependency problem.
I still miss that.
Stuff needed tweaking more wine worked almost never even for basically window's programs. Configuring Xfree86 was black magic. Running Startx at the terminal prompt was like rolling the dice. Distro choice was smaller and it was really a choice. Since the child distros were less of a thing. You had Debian , Redhat, Slackware, and SUSE. All were very different at a fundamental level with packaging and philosophy. Also it was way more common to buy boxed copies of Linux distros with big thick manuals that helped you get it installed and take your first steps with Linux. It reminded me of when I first got my TI 83 calculator an it had that massive manual with it.
Also Lugs and spending a lot of time on IRC getting and helping people on freenode (don't go there now) was a must.
There was a similar question a while ago with some nice reads in the answers :)
My first time trying out Linux was with a bootable CD from a PC gaming magazine. It was Corel Linux. If I recall correctly it booted into KDE.
Unfortunately on my system the mouse cursor was invisible. The mouse worked, I just couldn't see where the cursor was. My brother who was using Linux full time couldn't help me fix it.
Imagine a pile of floppy disks, with stuffs inscribed on it that you never heard of....
... will you insert one into your computer and reboot it?
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Well, in the 90's I managed to essentially brick two NIC's by tinkering with the tulip driver on command line. In the distro I used it had to be done manually and I still have no idea as to what happened inside those NIC's, but they sure didn't work ever again. Yes, I made the same mistake twice.
I remember building the kernel with the NE2000 drivers and having a network card for just installation and getting the 3com or RTL driver source over to the new install, then compiling those drivers, installing them, and downing the system to put the proper card in. There was a very small subset of sound cards and video cards that worked reliably. The notion that Linux was the OS where hardware just worked out of the box was ludicrous.
The DEs were pretty horrible and the software to use on them was scant. So desktop Linux was a pipe dream. I used Linux entirely as a security/server appliance. I built a couple hundred iptable/ipchains firewalls for businesses out of recycled pentium type desktops until hardware firewalls became a thing, it was fairly lucrative for a while there.