this post was submitted on 23 Jun 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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The upshot of a server is: it sits on your network and you can access its files as if they were a drive on your own system. There's a lot you can do beyond that, but the core value of a server is: files on the server are available to all computers on the network. It makes more intuitive sense when you have multiple desktop computers to share the files between, but even if you only have/use one desktop, the server still makes a lot of sense in terms of keeping your files insulated from problems that happen to your desktop system.
And "server" conjures visions of a big room with a special air conditioning system and raised floor for the cables. In today's reality, a 4TB server can be the size of a pack of playing cards.