A Short History of Linux Distributions [LWN.net]

A Short History of Linux Distributions

Posted Jul 1, 2004 20:38 UTC (Thu) by jzbiciak (✭ supporter ✭, #5246)
Parent article: A Short History of Linux Distributions

Wow, takes me back.

I remember having a hybrid SLS 1.0.3 / Slackware 1.1.1 system at one point. I also remember the a.out/ELF switchover.

I had a 386sx33 back then, with a whopping 4MB of RAM. I did run X eventually, but with little more than xterms open. All the real work was on one of the Sun machines elsewhere on campus.

Later I went to a 486DX33 with 16MB of RAM, and Slackware 3-ish. I snagged the RAM for the low, low price of $475. *cough*

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A Short History of Linux Distributions

Posted Jul 5, 2004 16:25 UTC (Mon) by jschrod (subscriber, #1646) [Link]

You remember it? well,

puma:bin $ pwd
/usr/local/bin
puma:bin $ file unshar xx*code
unshar:   Linux/i386 demand-paged executable (ZMAGIC), stripped
xxdecode: Linux/i386 demand-paged executable (ZMAGIC), stripped
xxencode: Linux/i386 demand-paged executable (ZMAGIC), stripped
puma:bin $ date
Mon Jul  5 18:23:31 CEST 2004

I still run some of them. Why should I recompile when they Just Work(tm)? Not that I need xxdecode any more, Bitnet is gone... :-) I still run SunOS binaries on my Solaris systems, as well :-)

Cheers, Joachim