Terminal and all that other shit, I follow you. Command lines. Fine. I don’t know what the Linux terms mean, but I understand command lines etc… But GNOME… what the fuck is it? Is it a suite? an environment? Every Linux user explains things like I’ve already been a user for a few years and all of them have forgotten what being NEW actually is.
Ironically, the WORST place to find Linux environments explained simply and clearly from the bottom up: The Internet.
This is where I remind and beg: Like. I’m. FIVE.
In: 81
You seem to resonate with others making the analogy that “Linux is DOS, GNOME is Windows 95”. I’ll hone in on that.
Since you say you understand terminals, I believe you understand that the terminal is ultimately what any modern computer is actually doing in the background. The graphical part that shows up on your monitor, allowing you to click on buttons with a cursor and see individual boxed-up applications on top of one another, that’s all just very fancy smoke and mirrors. Really, to some extent, everything you do in the fancy version is being translated on-the-fly to the low level version for you.
That translating from buttons and clicks in a GUI to low-level system calls is just a running computer program just like any other. And someone had to write that computer program. In the Linux ecosystem, the term for this kind of program is “desktop environment”, or often “DE” for short.
The concept of a DE being a separate piece of software from the operating system is, understandably, alien to someone who comes from a Windows or Macintosh background, as those two very popular systems never drew attention to the existence of theirs. They *have* them, in a sense, but they’re permanently baked-in as part of the operating system. You don’t get to pick and choose which one you want from several options. But in the Linux ecosystem, there actually are several options to pick from, and you can pick and choose which one you want to use. The underlying system will stay the same, but you can entirely change how the system expresses itself to you graphically by installing (or creating, if you are so inclined) any desktop environment you like. You can even install multiple of them simultaneously and pop in and out of each one on a whim, if you want.
The closest thing I can think to this ever happening on Windows is Microsoft Bob. Yeah, remember that? You could call that software a different “DE” of Windows, in a way. It abstracted using the underlying system into a graphical one in its own unique way, targeted to a very specific kind of user.
GNOME is one of several of the major Linux desktop DEs on offer by large, trusted development groups. In specific, GNOME was a product of the GNU Project, some of the biggest champions of free (as in liberty, not always as in beer) and open source software. The GNU Project has a habit of making deliberately obtuse names for things, particularly ones that start with “GN” where the “G” is decidedly *not* silent (yes, you are actually supposed to pronounce these as “guh-NEW” and “guh-NOME”). It originally stood for “_**G**NU **N**etwork **O**bject **M**odel **E**nvironment_”. Though, due to some somewhat recent office politics, the GNU Project and GNOME are no longer associated with each other.
GNOME is the default pack-in DE when you install many of the popular Linux-based operating systems with default configurations. Some of the other big DEs out there that provide a vaguely Windows-like experience are KDE, Cinnamon, and MATE (mah-tay, like the herbal tea). There are many more, but the bulk of them are probably best left unmentioned until you get a stronger grasp of these ones.
Oh, and just because you seemed to have some trouble with it in other comments, I’ll also just put here: “Distro” is short for “distrobution” (distribution). Some comments have likened it to a “branding” of Linux, which, I guess is kind of accurate.
Like, if you wanted to buy a car, where do you get it from? Ford? Hyundai? BMW? These are all brands that make cars, and all of their cars will get you from point A to B just the same, but they all come with their own little idiosyncrasies due to how each manufacturer decided to solve the same problems in its own way (or perhaps, not solve them at all). Linux distros are somewhat like that. Large groups of developers come together and build up a complete operating system around the Linux kernel (which is basically just the naked engine) the way they think it should be made, using the parts they think were the best choice. And you’re able to download and install what they came up with.
And like a car you’ve just bought, you’re free to at any time pop open the hood and tinker with the thing. Cutting out crap you don’t like, swapping out parts you think are superior, adding things you think you want, etc. Linux expressly encourages this. Windows and Mac, in increasing order of severity, generally don’t want you doing this. They are akin to the Teslas of cars. You take what they give you, entirely what they give you, and if you dare try to customize it, you’ll have to drag yourself through razor wire to do it. Entirely fine and reasonable for the majority of people who do not care to do such customization and just want a complete and finished car that works, but insufferable to people who want to feel like they really own and control their vehicle.
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