Linux is often listed as parallel to OSes like macOS. But afaik Mac is also based off of Unix, so can I say Mac is a distro of unix? And then Mac would become parallel to linux distros like ubuntu and debian? Is a distro an OS of their own?
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Linux is a kernel, rather than an operating system. A kernel is the most basic, central part of an operating system, but it is not an operating system by itself. To make a full operating system, you need a whole bunch of other software. When an operating system is based off of Linux, it is often called a Linux Distribution. The distribution includes not just the Linux kernel, but lots of other software packages that make up a full operating system. Using the term “Linux” as an operating system is a mistake/simplification that people make quite a bit.
Because Linux is freely available to anyone, there are a lot of people/groups who have created their own distributions of Linux. It isn’t like Windows, where there are only a few versions, and they are all created by Microsoft (Windows 10, Windows 11, Windows Server, Windows Embedded, etc…).
Linux is similar to Unix in many ways but it is not Unix. Mac OS X is based off of Mach, which is another Unix-like kernel. Mach is also open source, so it is possible for other people to build another operating system distribution with a very similar kernel to Mac OS X, although I’m not aware of any other modern Mach distributions. Google Android is based off of Linux, so it can be considered a type of Linux Distribution.
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