A decade ago, most PC users preferred Microsoft Windows.
MS Windows History
- 1985 – The introduction of Windows as ‘MS-DOS Executive', which could run DOS applications side-by-side Windows.
- 1987 – With the release of Intel's 386 CPU, most companies started adopting MS Windows 2.0/286/386 286/386 operating system. It introduces overlapping resizable flexible windows and the simultaneous running of MS-DOSS applications.
- 1990-1992 – Introduced Windows 3.x with a colorful user interface. It was a breakthrough, as it included a DOS extender that broke the 1MB memory limit. It was stable and faster and widely used to multitask DOS applications.
Further, it evolved into 16-bit Windows Workgroups Version 3.11 with added peer-to-peer networking. - 1995 – The 32-bit Windows 95 with direct boot into Windows rather than in DOS introduced. It has enhanced user interface with a standard Start menu and Taskbar.
- 1999 – Windows 98 introduced with an integrated IE (Internet Explorer) Web browser and fixed numerous bugs and upgraded its applications.
- 2000 – Windows ME, an upgrade to Windows 98
- 2001 – A 64-bit Windows XP with better security and administrative capabilities made available for AMD x86 and Intel Itanium CPUs.
- 2006 – Windows Vista – a client version of Windows, but most users criticized for its bugs and behavior
- 2007 – Introduced Windows 7 with improved stability
- 2012-2013 – Windows 8 – Current version
- 2015 – Windows 10
- 2017 – Windows 10 S (Streamlined version) obtains content via the Internet
Linux Journey
Today Linux has emerged as a professional rich-featured operating system for both Personal Computers and Workstations.
- 1990 – Linus Benedict Torvalds developed Linux with other programmers
- August 25, 1991 – The Linux kernel publicly announced
- 1992 – kernel re-licensed under the GNU-GPL and the first Linux distributions created
- 1993: Kernel adapted to the GNU environment, which leads over 100 developers to work on Linux Kernel and created a broad spectrum of applications. Slackware released the first time and in the same year Debian project, which is the largest community distribution.
- 1994: Version 1.0 released with all components of the kernel. The XFree86 project contributes to a graphical user interface (GUI). Red Hat and SUSE publish Commercial Linux distribution version 1.0.
- 1995: It's ported on DEC Alpha and Sun SPARC and to many platforms.
- 1996: Kernel version 2.0 released, which can serve several processors at the same time using symmetric multiprocessing (SMP). Thus, and becomes a serious alternative for many companies.
- 1998: IBM, Compaq, and Oracle announced support for Linux.
The Cathedral and the Bazaar first published as an essay (later as a book), resulting in Netscape publicly released the source code to its Netscape Communicator web browser suite. Thus brings the attention of the popular technical press to Linux's open-source development model.
A programmer's group begins developing the graphical user interface KDE. - 1999: A developers group starts working on the graphical environment GNOME, destined to become a free replacement for KDE, the then proprietary Qt toolkit. IBM announced an extensive project for the support of Linux.
- 2000: Dell announced as the No. 2 provider of Linux-based systems worldwide and the first major manufacturer to offer Linux across its full product line.
- 2002: The media reports that “Microsoft killed Dell Linux.”
- 2004: The XFree86 team with the existing X standards body form the X.Org Foundation, which results in substantially faster development of the X server for Linux.
- 2005: A free distribution project openSUSE begins from Novell's community. It also introduced the project OpenOffice.org version 2.0 and started supporting OASIS OpenDocument standards.
- 2006: Oracle releases the distribution of Red Hat Enterprise Linux. Novell and Microsoft announce cooperation for better interoperability and mutual patent protection.
- 2007: Dell starts distributing pre-installed Ubuntu laptops
- 2009: Symbolic moment for the Linux-based economy as Red Hat's market capitalization equals Sun's
- 2011: Linux kernel version 3.0 released
- 2012: The aggregate Linux server market revenue exceeds the rest of the Unix market.
- 2013: Google's Linux-based Android claims 75% of the smartphone market share
- 2014: Ubuntu claims 22,000,000 users.
- 2015: kernel version 4.0 released.
- 2019: kernel version 5.0 released.
References
- History of Linux, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Linux