Linux is deployed on a wide variety of computing systems, such as embedded devices, mobile devices (including its use in the Android operating system), personal computers, servers, mainframes, and supercomputers. Since the late 1990s, it has been included as part of a large number of operating system distributions, many of which are commonly also called Linux. Linux is provided under the GNU General Public License version 2 only, but it contains files under other compatible licenses. It was originally written in 1991 by Linus Torvalds for his i386-based PC, and it was soon adopted as the kernel for the GNU operating system, which was written to be a free (libre) replacement for Unix. The Linux kernel is a free and open-source, : 4 monolithic, modular, multitasking, Unix-like operating system kernel.
org /pub /scm /linux /kernel /git /torvalds /linux.