Who writes Linux? (And how you can too!)

By David M Williams
Monday, 25 August 2008 21:06

Opinion and Analysis

The very heart of the Linux operating system is the kernel, the piece of software which makes programs run and work with hardware. It's possibly the largest and most geographical spread open source project in the world. With software projects failing daily how can such a task actually work?

It’s well known that Linus Torvalds originated the kernel which he dubbed Linux way back in 1991. Yet, by the release of version 2.6.24 in January this year, Torvalds was responsible for a tiny 0.6% of the changes. This isn’t to say Torvald’s work is insignificant by any means, but rather to emphasise how Linux has evolved from the creative work of a sole developer into a massive project spanning almost 1,000 developers representing over 100 corporations.

70% of contributions came from developers working for companies. Red Hat is at the forefront with 11.2% then Novell (8.9%) and IBM (8.3%.) The top 10 individual contributors collectively provided 15% of kernel changes.

Yet, by far the largest single change contributor – at 13.9% - is the contributor listed as “none.” This is all the single developers who are just working on their own without the backing of any company. As much as major vendors are providing for the future of Linux there’s still definitely a place for lone coders with passion and enthusiasm, in the spirit of Torvalds.

No matter where they come from, there’s a huge amount of work going on. The number of active kernel developers has tripled since 2005. Code is coming in at an average of 3,621 lines per day. This code is scrutinised for quality and effectiveness before being officially accepted. New kernels, with all the enhancements, are making it out to the public in 2.7 monthly intervals.
Once a kernel is released it can be downloaded and used by any person. It is available in source code format and is compiled and packaged by the maintainers of Linux distributions such as Ubuntu. These new kernel builds can be obtained on demand by checking for software updates and are also included in the periodic new releases of these distributions.

How does all this work? When you take a high-level view there is a massive amount of co-ordination and workflow going on here which smoothly takes raw code – be they bug fixes or new features – as input and ends up with functional Linux distributions.

In this day and age where entire rows of books fill shelves on “why most IT projects fail” it is surely remarkable to see such well oiled machination and is undoubtedly the envy of many a project manager.

Here’s how it works – but before we begin, just why should you contribute to the Linux kernel anyway? Actually, wouldn’t it make sense for a company like Red Hat to keep its kernel modifications to itself? Imagine the traction a Linux vendor could gain if their distribution became known as the one which had the widest support for hardware, alone?

Such a proposal isn’t contrary to the GNU public license (GPL) that the Linux kernel is licensed under. It is available free of use for any person, and expressly permits modification for custom purposes. Yet, it’s not a software project which has suffered splintering or factionism. Why?

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