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Short History of Linux

• In 1991, while studying computer

science at University of Helsinki in
Finland (Europe)
Linus Torvalds began a project that
later became the Linux kernel.
Linus Torvalds

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 Short History of Windows
• Windows 1.0
• The very first version, Windows 1.0,
released in November 1985 by founder
Bill Gates, was Microsoft’s first true
attempt at a graphical user interface in
16-bit.
• It ran on top of MS-DOS, which relied
on command-line input.
Bill Gates
• It relied heavily on the use of a mouse
as a computer input device.

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 Windows Vs. Linux File System

• In Microsoft Windows, files are stored in folders on different

data drives like

• But, in Linux, files are ordered in a tree structure starting

with the root directory.
• This root directory can be considered as the start of the file
system, and it further branches out various other
subdirectories. The root is denoted with a forward slash '/'.
• A general tree file system on your Linux may look like this.

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Windows Vs. Linux: Directories
In Windows, System and Program files are usually
saved in C: drive. But, in Linux, you would find the
system and program files in different directories.

For example, the boot files are stored in the

/boot directory, and program and software files
can be found under /bin, device files in /dev.

In the next slide there are important Linux

Directories and a short description of what they
contain.
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 Windows Vs. Linux: Directories

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 Windows Vs. Linux: File Name
Convention
In Windows, you cannot have 2 files with the same name in the same folder. See below -

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While in Linux, you can have 2 files with the same name in the
same directory, provided they use different cases

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Windows Vs. Linux: Key Differences
Windows
• Windows uses different data •
drives like C: D: E to stored
files and folders.
• Windows has different drives •
like C: D: E
• Hard drives, CD-ROMs,
printers are considered as
devices
• There are 4 types of user
account types -
1) Administrator, 2) Standard,
3) Child, 4) Guest
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Linux
Unix/Linux uses a tree like a
hierarchical file system.
There are no drives in Linux
• Peripherals like hard drives,
CD-ROMs, printers are also
considered files in
Linux/Unix
• There are 3 types of user
account types –
1) Regular, 2) Root and
3) Service Account
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• Administrator user has all • Root user is the super user
administrative privileges of and has all administrative
computers. privileges.

• In Windows, you cannot • Linux file naming

have 2 files with the same convention is case sensitive.
name in the same folder Thus, sample and SAMPLE
are 2 different files in
Linux/Unix operating system.
• In windows, My • For every user
Documents is default home /home/username directory
directory. is created which is called his
home directory.
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