Distinction between Fedora and Gnome3

[hikerguy]

This may seem like an oddball question, but I ask because I don't know. When working
with Fedora 15, which parts of what I see on screen are actually Fedora, and which parts of Gnome 3?

I'm trying to understand where the separation lies between the OS and the shell, and I'm not quite clear when I'm "doing things" if I'm using a feature of Fedora, or Gnome 3. I know when I'm in a terminal window, that's the shell/Gnome3. But what else that I do is actually the shell, and not Fedora?

Thanks,

Andy

[PabloTwo]

"Fedora" = A philosophy on how to put together a Linux distribution. You can't actually "see" Fedora.
"Gnome 3" = The latest incarnation of a Desktop Environment (DE) called Gnome that runs on a Linux OS.

You can run Fedora Linux without anything Gnome installed, by, for instance, installing from a Fedora-KDE Live CD spin. You can install/run Fedora Linux without any DE installed at all for that matter.

In the latter case, or when you go to "run level 3", you have no "windows", your monitor displays only a tty console running (usually) the bash shell.

You can open a "terminal window" in any Linux DE, not just Gnome. What you refer to as a "terminal window" is just "gnome-terminal" running, a program component of the gnome-shell/Gnome3 DE. If you choose to, you could run any number of other X terminals not related to Gnome at all.

Is the picture any clearer to you now?

[hikerguy]

Well, ya know the saying "clear as mud?"

My understanding is that you can take the kernel that Linus Torvalds created, modify it, and put out your own distribution (e.g. Ubuntu, Mint, etc).

So, one thing I'm not clear on is what's so significantly different between the various distros?

And, would I be correct in saying that without Desktop Environments like KDE and Gnome, there would be no GUI for any distro (and you'd be working at the command line at all times)?

Thanks,

Andy

[jamielinux]

Originally Posted by hikerguy

My understanding is that you can take the kernel that Linus Torvalds created, modify it, and put out your own distribution (e.g. Ubuntu, Mint, etc).

Distributions all use the Linux kernel, but distributions use a lot more than just that. There are a huge number of software packages that get put together for a distribution release.

So, one thing I'm not clear on is what's so significantly different between the various distros?

Target audience is probably the big one.

RedHat/Debian = Servers
Ubuntu/Mint = Desktops
Arch/Gentoo = Power users

Using those three examples:

1) package versions increase as you go down the list
2) expected stability decreases as you go down the list

And, would I be correct in saying that without Desktop Environments like KDE and Gnome, there would be no GUI for any distro (and you'd be working at the command line at all times)?

Well kind of. Xfce, LXDE, openbox, fluxbox, a whole range of tiling window managers (e.g. dwm, i3wm, wmii, ratpoison) also exist. But yes, without those, no GUI would exist. The Linux kernel includes no GUI. A distribution is a collection of packages, put together with a certain vision, and delivered with a distribution specific set of defaults, with a certain release cycle and package policy.

To answer your original question...

which parts of what I see on screen are actually Fedora, and which parts of Gnome 3?

What you see is actually both Fedora and GNOME 3 The implementation of any package is often different across different distributions.