Literally everything.

Okay not everything, I’m sure they share some basic libraries like openssl. But the core OS is apples and oranges.

I started in IT as a windows guy in a unix heavy lab. I aliased windows command line things to output a message to use the linux version of the command so that I would learn it. so if I typed dir I would get a message that said use ls.

is the only difference the syntax ? How libraries interact? How disks are mounted ?

Ah, yes.

You know, the things you just mentioned ARE the basic differences. As long as both work on the same architecture, and none reinvent the wheel, everything is the same.

And as long as you don’t reinvent the computer and make a new assembly and binary, a kernel and libraries will be the most effective ways to work.

Its like saying „what is the difference between python and c++ anyway? If we just strip away everything differentiating the 2, we just get a programming lang.

And yes, I would prefer Linux, for the same reason a python Dev prefers python and a C++ Dev prefers C++: because I’m Used to the syntax and the quirks of Linux. I don’t want to jump back to the ungodly CLI of cmd, powershell and everything else. I have learned the ins and outs of Linux, and that’s how its gonna stay.

The entire difference is the kernel. There’s a reason why Apple moved to BSD forever ago for their OS. Somebody did it better than they would have been able to from scratch. Everything above that level on up to the DE matters less as far as stability and performance goes for desktop users.

They come from completely different heritages.

GNU/Linux is a reimplementation of Unix, an operating system that was originally designed mainly for universities, but also mainframes.

Windows is descended from DOS, an operating system intended for home computers.

Nowadays Windows is the only widely used non-Unix-like OS; GNU/Linux, Android, macOS and iOS are all Unix-like.

If Windows became FOSS, I at least would likely switch to it. It’s really the FOSS philosophy more than anything else that makes me want to use GNU/Linux.

You rather should ask what separates Windows from all the Unix-likes. Windows is the weird one, not Linux.

From my basic understanding: Windows has a microkernel hybrid style architecture. It’s kind of like microservices. Instead of all resources being shared within a system process, You get a lot of tiny services all making calls to each other and the main kernel.

This introduces a lot of overhead because variables need to be sent and requested between processes. And they don’t simply share them in the same memory.

Linux on the other hand has most services under one monolithic kernel and they can all access the same memory. So there is no need for all of that intercommunication between services.

At least that’s my basic understanding and if I’m wrong (which I probably am), then somebody on the internet will now correct me.

I think its easier and shorter to say what is the same between the two than different, but some things that are different:

1. Filesystem (ex. Linux treats everything as a file, more flexibility in organization, more compatibility for differing systems, etc)
2. Security Model (NTFS vs UNIX, selinux, ACLs, etc)
3. File Execution (File extensions don’t really matter in Linux - based on file permission not extension, ELF vs PE, etc)
4. Kernel (Monolithic vs Hybrid kernel systems - Windows hands off to HAL vs the Linux kernel doing core functions)
5. System Calls (Windows use Win32/NT APIs, Linux uses POSIX-compliant)

Performance is dependent on use case, but in general:

1. Linux uses fewer system resources
2. Linux has faster boot time
3. Linux has better CPU/disk throughput
4. Windows has better gaming driver support
5. Linux has higher stability/control (hence why its the defacto server OS)

If we stripped all ms’s junk out and made windows open source, would we still prefer linux?

In what context? For gaming maybe, but that’s one single use. There is more to computers than video games, at least for the majority of Linux users. I wouldn’t trust Windows on any server I run.

Yes we would still prefer Linux. Windows is just a single object without any modularity. With Linux by itself is of course just a barebones kernal waiting to be added to. You can choose which gnu libraries to use you can chose which package manager to use you can chose which desktop environment to use (or ommit it entirely.) Windows doesn’t have that option.

As well since the source code for linux has been open for over 30 years people know how it works, it would take ages for people to study windows and actually figure out how to do anything with it.