Aside from Linux running on NASA hardware, phones and consoles. Does it run on ATM machines, PDAs and point of sale monitors?
I ask this because I’ve seen Windows being used in airport terminals and really old versions being used for cash machines as well. The crowdstrike problem made this more prevalent by seeing “non end user computers” using the OS.
Does Linux fill this niche as well do you know? I don’t recall hearing any big name embedded distro used for those sorts of machines. Maybe Alpine Linux or NetBSD?
Thank you in advance for your input!
Yes. My work uses Ubuntu for certain touchscreen PoS devices they sell to their customers. It runs their proprietary apps automatically, and the end user doesn’t know or care that it’s Linux underneath.
There are tons of computers running Linux besides PCs. By far the biggest part are servers and supercomputers. Microsoft even has their own distribution for their server business. Then there are all the Android phones and devices. Android is Linux. In Germany I’ve also often seen Linux used for kiosks at government agencies.
Linux is used in TVs and set top boxes. Everything that says Tizen or WebOS is powered by Linux. I’ve also seen it used as in-flight entertainment systems. And Lunduke had an example of Linux running on a machine controlling how cows are milked, if I recall correctly.
For most systems you won’t actually know what OS is used until you see a hardware error screen. Although Microsoft has made it a little easier with mandatory updates.
I am not positive but if it still true originally webos was not linux. It started off as a very ahead of its time cell phone os made by Palm Inc. After they failed to gain traction it was sold to LG or made open source then sold or bought. LG uses it in their TVs but if I recall the base os is not Linux but some form of palmos assuming it has not been moved to Linux.
I saw the self checkout machines in my supermarket being restarted a few times and caught a glimpse of what was shown on the screen. Before they were upgrade some time ago they showed that CentOS was running and now I think that I saw Rocky Linux running on there. So yes, these are definitely out there and used widely.
Also I’ve see pictures of Raspberry Pis being used almost everywhere.
Holy cow what country is this? All the self-service check outs in our Dutch Albert Heijns and Lidls use Windows 10/11!
A good boba tea shop, Sencha Silk near Arnhem Centraal, their self checkout used unregistered Windows 10’s and upgraded them to unregistered Windows 11’s recently, judging by the watermark on the bottom-right. Based.
A ton of digital signage (think fast food restaurant menus) run Linux as well.
Most home routers do as well.
Wouldn’t a home router with Windows cost way more because of the licence?
Probably would also need like ten times the amount of ram and disk space. These things usually run on 64/128Mb of RAM and anywhere from 8 to 32Mb of flash.
I think those numbers might be on the low side. Like, not by heaps though. My Asus RT-AC86U has 512MB of RAM and 256MB of flash. It’s not exactly new either, I’d imagine an AX router would need more.
I worked in retail until 2016, and a few years before I left they switched all the PoS registers to Linux.
