Section 1.8. Programmer Support

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1.8. Programmer Support

Any good operating system must also provide an environment in which programmers can develop new and innovative software to address the changing needs of the user community. Linux caters very well to programmers. It is an example of an "open" system, which means that the internal software architecture is well documented and available in source code form, either free of charge or for a relatively small fee. The features of Linuxsuch as parallel processing, interprocess communication, and file handlingare all easily accessible from a programming language such as C via a set of functions known as "system calls." Many facilities that were difficult to use on older operating systems are now within the reach of every systems programmer.