Dictionary of Computer and Internet Terms: Gnu
Gnu
a project led by Richard Stallman of the Free Software Foundation. Gnu stands for "Gnu is not UNIX"; the Gnu project's original goal was to develop a freely distributed substitute for UNIX, but Linux (the leading free UNIX) evolved into a somewhat separate project. The most important Gnu products are the Emacs editor and the Gnu C Compiler.
Gnu software is copyrighted and is distributed free subject to certain conditions (typically, you must distribute it complete and intact, with source code). This set of conditions is sometimes called "copyleft" (i.e., a copyright with the opposite of its usual function) and also applies to some other free software, such as Linux.
