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Linux is a fully 32 bit multitasking operating system. It was conceived by Linus Torvalds and is based on the Unix system.

It is growing in popularity for a number of reasons - not least because it makes more efficient use of PC hardware. This means that your machine will seem more responsive when running Linux. Other advantages include :

Cost and support - Linux is available free. Yet, you can pay for commercial 'distributions'- examples are RedHat, SUSE, and Debian, and other variants exist. This gives you access to technical support, manuals, upgrades. All of these are available online though - check out questions in newsgroups such as comp.os.linux.setup, and this comprehensive FAQ and Link list.

Licensing - Linux is known as 'open source' meaning that -
if you have the skills - the original code is available, and you can modify it as desired. Contrast this with Microsoft's licensing model, under which you never actually 'own' the software, and no support will be given if you make changes to it. The result of this is that thousands of programmers collaborate across the web to constantly improve & update Linux. This leads on to -

Security - One of the biggest strengths of the OS. Security can be applied to files, directories, networking and user access, making it difficult for hackers to gain access. Security problems are often fixed in days by net-based distribution of updated software. An example is the 'Love Bug', May 2000, which directly affects only Windows PC's, though the problem overlaps with the Linux community as many of the worlds mail systems run Linux - the resulting rapid increase in traffic became a problem until filters were applied to incoming mail on servers over a few hours.
With Windows NT, you may have to wait for Microsoft corp. to admit there's a problem before the prospect of a fix comes along. See CERT for recent security issues and fixes across all operating systems.

Other stuff - Of course, an OS is a complicated thing, problems do occur - most notably with very recent hardware. A lot of help is available though, and present distributions include fairly good set-up tools on a par with Windows versions, which are being improved all the time. They must be good if I can use 'em - I've now installed Redhat, Mandrake and SUSE on different systems. Though fiddly at first, things soon drop into place - though the first 'drop' may take a few days! Finally, just to remind you what's at stake here, for a further tirade against the evil demon Microsoft, this page!

"Linux is like a wigwam - no Windows, no Gates, Apache inside!"