Acronym of Gnu Network Object Model Environment.

The GNOME project (pronounced with a hard "G") is a collaborative software project building a complete user-friendly graphic user interface (GUI) entirely with free software components. GNOME is a GUI for GNU/Linux/Unix systems. GNOME's most apparent distinction is that it's built on the GimpToolKit. Components of GNOME include GConf, Nautilus, a virtual filesystem layer (gnome-vfs), and more.

GNOME is the Desktop of choice for business Linux and has been adopted by the likes of IBM and SunMicrosystems:, this is partly due to the LGPL'd GTK2 core, which makes GNOME more Free than the competing KDE, and at the same time cheaper (developers don't need to fork out to TrollTech for a non-GPL version of Qt) to develop commercial software for. Ximian, a company set up by MiguelDeIcaza to develop it commercially, have a (now outdated) customized version called XimianDesktop you can download from their web site.

For a peculiarly skewed and old-fashioned comparison of GNOME vs KDE development styles, see http://www.illusionary.com/GNOMEvKDE.html

See also:

• KDE
• DesktopEnvironment
• LinuxOnTheDesktop
• GnomeNotes