“The term userland (or user space) refers to all code that runs outside the operating system's kernel.”
I see a difference between userland and user space. For userland I would add “and that’s needed to bring the OS to a usable state”. You need code that is triggered when an USB device is plugged in, tools to query what hardware is available, tools to format disks, etc.
“Usable state” is up for discussion, though. For example, I don’t think X11 or Wayland are needed, but opinions on that will vary. That may be why the table in the link I gave has parts shaded yellow.
I don’t think (but Wikipedia disagrees with that by making user space and userland synonymous) anybody calls QT, the Gimp or Open Office part of userland, even though they run in user space.
Comments
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_space#Overview says:
“The term userland (or user space) refers to all code that runs outside the operating system's kernel.”
I see a difference between userland and user space. For userland I would add “and that’s needed to bring the OS to a usable state”. You need code that is triggered when an USB device is plugged in, tools to query what hardware is available, tools to format disks, etc.
“Usable state” is up for discussion, though. For example, I don’t think X11 or Wayland are needed, but opinions on that will vary. That may be why the table in the link I gave has parts shaded yellow.
I don’t think (but Wikipedia disagrees with that by making user space and userland synonymous) anybody calls QT, the Gimp or Open Office part of userland, even though they run in user space.
QT, Gimp and Open Office are 100% considered userland. I'd be surprised if you could find very many people who disagree.