Looking at a few online sources, Linus actually said when "386BSD came out, Linux was already in a usable state, that I never really thought about switching. If 386BSD had been available when I started on Linux, Linux would probably never had happened".

Although the dates differ, it seems Linux was released in 1991


Kind Regards,
Angus Robinson


On Wed, Jul 14, 2021 at 10:04 AM Michael Kjörling <michael@kjorling.se> wrote:
On 14 Jul 2021 08:28 +1000, from dave@horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall):
> In 1992, 386BSD is released by Lynne and William Jolitz, starting the open
> source operating system movement (Linux didn't come along under later).

Are you sure? Wikipedia claims that it happened the other way around;
that the Linux kernel initial release was 0.02 on 5 Oct 1991, while
the 386BSD initial release was 0.0 on 12 March 1992.

It seems that work on 386BSD began earlier than work on Linux, but
that the initial release of Linux was earlier than the initial release
of 386BSD.

--
Michael Kjörling • https://michael.kjorling.semichael@kjorling.se
 “Remember when, on the Internet, nobody cared that you were a dog?”