Maybe. But I just don't know why this discussion started in the first place. There is a `open` command on likely almost every desktop Linux box. So it's not Mac specific (which was my sole point in my first comment in this thread).

> Right, you said "alias" multiple times earlier. Symlinks and aliases are not the same thing.

You're technically correct. My fault!

I've called it alias as it's a symlink coming form the Debian alternatives facility. The alternatives mechanisms manages system wide command "aliases"… I should have been more exact in this point.

> I was saying I suspect Debian got the idea from macOS.

I have no prove but I doubt that. There were other tools on Linux called `open` before MacOS X came along as far as I know. The whole thing seems to be rooted in BSD (where NextStep got it's Unix parts form).

> For what it's worth "open" doesn't exist on my Ubuntu servers either.

Makes perfect sense. It's a desktop tool.

> And it was added to Debian only 2 years ago.

I don't think so. I had `xdg-utils` and it's `open` command installed for many years. It's at least 17 years old:

https://cgit.freedesktop.org/xdg/xdg-utils/refs/tags

> Anyway, this is all moot because there are easy workarounds for the naming conflict

I agree. The Debian alternatives system was made exactly to handle this kind of name conflicts around commands. So there's no big issue, indeed!