The first person to call the penguin “Tux” was James Hughes, who said that it stood for “(T)orvalds (U)ni(X)”.

However, tux is also an abbreviation of tuxedo, the outfit which often springs to mind when one sees a penguin.

Tux was originally designed as a submission for a Linux logo contest.

Why Linux mascot is a penguin?

Because Torvalds Had Penguinitis! Short Bytes: The official mascot of the Linux kernel developed by Linus Torvalds is a penguin named Tux. Some people believe that Torvalds was bitten by a penguin that’s why he chose one to represent his kernel.

Why was Linux developed?

In 1991, while studying computer science at University of Helsinki, Linus Torvalds began a project that later became the Linux kernel. He wrote the program specifically for the hardware he was using and independent of an operating system because he wanted to use the functions of his new PC with an 80386 processor.