Mono is a software platform designed to allow developers to easily create
cross platform applications. It is an open source implementation of
Microsoft's .Net Framework based on the ECMA standards for C# and the Common
Language Runtime. We feel that by embracing a successful, standardized
software platform, we can lower the barriers to producing great applications
for Linux.
Notes from https://github.com/mono/mono:
- Mono build relies on a working Mono C# compiler to compile itself
(also known as bootstrapping).
- If you don't have a working Mono installation, the build process uses
the 'monolite' distribution, which contains just enough to run the 'mcs'
compiler. This is considered a "slightly more risky approach" to build Mono.