| Index of Documentation for People Interested in Writing and/or | |
| Understanding the Linux Kernel. | |
| Juan-Mariano de Goyeneche <jmseyas@dit.upm.es> | |
| /* | |
| * The latest version of this document may be found at: | |
| * http://www.dit.upm.es/~jmseyas/linux/kernel/hackers-docs.html | |
| */ | |
| The need for a document like this one became apparent in the | |
| linux-kernel mailing list as the same questions, asking for pointers | |
| to information, appeared again and again. | |
| Fortunately, as more and more people get to GNU/Linux, more and more | |
| get interested in the Kernel. But reading the sources is not always | |
| enough. It is easy to understand the code, but miss the concepts, the | |
| philosophy and design decisions behind this code. | |
| Unfortunately, not many documents are available for beginners to | |
| start. And, even if they exist, there was no "well-known" place which | |
| kept track of them. These lines try to cover this lack. All documents | |
| available on line known by the author are listed, while some reference | |
| books are also mentioned. | |
| PLEASE, if you know any paper not listed here or write a new document, | |
| send me an e-mail, and I'll include a reference to it here. Any | |
| corrections, ideas or comments are also welcomed. | |
| The papers that follow are listed in no particular order. All are | |
| cataloged with the following fields: the document's "Title", the | |
| "Author"/s, the "URL" where they can be found, some "Keywords" helpful | |
| when searching for specific topics, and a brief "Description" of the | |
| Document. | |
| Enjoy! | |
| ON-LINE DOCS: | |
| * Title: "Linux Device Drivers, Third Edition" | |
| Author: Jonathan Corbet, Alessandro Rubini, Greg Kroah-Hartman | |
| URL: http://lwn.net/Kernel/LDD3/ | |
| Description: A 600-page book covering the (2.6.10) driver | |
| programming API and kernel hacking in general. Available under the | |
| Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 license. | |
| * Title: "The Linux Kernel" | |
| Author: David A. Rusling. | |
| URL: http://www.tldp.org/LDP/tlk/tlk.html | |
| Keywords: everything!, book. | |
| Description: On line, 200 pages book describing most aspects of | |
| the Linux Kernel. Probably, the first reference for beginners. | |
| Lots of illustrations explaining data structures use and | |
| relationships in the purest Richard W. Stevens' style. Contents: | |
| "1.-Hardware Basics, 2.-Software Basics, 3.-Memory Management, | |
| 4.-Processes, 5.-Interprocess Communication Mechanisms, 6.-PCI, | |
| 7.-Interrupts and Interrupt Handling, 8.-Device Drivers, 9.-The | |
| File system, 10.-Networks, 11.-Kernel Mechanisms, 12.-Modules, | |
| 13.-The Linux Kernel Sources, A.-Linux Data Structures, B.-The | |
| Alpha AXP Processor, C.-Useful Web and FTP Sites, D.-The GNU | |
| General Public License, Glossary". In short: a must have. | |
| * Title: "The Linux Kernel Hackers' Guide" | |
| Author: Michael K.Johnson and others. | |
| URL: http://www.tldp.org/LDP/khg/HyperNews/get/khg.html | |
| Keywords: everything! | |
| Description: No more Postscript book-like version. Only HTML now. | |
| Many people have contributed. The interface is similar to web | |
| available mailing lists archives. You can find some articles and | |
| then some mails asking questions about them and/or complementing | |
| previous contributions. A little bit anarchic in this aspect, but | |
| with some valuable information in some cases. | |
| * Title: "Conceptual Architecture of the Linux Kernel" | |
| Author: Ivan T. Bowman. | |
| URL: http://plg.uwaterloo.ca/~itbowman/papers/CS746G-a1.html | |
| Keywords: conceptual software arquitecture, extracted design, | |
| reverse engineering, system structure. | |
| Description: Conceptual software arquitecture of the Linux kernel, | |
| automatically extracted from the source code. Very detailed. Good | |
| figures. Gives good overall kernel understanding. | |
| * Title: "Concrete Architecture of the Linux Kernel" | |
| Author: Ivan T. Bowman, Saheem Siddiqi, and Meyer C. Tanuan. | |
| URL: http://plg.uwaterloo.ca/~itbowman/papers/CS746G-a2.html | |
| Keywords: concrete arquitecture, extracted design, reverse | |
| engineering, system structure, dependencies. | |
| Description: Concrete arquitecture of the Linux kernel, | |
| automatically extracted from the source code. Very detailed. Good | |
| figures. Gives good overall kernel understanding. This papers | |
| focus on lower details than its predecessor (files, variables...). | |
| * Title: "Linux as a Case Study: Its Extracted Software | |
| Architecture" | |
| Author: Ivan T. Bowman, Richard C. Holt and Neil V. Brewster. | |
| URL: http://plg.uwaterloo.ca/~itbowman/papers/linuxcase.html | |
| Keywords: software architecture, architecture recovery, | |
| redocumentation. | |
| Description: Paper appeared at ICSE'99, Los Angeles, May 16-22, | |
| 1999. A mixture of the previous two documents from the same | |
| author. | |
| * Title: "Overview of the Virtual File System" | |
| Author: Richard Gooch. | |
| URL: http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~rgooch/linux/vfs.txt | |
| Keywords: VFS, File System, mounting filesystems, opening files, | |
| dentries, dcache. | |
| Description: Brief introduction to the Linux Virtual File System. | |
| What is it, how it works, operations taken when opening a file or | |
| mounting a file system and description of important data | |
| structures explaining the purpose of each of their entries. | |
| * Title: "The Linux RAID-1, 4, 5 Code" | |
| Author: Ingo Molnar, Gadi Oxman and Miguel de Icaza. | |
| URL: http://www2.linuxjournal.com/lj-issues/issue44/2391.html | |
| Keywords: RAID, MD driver. | |
| Description: Linux Journal Kernel Korner article. Here is it's | |
| abstract: "A description of the implementation of the RAID-1, | |
| RAID-4 and RAID-5 personalities of the MD device driver in the | |
| Linux kernel, providing users with high performance and reliable, | |
| secondary-storage capability using software". | |
| * Title: "Dynamic Kernels: Modularized Device Drivers" | |
| Author: Alessandro Rubini. | |
| URL: http://www2.linuxjournal.com/lj-issues/issue23/1219.html | |
| Keywords: device driver, module, loading/unloading modules, | |
| allocating resources. | |
| Description: Linux Journal Kernel Korner article. Here is it's | |
| abstract: "This is the first of a series of four articles | |
| co-authored by Alessandro Rubini and Georg Zezchwitz which present | |
| a practical approach to writing Linux device drivers as kernel | |
| loadable modules. This installment presents an introduction to the | |
| topic, preparing the reader to understand next month's | |
| installment". | |
| * Title: "Dynamic Kernels: Discovery" | |
| Author: Alessandro Rubini. | |
| URL: http://www2.linuxjournal.com/lj-issues/issue24/1220.html | |
| Keywords: character driver, init_module, clean_up module, | |
| autodetection, mayor number, minor number, file operations, | |
| open(), close(). | |
| Description: Linux Journal Kernel Korner article. Here is it's | |
| abstract: "This article, the second of four, introduces part of | |
| the actual code to create custom module implementing a character | |
| device driver. It describes the code for module initialization and | |
| cleanup, as well as the open() and close() system calls". | |
| * Title: "The Devil's in the Details" | |
| Author: Georg v. Zezschwitz and Alessandro Rubini. | |
| URL: http://www2.linuxjournal.com/lj-issues/issue25/1221.html | |
| Keywords: read(), write(), select(), ioctl(), blocking/non | |
| blocking mode, interrupt handler. | |
| Description: Linux Journal Kernel Korner article. Here is it's | |
| abstract: "This article, the third of four on writing character | |
| device drivers, introduces concepts of reading, writing, and using | |
| ioctl-calls". | |
| * Title: "Dissecting Interrupts and Browsing DMA" | |
| Author: Alessandro Rubini and Georg v. Zezschwitz. | |
| URL: http://www2.linuxjournal.com/lj-issues/issue26/1222.html | |
| Keywords: interrupts, irqs, DMA, bottom halves, task queues. | |
| Description: Linux Journal Kernel Korner article. Here is it's | |
| abstract: "This is the fourth in a series of articles about | |
| writing character device drivers as loadable kernel modules. This | |
| month, we further investigate the field of interrupt handling. | |
| Though it is conceptually simple, practical limitations and | |
| constraints make this an ``interesting'' part of device driver | |
| writing, and several different facilities have been provided for | |
| different situations. We also investigate the complex topic of | |
| DMA". | |
| * Title: "Device Drivers Concluded" | |
| Author: Georg v. Zezschwitz. | |
| URL: http://www2.linuxjournal.com/lj-issues/issue28/1287.html | |
| Keywords: address spaces, pages, pagination, page management, | |
| demand loading, swapping, memory protection, memory mapping, mmap, | |
| virtual memory areas (VMAs), vremap, PCI. | |
| Description: Finally, the above turned out into a five articles | |
| series. This latest one's introduction reads: "This is the last of | |
| five articles about character device drivers. In this final | |
| section, Georg deals with memory mapping devices, beginning with | |
| an overall description of the Linux memory management concepts". | |
| * Title: "Network Buffers And Memory Management" | |
| Author: Alan Cox. | |
| URL: http://www2.linuxjournal.com/lj-issues/issue30/1312.html | |
| Keywords: sk_buffs, network devices, protocol/link layer | |
| variables, network devices flags, transmit, receive, | |
| configuration, multicast. | |
| Description: Linux Journal Kernel Korner. Here is the abstract: | |
| "Writing a network device driver for Linux is fundamentally | |
| simple---most of the complexity (other than talking to the | |
| hardware) involves managing network packets in memory". | |
| * Title: "Writing Linux Device Drivers" | |
| Author: Michael K. Johnson. | |
| URL: http://users.evitech.fi/~tk/rtos/writing_linux_device_d.html | |
| Keywords: files, VFS, file operations, kernel interface, character | |
| vs block devices, I/O access, hardware interrupts, DMA, access to | |
| user memory, memory allocation, timers. | |
| Description: Introductory 50-minutes (sic) tutorial on writing | |
| device drivers. 12 pages written by the same author of the "Kernel | |
| Hackers' Guide" which give a very good overview of the topic. | |
| * Title: "The Venus kernel interface" | |
| Author: Peter J. Braam. | |
| URL: | |
| http://www.coda.cs.cmu.edu/doc/html/kernel-venus-protocol.html | |
| Keywords: coda, filesystem, venus, cache manager. | |
| Description: "This document describes the communication between | |
| Venus and kernel level file system code needed for the operation | |
| of the Coda filesystem. This version document is meant to describe | |
| the current interface (version 1.0) as well as improvements we | |
| envisage". | |
| * Title: "Programming PCI-Devices under Linux" | |
| Author: Claus Schroeter. | |
| URL: | |
| ftp://ftp.llp.fu-berlin.de/pub/linux/LINUX-LAB/whitepapers/pcip.ps | |
| .gz | |
| Keywords: PCI, device, busmastering. | |
| Description: 6 pages tutorial on PCI programming under Linux. | |
| Gives the basic concepts on the architecture of the PCI subsystem, | |
| as long as basic functions and macros to read/write the devices | |
| and perform busmastering. | |
| * Title: "Writing Character Device Driver for Linux" | |
| Author: R. Baruch and C. Schroeter. | |
| URL: | |
| ftp://ftp.llp.fu-berlin.de/pub/linux/LINUX-LAB/whitepapers/drivers | |
| .ps.gz | |
| Keywords: character device drivers, I/O, signals, DMA, accessing | |
| ports in user space, kernel environment. | |
| Description: 68 pages paper on writing character drivers. A little | |
| bit old (1.993, 1.994) although still useful. | |
| * Title: "Design and Implementation of the Second Extended | |
| Filesystem" | |
| Author: Rémy Card, Theodore Ts'o, Stephen Tweedie. | |
| URL: http://web.mit.edu/tytso/www/linux/ext2intro.html | |
| Keywords: ext2, linux fs history, inode, directory, link, devices, | |
| VFS, physical structure, performance, benchmarks, ext2fs library, | |
| ext2fs tools, e2fsck. | |
| Description: Paper written by three of the top ext2 hackers. | |
| Covers Linux filesystems history, ext2 motivation, ext2 features, | |
| design, physical structure on disk, performance, benchmarks, | |
| e2fsck's passes description... A must read! | |
| Notes: This paper was first published in the Proceedings of the | |
| First Dutch International Symposium on Linux, ISBN 90-367-0385-9. | |
| * Title: "Analysis of the Ext2fs structure" | |
| Author: Louis-Dominique Dubeau. | |
| URL: http://step.polymtl.ca/~ldd/ext2fs/ext2fs_toc.html | |
| Keywords: ext2, filesystem, ext2fs. | |
| Description: Description of ext2's blocks, directories, inodes, | |
| bitmaps, invariants... | |
| * Title: "Journaling the Linux ext2fs Filesystem" | |
| Author: Stephen C. Tweedie. | |
| URL: | |
| ftp://ftp.uk.linux.org/pub/linux/sct/fs/jfs/journal-design.ps.gz | |
| Keywords: ext3, journaling. | |
| Description: Excellent 8-pages paper explaining the journaling | |
| capabilities added to ext2 by the author, showing different | |
| problems faced and the alternatives chosen. | |
| * Title: "Kernel API changes from 2.0 to 2.2" | |
| Author: Richard Gooch. | |
| URL: | |
| http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~rgooch/linux/docs/porting-to-2.2.html | |
| Keywords: 2.2, changes. | |
| Description: Kernel functions/structures/variables which changed | |
| from 2.0.x to 2.2.x. | |
| * Title: "Kernel API changes from 2.2 to 2.4" | |
| Author: Richard Gooch. | |
| URL: | |
| http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~rgooch/linux/docs/porting-to-2.4.html | |
| Keywords: 2.4, changes. | |
| Description: Kernel functions/structures/variables which changed | |
| from 2.2.x to 2.4.x. | |
| * Title: "Linux Kernel Module Programming Guide" | |
| Author: Ori Pomerantz. | |
| URL: http://tldp.org/LDP/lkmpg/2.6/html/index.html | |
| Keywords: modules, GPL book, /proc, ioctls, system calls, | |
| interrupt handlers . | |
| Description: Very nice 92 pages GPL book on the topic of modules | |
| programming. Lots of examples. | |
| * Title: "I/O Event Handling Under Linux" | |
| Author: Richard Gooch. | |
| URL: http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~rgooch/linux/docs/io-events.html | |
| Keywords: IO, I/O, select(2), poll(2), FDs, aio_read(2), readiness | |
| event queues. | |
| Description: From the Introduction: "I/O Event handling is about | |
| how your Operating System allows you to manage a large number of | |
| open files (file descriptors in UNIX/POSIX, or FDs) in your | |
| application. You want the OS to notify you when FDs become active | |
| (have data ready to be read or are ready for writing). Ideally you | |
| want a mechanism that is scalable. This means a large number of | |
| inactive FDs cost very little in memory and CPU time to manage". | |
| * Title: "The Kernel Hacking HOWTO" | |
| Author: Various Talented People, and Rusty. | |
| Location: in kernel tree, Documentation/DocBook/kernel-hacking/ | |
| (must be built as "make {htmldocs | psdocs | pdfdocs}) | |
| Keywords: HOWTO, kernel contexts, deadlock, locking, modules, | |
| symbols, return conventions. | |
| Description: From the Introduction: "Please understand that I | |
| never wanted to write this document, being grossly underqualified, | |
| but I always wanted to read it, and this was the only way. I | |
| simply explain some best practices, and give reading entry-points | |
| into the kernel sources. I avoid implementation details: that's | |
| what the code is for, and I ignore whole tracts of useful | |
| routines. This document assumes familiarity with C, and an | |
| understanding of what the kernel is, and how it is used. It was | |
| originally written for the 2.3 kernels, but nearly all of it | |
| applies to 2.2 too; 2.0 is slightly different". | |
| * Title: "Writing an ALSA Driver" | |
| Author: Takashi Iwai <tiwai@suse.de> | |
| URL: http://www.alsa-project.org/~iwai/writing-an-alsa-driver/index.html | |
| Keywords: ALSA, sound, soundcard, driver, lowlevel, hardware. | |
| Description: Advanced Linux Sound Architecture for developers, | |
| both at kernel and user-level sides. ALSA is the Linux kernel | |
| sound architecture in the 2.6 kernel version. | |
| * Title: "Programming Guide for Linux USB Device Drivers" | |
| Author: Detlef Fliegl. | |
| URL: http://usb.in.tum.de/usbdoc/ | |
| Keywords: USB, universal serial bus. | |
| Description: A must-read. From the Preface: "This document should | |
| give detailed information about the current state of the USB | |
| subsystem and its API for USB device drivers. The first section | |
| will deal with the basics of USB devices. You will learn about | |
| different types of devices and their properties. Going into detail | |
| you will see how USB devices communicate on the bus. The second | |
| section gives an overview of the Linux USB subsystem [2] and the | |
| device driver framework. Then the API and its data structures will | |
| be explained step by step. The last section of this document | |
| contains a reference of all API calls and their return codes". | |
| Notes: Beware: the main page states: "This document may not be | |
| published, printed or used in excerpts without explicit permission | |
| of the author". Fortunately, it may still be read... | |
| * Title: "Tour Of the Linux Kernel Source" | |
| Author: Vijo Cherian. | |
| URL: http://www.geocities.com/vijoc/tolks/tolks.html | |
| Keywords: . | |
| Description: A classic of this page! Was lost for a while and is | |
| back again. Thanks Vijo! TOLKS: the name says it all. A tour of | |
| the sources, describing directories, files, variables, data | |
| structures... It covers general stuff, device drivers, | |
| filesystems, IPC and Networking Code. | |
| * Title: "Linux Kernel Mailing List Glossary" | |
| Author: various | |
| URL: http://kernelnewbies.org/glossary/ | |
| Keywords: glossary, terms, linux-kernel. | |
| Description: From the introduction: "This glossary is intended as | |
| a brief description of some of the acronyms and terms you may hear | |
| during discussion of the Linux kernel". | |
| * Title: "Linux Kernel Locking HOWTO" | |
| Author: Various Talented People, and Rusty. | |
| Location: in kernel tree, Documentation/DocBook/kernel-locking/ | |
| (must be built as "make {htmldocs | psdocs | pdfdocs}) | |
| Keywords: locks, locking, spinlock, semaphore, atomic, race | |
| condition, bottom halves, tasklets, softirqs. | |
| Description: The title says it all: document describing the | |
| locking system in the Linux Kernel either in uniprocessor or SMP | |
| systems. | |
| Notes: "It was originally written for the later (>2.3.47) 2.3 | |
| kernels, but most of it applies to 2.2 too; 2.0 is slightly | |
| different". Freely redistributable under the conditions of the GNU | |
| General Public License. | |
| * Title: "Porting Linux 2.0 Drivers To Linux 2.2: Changes and New | |
| Features " | |
| Author: Alan Cox. | |
| URL: http://www.linux-mag.com/1999-05/gear_01.html | |
| Keywords: ports, porting. | |
| Description: Article from Linux Magazine on porting from 2.0 to | |
| 2.2 kernels. | |
| * Title: "Porting Device Drivers To Linux 2.2: part II" | |
| Author: Alan Cox. | |
| URL: http://www.linux-mag.com/1999-06/gear_01.html | |
| Keywords: ports, porting. | |
| Description: Second part on porting from 2.0 to 2.2 kernels. | |
| * Title: "How To Make Sure Your Driver Will Work On The Power | |
| Macintosh" | |
| Author: Paul Mackerras. | |
| URL: http://www.linux-mag.com/1999-07/gear_01.html | |
| Keywords: Mac, Power Macintosh, porting, drivers, compatibility. | |
| Description: The title says it all. | |
| * Title: "An Introduction to SCSI Drivers" | |
| Author: Alan Cox. | |
| URL: http://www.linux-mag.com/1999-08/gear_01.html | |
| Keywords: SCSI, device, driver. | |
| Description: The title says it all. | |
| * Title: "Advanced SCSI Drivers And Other Tales" | |
| Author: Alan Cox. | |
| URL: http://www.linux-mag.com/1999-09/gear_01.html | |
| Keywords: SCSI, device, driver, advanced. | |
| Description: The title says it all. | |
| * Title: "Writing Linux Mouse Drivers" | |
| Author: Alan Cox. | |
| URL: http://www.linux-mag.com/1999-10/gear_01.html | |
| Keywords: mouse, driver, gpm. | |
| Description: The title says it all. | |
| * Title: "More on Mouse Drivers" | |
| Author: Alan Cox. | |
| URL: http://www.linux-mag.com/1999-11/gear_01.html | |
| Keywords: mouse, driver, gpm, races, asynchronous I/O. | |
| Description: The title still says it all. | |
| * Title: "Writing Video4linux Radio Driver" | |
| Author: Alan Cox. | |
| URL: http://www.linux-mag.com/1999-12/gear_01.html | |
| Keywords: video4linux, driver, radio, radio devices. | |
| Description: The title says it all. | |
| * Title: "Video4linux Drivers, Part 1: Video-Capture Device" | |
| Author: Alan Cox. | |
| URL: http://www.linux-mag.com/2000-01/gear_01.html | |
| Keywords: video4linux, driver, video capture, capture devices, | |
| camera driver. | |
| Description: The title says it all. | |
| * Title: "Video4linux Drivers, Part 2: Video-capture Devices" | |
| Author: Alan Cox. | |
| URL: http://www.linux-mag.com/2000-02/gear_01.html | |
| Keywords: video4linux, driver, video capture, capture devices, | |
| camera driver, control, query capabilities, capability, facility. | |
| Description: The title says it all. | |
| * Title: "PCI Management in Linux 2.2" | |
| Author: Alan Cox. | |
| URL: http://www.linux-mag.com/2000-03/gear_01.html | |
| Keywords: PCI, bus, bus-mastering. | |
| Description: The title says it all. | |
| * Title: "Linux 2.4 Kernel Internals" | |
| Author: Tigran Aivazian and Christoph Hellwig. | |
| URL: http://www.moses.uklinux.net/patches/lki.html | |
| Keywords: Linux, kernel, booting, SMB boot, VFS, page cache. | |
| Description: A little book used for a short training course. | |
| Covers building the kernel image, booting (including SMP bootup), | |
| process management, VFS and more. | |
| * Title: "Linux IP Networking. A Guide to the Implementation and | |
| Modification of the Linux Protocol Stack." | |
| Author: Glenn Herrin. | |
| URL: | |
| http://kernelnewbies.org/documents/ipnetworking/linuxipnetworking. | |
| html | |
| Keywords: network, networking, protocol, IP, UDP, TCP, connection, | |
| socket, receiving, transmitting, forwarding, routing, packets, | |
| modules, /proc, sk_buff, FIB, tags. | |
| Description: Excellent paper devoted to the Linux IP Networking, | |
| explaining anything from the kernel's to the user space | |
| configuration tools' code. Very good to get a general overview of | |
| the kernel networking implementation and understand all steps | |
| packets follow from the time they are received at the network | |
| device till they are delivered to applications. The studied kernel | |
| code is from 2.2.14 version. Provides code for a working packet | |
| dropper example. | |
| * Title: "Get those boards talking under Linux." | |
| Author: Alex Ivchenko. | |
| URL: http://www.edn.com/article/CA46968.html | |
| Keywords: data-acquisition boards, drivers, modules, interrupts, | |
| memory allocation. | |
| Description: Article written for people wishing to make their data | |
| acquisition boards work on their GNU/Linux machines. Gives a basic | |
| overview on writing drivers, from the naming of functions to | |
| interrupt handling. | |
| Notes: Two-parts article. Part II is at | |
| URL: http://www.edn.com/article/CA46998.html | |
| * Title: "Linux PCMCIA Programmer's Guide" | |
| Author: David Hinds. | |
| URL: http://pcmcia-cs.sourceforge.net/ftp/doc/PCMCIA-PROG.html | |
| Keywords: PCMCIA. | |
| Description: "This document describes how to write kernel device | |
| drivers for the Linux PCMCIA Card Services interface. It also | |
| describes how to write user-mode utilities for communicating with | |
| Card Services. | |
| * Title: "The Linux Kernel NFSD Implementation" | |
| Author: Neil Brown. | |
| URL: | |
| http://www.cse.unsw.edu.au/~neilb/oss/linux-commentary/nfsd.html | |
| Keywords: knfsd, nfsd, NFS, RPC, lockd, mountd, statd. | |
| Description: The title says it all. | |
| Notes: Covers knfsd's version 1.4.7 (patch against 2.2.7 kernel). | |
| * Title: "A Linux vm README" | |
| Author: Kanoj Sarcar. | |
| URL: http://reality.sgi.com/kanoj_engr/vm229.html | |
| Keywords: virtual memory, mm, pgd, vma, page, page flags, page | |
| cache, swap cache, kswapd. | |
| Description: Telegraphic, short descriptions and definitions | |
| relating the Linux virtual memory implementation. | |
| * Title: "(nearly) Complete Linux Loadable Kernel Modules. The | |
| definitive guide for hackers, virus coders and system | |
| administrators." | |
| Author: pragmatic/THC. | |
| URL: http://packetstormsecurity.org/docs/hack/LKM_HACKING.html | |
| Keywords: syscalls, intercept, hide, abuse, symbol table. | |
| Description: Interesting paper on how to abuse the Linux kernel in | |
| order to intercept and modify syscalls, make | |
| files/directories/processes invisible, become root, hijack ttys, | |
| write kernel modules based virus... and solutions for admins to | |
| avoid all those abuses. | |
| Notes: For 2.0.x kernels. Gives guidances to port it to 2.2.x | |
| kernels. | |
| BOOKS: (Not on-line) | |
| * Title: "Linux Device Drivers" | |
| Author: Alessandro Rubini. | |
| Publisher: O'Reilly & Associates. | |
| Date: 1998. | |
| Pages: 439. | |
| ISBN: 1-56592-292-1 | |
| * Title: "Linux Device Drivers, 2nd Edition" | |
| Author: Alessandro Rubini and Jonathan Corbet. | |
| Publisher: O'Reilly & Associates. | |
| Date: 2001. | |
| Pages: 586. | |
| ISBN: 0-59600-008-1 | |
| Notes: Further information in | |
| http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/linuxdrive2/ | |
| * Title: "Linux Device Drivers, 3nd Edition" | |
| Authors: Jonathan Corbet, Alessandro Rubini, and Greg Kroah-Hartman | |
| Publisher: O'Reilly & Associates. | |
| Date: 2005. | |
| Pages: 636. | |
| ISBN: 0-596-00590-3 | |
| Notes: Further information in | |
| http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/linuxdrive3/ | |
| PDF format, URL: http://lwn.net/Kernel/LDD3/ | |
| * Title: "Linux Kernel Internals" | |
| Author: Michael Beck. | |
| Publisher: Addison-Wesley. | |
| Date: 1997. | |
| ISBN: 0-201-33143-8 (second edition) | |
| * Title: "The Design of the UNIX Operating System" | |
| Author: Maurice J. Bach. | |
| Publisher: Prentice Hall. | |
| Date: 1986. | |
| Pages: 471. | |
| ISBN: 0-13-201757-1 | |
| * Title: "The Design and Implementation of the 4.3 BSD UNIX | |
| Operating System" | |
| Author: Samuel J. Leffler, Marshall Kirk McKusick, Michael J. | |
| Karels, John S. Quarterman. | |
| Publisher: Addison-Wesley. | |
| Date: 1989 (reprinted with corrections on October, 1990). | |
| ISBN: 0-201-06196-1 | |
| * Title: "The Design and Implementation of the 4.4 BSD UNIX | |
| Operating System" | |
| Author: Marshall Kirk McKusick, Keith Bostic, Michael J. Karels, | |
| John S. Quarterman. | |
| Publisher: Addison-Wesley. | |
| Date: 1996. | |
| ISBN: 0-201-54979-4 | |
| * Title: "Programmation Linux 2.0 API systeme et fonctionnement du | |
| noyau" | |
| Author: Remy Card, Eric Dumas, Franck Mevel. | |
| Publisher: Eyrolles. | |
| Date: 1997. | |
| Pages: 520. | |
| ISBN: 2-212-08932-5 | |
| Notes: French. | |
| * Title: "The Linux Kernel Book" | |
| Author: Remy Card, Eric Dumas, Franck Mevel. | |
| Publisher: John Wiley & Sons. | |
| Date: 1998. | |
| ISBN: 0-471-98141-9 | |
| Notes: English translation. | |
| * Title: "Linux 2.0" | |
| Author: Remy Card, Eric Dumas, Franck Mevel. | |
| Publisher: Gestión 2000. | |
| Date: 1997. | |
| Pages: 501. | |
| ISBN: 8-480-88208-5 | |
| Notes: Spanish translation. | |
| * Title: "Unix internals -- the new frontiers" | |
| Author: Uresh Vahalia. | |
| Publisher: Prentice Hall. | |
| Date: 1996. | |
| Pages: 600. | |
| ISBN: 0-13-101908-2 | |
| * Title: "Linux Core Kernel Commentary. Guide to Insider's Knowledge | |
| on the Core Kernel of the Linux Code" | |
| Author: Scott Maxwell. | |
| Publisher: Coriolis. | |
| Date: 1999. | |
| Pages: 592. | |
| ISBN: 1-57610-469-9 | |
| Notes: CD-ROM included. Line by line commentary of the kernel | |
| code. | |
| * Title: "Linux IP Stacks Commentary" | |
| Author: Stephen Satchell and HBJ Clifford. | |
| Publisher: Coriolis. | |
| Date: 2000. | |
| Pages: ???. | |
| ISBN: 1-57610-470-2 | |
| Notes: Line by line source code commentary book. | |
| * Title: "Programming for the real world - POSIX.4" | |
| Author: Bill O. Gallmeister. | |
| Publisher: O'Reilly & Associates, Inc.. | |
| Date: 1995. | |
| Pages: ???. | |
| ISBN: I-56592-074-0 | |
| Notes: Though not being directly about Linux, Linux aims to be | |
| POSIX. Good reference. | |
| * Title: "Understanding the Linux Kernel" | |
| Author: Daniel P. Bovet and Marco Cesati. | |
| Publisher: O'Reilly & Associates, Inc.. | |
| Date: 2000. | |
| Pages: 702. | |
| ISBN: 0-596-00002-2 | |
| Notes: Further information in | |
| http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/linuxkernel/ | |
| MISCELLANEOUS: | |
| * Name: linux/Documentation | |
| Author: Many. | |
| URL: Just look inside your kernel sources. | |
| Keywords: anything, DocBook. | |
| Description: Documentation that comes with the kernel sources, | |
| inside the Documentation directory. Some pages from this document | |
| (including this document itself) have been moved there, and might | |
| be more up to date than the web version. | |
| * Name: "Linux Source Driver" | |
| URL: http://lsd.linux.cz | |
| Keywords: Browsing source code. | |
| Description: "Linux Source Driver (LSD) is an application, which | |
| can make browsing source codes of Linux kernel easier than you can | |
| imagine. You can select between multiple versions of kernel (e.g. | |
| 0.01, 1.0.0, 2.0.33, 2.0.34pre13, 2.0.0, 2.1.101 etc.). With LSD | |
| you can search Linux kernel (fulltext, macros, types, functions | |
| and variables) and LSD can generate patches for you on the fly | |
| (files, directories or kernel)". | |
| * Name: "Linux Kernel Source Reference" | |
| Author: Thomas Graichen. | |
| URL: http://innominate.org/~graichen/projects/lksr/ | |
| Keywords: CVS, web, cvsweb, browsing source code. | |
| Description: Web interface to a CVS server with the kernel | |
| sources. "Here you can have a look at any file of the Linux kernel | |
| sources of any version starting from 1.0 up to the (daily updated) | |
| current version available. Also you can check the differences | |
| between two versions of a file". | |
| * Name: "Cross-Referencing Linux" | |
| URL: http://lxr.linux.no/source/ | |
| Keywords: Browsing source code. | |
| Description: Another web-based Linux kernel source code browser. | |
| Lots of cross references to variables and functions. You can see | |
| where they are defined and where they are used. | |
| * Name: "Linux Weekly News" | |
| URL: http://lwn.net | |
| Keywords: latest kernel news. | |
| Description: The title says it all. There's a fixed kernel section | |
| summarizing developers' work, bug fixes, new features and versions | |
| produced during the week. Published every Thursday. | |
| * Name: "Kernel Traffic" | |
| URL: http://www.kerneltraffic.org/kernel-traffic/ | |
| Keywords: linux-kernel mailing list, weekly kernel news. | |
| Description: Weekly newsletter covering the most relevant | |
| discussions of the linux-kernel mailing list. | |
| * Name: "CuTTiNG.eDGe.LiNuX" | |
| URL: http://edge.kernelnotes.org | |
| Keywords: changelist. | |
| Description: Site which provides the changelist for every kernel | |
| release. What's new, what's better, what's changed. Myrdraal reads | |
| the patches and describes them. Pointers to the patches are there, | |
| too. | |
| * Name: "New linux-kernel Mailing List FAQ" | |
| URL: http://www.tux.org/lkml/ | |
| Keywords: linux-kernel mailing list FAQ. | |
| Description: linux-kernel is a mailing list for developers to | |
| communicate. This FAQ builds on the previous linux-kernel mailing | |
| list FAQ maintained by Frohwalt Egerer, who no longer maintains | |
| it. Read it to see how to join the mailing list. Dozens of | |
| interesting questions regarding the list, Linux, developers (who | |
| is ...?), terms (what is...?) are answered here too. Just read it. | |
| * Name: "Linux Virtual File System" | |
| Author: Peter J. Braam. | |
| URL: http://www.coda.cs.cmu.edu/doc/talks/linuxvfs/ | |
| Keywords: slides, VFS, inode, superblock, dentry, dcache. | |
| Description: Set of slides, presumably from a presentation on the | |
| Linux VFS layer. Covers version 2.1.x, with dentries and the | |
| dcache. | |
| * Name: "Gary's Encyclopedia - The Linux Kernel" | |
| Author: Gary (I suppose...). | |
| URL: http://members.aa.net/~swear/pedia/kernel.html | |
| Keywords: links, not found here?. | |
| Description: Gary's Encyclopedia exists to allow the rapid finding | |
| of documentation and other information of interest to GNU/Linux | |
| users. It has about 4000 links to external pages in 150 major | |
| categories. This link is for kernel-specific links, documents, | |
| sites... Look there if you could not find here what you were | |
| looking for. | |
| * Name: "The home page of Linux-MM" | |
| Author: The Linux-MM team. | |
| URL: http://linux-mm.org/ | |
| Keywords: memory management, Linux-MM, mm patches, TODO, docs, | |
| mailing list. | |
| Description: Site devoted to Linux Memory Management development. | |
| Memory related patches, HOWTOs, links, mm developers... Don't miss | |
| it if you are interested in memory management development! | |
| * Name: "Kernel Newbies IRC Channel" | |
| URL: http://www.kernelnewbies.org | |
| Keywords: IRC, newbies, channel, asking doubts. | |
| Description: #kernelnewbies on irc.openprojects.net. From the web | |
| page: "#kernelnewbies is an IRC network dedicated to the 'newbie' | |
| kernel hacker. The audience mostly consists of people who are | |
| learning about the kernel, working on kernel projects or | |
| professional kernel hackers that want to help less seasoned kernel | |
| people. [...] #kernelnewbies is on the Open Projects IRC Network, | |
| try irc.openprojects.net or irc.<country>.openprojects.net as your | |
| server and then /join #kernelnewbies". It also hosts articles, | |
| documents, FAQs... | |
| * Name: "linux-kernel mailing list archives and search engines" | |
| URL: http://vger.kernel.org/vger-lists.html | |
| URL: http://www.uwsg.indiana.edu/hypermail/linux/kernel/index.html | |
| URL: http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=linux-kernel | |
| URL: http://groups.google.com/group/mlist.linux.kernel | |
| URL: http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/linux/linux-kernel/ | |
| URL: http://www.lib.uaa.alaska.edu/linux-kernel/ | |
| Keywords: linux-kernel, archives, search. | |
| Description: Some of the linux-kernel mailing list archivers. If | |
| you have a better/another one, please let me know. | |
| _________________________________________________________________ | |
| Document last updated on Sat 2005-NOV-19 |