Linux Device Drivers

Sources for Further Information

Most of the information I provide in this book is extracted directly from the kernel sources. As long as you have them installed in your system, you’ll rarely need other documents to supplement the information. There are a few interesting books out there that can help in writing device drivers, although the main sources of information are the kernel sources and the technical documentation about your devices. Needless to say, you’ll appreciate the manuals that describe your own computer platform.

As far as kernel hacking is concerned, the best information (after the source files) is available on the Internet. Linux Journal also hosts some interesting technical articles. Check the ``Kernel Korner'' column, but skip my own articles, as I tend to repeat myself; non-Kernel Korner articles are interesting as well, but rarely as technical as the average reader of this book will appreciate.

On the Internet, I’d suggest looking in the following places:

http://www.redhat.com:8080/

The ``HyperNews'' server at Red Hat carries the Kernel Hacker’s Guide, an interesting document about the kernel internals. Some of its chapters are quite old, but some have been introduced or updated recently. The material is quite interesting, in my opinion.

http://www.kernel.org/ , ftp://ftp.kernel.org/

This site is the home of Linux kernel development. You’ll find the latest kernel release and related information. Note that the FTP site is mirrored throughout the world, so you’ll most likely find a mirror near you.

ftp://sunsite.unc.edu/pub/Linux/docs/ , ftp://tsx-11.mit.edu/pub/linux/docs/

The ``Linux Documentation Project'' carries a lot of interesting documents called ``HOWTOs''; some of them are pretty technical and cover kernel-related topics. Sunsite and tsx-11 also carry most of the programs available for Linux; they are interesting in general, not only for their docs/ directory. Well, I’m sure you know about these archives already, but I think it’s worth mentioning them.

http://www.ssc.com/

SSC, Specialized System Consultants, are the publishers of Linux Journal, and their site carries the HTML version of most of the articles they’ve published. Any interesting article they print is converted to HTML shortly after publication and is made available on the Web.

http://www.conecta.it/linux/

This Italian site is one of the places where a Linux enthusiast keeps updated information about all the ongoing projects involving Linux. Maybe you already know an interesting site with HTTP links about Linux development; if not, this one is a good starting point.