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1 | 8: FOR MORE INFORMATION |
2 | ||
3 | There are numerous sources of information on Linux kernel development and | |
4 | related topics. First among those will always be the Documentation | |
5 | directory found in the kernel source distribution. The top-level HOWTO | |
6 | file is an important starting point; SubmittingPatches and | |
7 | SubmittingDrivers are also something which all kernel developers should | |
8 | read. Many internal kernel APIs are documented using the kerneldoc | |
9 | mechanism; "make htmldocs" or "make pdfdocs" can be used to generate those | |
10 | documents in HTML or PDF format (though the version of TeX shipped by some | |
11 | distributions runs into internal limits and fails to process the documents | |
12 | properly). | |
13 | ||
14 | Various web sites discuss kernel development at all levels of detail. Your | |
15 | author would like to humbly suggest http://lwn.net/ as a source; | |
16 | information on many specific kernel topics can be found via the LWN kernel | |
17 | index at: | |
18 | ||
19 | http://lwn.net/Kernel/Index/ | |
20 | ||
21 | Beyond that, a valuable resource for kernel developers is: | |
22 | ||
23 | http://kernelnewbies.org/ | |
24 | ||
25 | Information about the linux-next tree gathers at: | |
26 | ||
27 | http://linux.f-seidel.de/linux-next/pmwiki/ | |
28 | ||
29 | And, of course, one should not forget http://kernel.org/, the definitive | |
30 | location for kernel release information. | |
31 | ||
32 | There are a number of books on kernel development: | |
33 | ||
34 | Linux Device Drivers, 3rd Edition (Jonathan Corbet, Alessandro | |
35 | Rubini, and Greg Kroah-Hartman). Online at | |
36 | http://lwn.net/Kernel/LDD3/. | |
37 | ||
38 | Linux Kernel Development (Robert Love). | |
39 | ||
40 | Understanding the Linux Kernel (Daniel Bovet and Marco Cesati). | |
41 | ||
42 | All of these books suffer from a common fault, though: they tend to be | |
43 | somewhat obsolete by the time they hit the shelves, and they have been on | |
44 | the shelves for a while now. Still, there is quite a bit of good | |
45 | information to be found there. | |
46 | ||
47 | Documentation for git can be found at: | |
48 | ||
49 | http://www.kernel.org/pub/software/scm/git/docs/ | |
50 | ||
51 | http://www.kernel.org/pub/software/scm/git/docs/user-manual.html | |
52 | ||
53 | ||
54 | 9: CONCLUSION | |
55 | ||
56 | Congratulations to anybody who has made it through this long-winded | |
57 | document. Hopefully it has provided a helpful understanding of how the | |
58 | Linux kernel is developed and how you can participate in that process. | |
59 | ||
60 | In the end, it's the participation that matters. Any open source software | |
61 | project is no more than the sum of what its contributors put into it. The | |
62 | Linux kernel has progressed as quickly and as well as it has because it has | |
63 | been helped by an impressively large group of developers, all of whom are | |
64 | working to make it better. The kernel is a premier example of what can be | |
65 | done when thousands of people work together toward a common goal. | |
66 | ||
67 | The kernel can always benefit from a larger developer base, though. There | |
68 | is always more work to do. But, just as importantly, most other | |
69 | participants in the Linux ecosystem can benefit through contributing to the | |
70 | kernel. Getting code into the mainline is the key to higher code quality, | |
71 | lower maintenance and distribution costs, a higher level of influence over | |
72 | the direction of kernel development, and more. It is a situation where | |
73 | everybody involved wins. Fire up your editor and come join us; you will be | |
74 | more than welcome. |