Based on kernel version 4.8. Page generated on 2016-10-06 23:10 EST.
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 And, of course, one should not forget http://kernel.org/, the definitive 26 location for kernel release information. 27 28 There are a number of books on kernel development: 29 30 Linux Device Drivers, 3rd Edition (Jonathan Corbet, Alessandro 31 Rubini, and Greg Kroah-Hartman). Online at 32 http://lwn.net/Kernel/LDD3/. 33 34 Linux Kernel Development (Robert Love). 35 36 Understanding the Linux Kernel (Daniel Bovet and Marco Cesati). 37 38 All of these books suffer from a common fault, though: they tend to be 39 somewhat obsolete by the time they hit the shelves, and they have been on 40 the shelves for a while now. Still, there is quite a bit of good 41 information to be found there. 42 43 Documentation for git can be found at: 44 45 http://www.kernel.org/pub/software/scm/git/docs/ 46 47 http://www.kernel.org/pub/software/scm/git/docs/user-manual.html 48 49 50 9: CONCLUSION 51 52 Congratulations to anybody who has made it through this long-winded 53 document. Hopefully it has provided a helpful understanding of how the 54 Linux kernel is developed and how you can participate in that process. 55 56 In the end, it's the participation that matters. Any open source software 57 project is no more than the sum of what its contributors put into it. The 58 Linux kernel has progressed as quickly and as well as it has because it has 59 been helped by an impressively large group of developers, all of whom are 60 working to make it better. The kernel is a premier example of what can be 61 done when thousands of people work together toward a common goal. 62 63 The kernel can always benefit from a larger developer base, though. There 64 is always more work to do. But, just as importantly, most other 65 participants in the Linux ecosystem can benefit through contributing to the 66 kernel. Getting code into the mainline is the key to higher code quality, 67 lower maintenance and distribution costs, a higher level of influence over 68 the direction of kernel development, and more. It is a situation where 69 everybody involved wins. Fire up your editor and come join us; you will be 70 more than welcome.