Linux Insides

by penguin_booze on 5/14/2022, 1:50 PM with 26 comments
  • by mdp2021 on 5/14/2022, 5:16 PM

    I am only at the first page, but already I must recommend this work

    https://0xax.gitbooks.io/linux-insides/content/

    as unmissable, and "I should have read this as a child" - that is, for those who feel a lack of solid ground until they know exactly what makes the machine work.

  • by fn-mote on 5/14/2022, 5:12 PM

    I read some of this to try to determine how it would compare to a classic operating systems design book - like maybe "The Design and Implementation of the 4.4 BSD Operating System".

    Looking at the Paging [1] chapter, the _Linux Insides_ book has a clear, very technical, description of the meaning of every bit in pointers used for virtual addressing. It includes details like what bits you need to set in order to enable a particular paging mode, so it's really enough detail to actually _do_ something.

    I don't think I'm the target audience, but it was interesting to look at.

    [1] https://0xax.gitbooks.io/linux-insides/content/Theory/linux-...

  • by agons on 5/14/2022, 5:42 PM

    This looks like a really good resource, but why is it so difficult to find a somewhat up-to-date description of networking in the Linux kernel?

    It seems like the least documented (at a high level, anyway) part of the kernel - if anyone knows a good resource I'd love to hear it.

  • by phendrenad2 on 5/14/2022, 7:08 PM

    This is already outdated, right? Nobody boots up from legacy BIOS anymore, so everything up to and including "transitioning to 64-bit" is wrong. UEFI boot is simpler, but still worth digging into. And what about AARCH64 and other platforms where there are no CPU modes to go through?

  • by wolverine876 on 5/15/2022, 12:05 AM

    Who wrote it? Perhaps everyone already knows them (except me)? What expertise do they have? This Github user shares the same Twitter account:

    https://github.com/0xAX

    And they say they are an "Elixir developer at @travelping":

    https://www.travelping.com/

  • by asicsp on 5/15/2022, 2:50 AM

    Previous discussions:

    "Linux Inside – How the Linux Kernel Works" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14422605 (564 points | May 27, 2017 | 31 comments)

    "Inline assembly in Linux" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11606518 (158 points | May 1, 2016 | 33 comments )

    Full list here: https://hn.algolia.com/?q=0xax+linux+insides

  • by dijksterhuis on 5/14/2022, 8:52 PM

    Anyone else read this title to the tune of "Intel Inside"?

  • by matheusmoreira on 5/14/2022, 7:15 PM

    > The basic usage is the same as other mailing lists powered by mailman.

    Would be nice if this section was more detailed. Mailing lists can be quite confusing for the uninitiated.

  • by ftyhbhyjnjk on 5/14/2022, 5:19 PM

    Holy cow!!! This is amazing. Do you offer training videos also?

  • by bluedays on 5/14/2022, 7:00 PM

    Man I always want to read about this stuff but it always comes across super dull. I really think the standard Computer Science curriculum needs to focus more on writing. Seems to me that if programming is mostly about communication we should focus more on learning to write in a more engaging style.