Linux Developer Network - Featured Articles

Stable Userspace Driver API

Mon, 23 Jul 2007 15:46:42 +0000

“The stable driver API was already announced a year ago by Greg Kroah-Hartman. Now the last patches where uploaded and the API was included in Linus’ tree. The idea of the API is to make life easier for driver developers:

This interface allows the ability to write the majority of a driver in userspace with only a very small shell of a driver in the kernel itself. It uses a char device and sysfs to interact with a userspace process to process interrupts and control memory accesses.”

Anatomy of the Linux Kernel

Thu, 19 Jul 2007 00:04:26 +0000

Great article from IBM DeveloperWorks on the kernel and how it’s structured.

As Michael Dolan points out, it’s the number one most read article on DeveloperWorks for June. Further proof that for developers, Linux is the platform of choice and one that is gaining even more momentum at the expense of some other proprietary platforms who shall remain nameless. Or so says Infoworld and Evans Data.

Analyst Report: New LF Testing Standards May Accelerate Linux Data Center Growth

Sat, 14 Apr 2007 19:27:33 +0000

Nice reaction from our press release on the LSB update and new testing tools available here. My favorite from SearchEnterpriseLinux:

According to a report from Saugatuck Technology Inc., new testing standards contained in the latest version of the Linux Standard Base (LSB) server specification could boost the confidence of IT managers looking to integrate Linux applications into their data centers.

The research report is titled: New Testing Standards May Accelerate Linux Data Center Growth

Interrupt Management in Linux

Fri, 30 Mar 2007 19:24:08 +0000

From Dr Dobbs: “Bill Gatliff provides a walkthrough of the portions of the Linux kernel that manage interrupts and describes how Linux interacts with interrupt controllers and how to adapt code for custom hardware.”

Java 2007: Year in Preview from IBM DeveloperWorks

Sat, 17 Mar 2007 02:14:43 +0000

IBM DeveloperWorks has a nice round up of the last and coming years for Java. Highlights:
Before 2007 is half up, Sun will release the Java Development Kit (JDK) under an open source license. Freeing the JDK is a huge step for the Java developer community, and it will drive the evolution of the Java platform for the next decade.

Expect the quality of the JDK to improve dramatically as programmers stop merely reporting bugs and start fixing them. Bug reports at the Java Developer Connection will include detailed analysis of what’s broken in the JDK and provide patches for fixing it. As Linus’s Law states, “Given enough eyeballs, all bugs are shallow.” That is, debugging is parallelizable. The same is true of optimization. Open source makes both massively parallelizable.

Migrating to Linux?

Fri, 16 Mar 2007 22:23:40 +0000

While we have a lot of information on our developer site about writing Linux appliations, our member IBM has a nice migration station available on DeveloperWorks.

If you’re currently porting to Linux, let us know what types of information/support would be most helpful. One of the LF’s main goals is to increase the number of applications on Linux.

LSB Distribution Testing — How To

Mon, 26 Feb 2007 19:27:04 +0000

Jeff Licquia writes up how to test a distribution in this blog post.

Mono brings Visual Basic Programming to Linux

Fri, 23 Feb 2007 22:37:42 +0000

Say what you will about Visual Basic, but many people (especially in enterprises) use it for developing applications. Anything that results in more applications on Linux is a good thing. Read the news of the new compiler brought to us by Novell.

“From its inception, the Mono project has focused on creating a development framework that allows .NET software to run across all the leading server and client platforms” stated Miguel de Icaza, vice president of developer platforms at Novell and founder of the Mono project. “The delivery of the Visual Basic compiler is a key step forward in this process. Now, developers do not need any Linux expertise to create applications that will run easily on Linux.”

Installation directories

Mon, 18 Dec 2006 17:01:56 +0000

The Filesystem Hierarchy Standard (FHS) is part of the Linux Standard Base (LSB) specifications, and does a pretty good job of laying out where software should be installed, depending on whether the files are coming from the distribution vendor, ISV, or they’re installed by the local admin.

For instance, distributions should install software under /usr. If you’re administering a Linux system and want to install packages from source, they should be installed under /usr/local, and ISVs should install software under /opt.

But, there are times when it’s not crystal clear where software should be installed. For example, where do browser plugins live? This topic came up recently on the lsb-discuss mailing list.

If you’re confused by the finer details of the FHS, there’s also a fhs-discuss mailing list for questions about the FHS, and you might also be able to find good tips in the fhs-discuss archive.

Using the Linux Developer Network

Sun, 17 Dec 2006 21:26:35 +0000

If this is your first time thinking about certifying for the Linux Standard Base (LSB), you probably want to start with this tutorial, which appeared on IBM developerWorks, and Novell’s “Understanding and Using the Linux Standard Base,” which should provide a good overview of the importance of certifying against the LSB and how to do so.

If you are looking for more specific information, such as answers to frequently asked questions (FAQs) about the LSB, or what specifications comprise the LSB, you should browse the LDN and our Link Directory.

We’re still busy building the link directory, so feel free to sign up to add links using your del.icio.us account, or just use the form to submit one link at a time. If you’ve written anything on Linux development and/or LSB certification, be sure to submit that as well.

Do you have questions about the LSB, and can’t find the answers via LDN? Leave a comment here, and we’ll add the questions to our FAQ and try to address them on the LDN blog or FAQ as they arise.

If you need more immediate help, you might want to subscribe to the lsb-discuss mailing list. The lsb-discuss list is a moderate-traffic list where developers can discuss the ins and outs of the LSB with other developers.