>From my own studies on kernel design I found limiting to just one kernel is a bad idea. Even if only for a certain part of the kernel. I study every kernel source code I can get my hands on and every theory book I can find. From these I take what I consider to be the best approach to kernel designs. If you want to design and contribute to Linuxs future study Minix, and *BSD, and EROS, and Linux, and the dozens of other free OSs on the web and books. If you only want to know how Linux works, then just memorize /usr/src/linux/* :) On Tuesday 19 March 2002 01:24 am, Andrew Nesbit wrote: > Thanks, Adam for the advice :) > > Yes, I think I will jump straight into the Linux kernel; there are > specific things that I want to accomplish, and as much as I'd /love/ > to spend time studying many different OSes, time doesn't permit that, > unfortunately. > > Anyway, thanks again for you reply :) > > -Andrew > > > On March 18, 2002 08:50, Andrew Nesbit wrote: > > > Hi everybody... this is my first post to kernelnewbies :) > > > > Ahoy hoy! > > > > > I was just wondering if it would be worthwhile for me to study the > > > Minix source before Linux's? Or would I be better off just jumping > > > straight into the deep end and learning Linux straight off? > > > > Pedagogically, Minix is probably easier to learn because its got a book > > based around it. I started to read said book last fall and its a good > > read. If you are interested in learning about operating systems and the > > more modern school of design, Minix would be a good place to start before > > moving on to Mach or Hurd. > > > > If you want to learn something practical or Linux is a specific goal, > > then getting one of the O'Reilly books on the Linux kernel might be more > > practical for you. They too focus on the specific implementation of the > > 2.2 and 2.4 kernels and are good books. Maurice Bach and Kirk McKusick, > > et. al. have also done great (but a little more academic) books on Unix > > operating systems. > > > > Unfortunately, the implementation knowledge is not transferrable. As you > > may know, Linux is a monolithic kernel while Minix is a microkernel. > > They are quite different design philosophies. There's extensive debate > > on which is better and you can even find a Usenet thread where the > > designers of Linux and Minix duked it out as to which one was better. > > > > I'm getting tangential. Study Minix if you want to learn the theory of > > modern operating systems and study Linux if you want to learn about > > modern Unix operating systems. > > > > Systems software is a really exciting field. I hope you find something > > to get you started in it. Good luck! > > -- > Kernelnewbies: Help each other learn about the Linux kernel. > Archive: http://mail.nl.linux.org/kernelnewbies/ > FAQ: http://kernelnewbies.org/faq/ -- Kernelnewbies: Help each other learn about the Linux kernel. Archive: http://mail.nl.linux.org/kernelnewbies/ FAQ: http://kernelnewbies.org/faq/
