Submitted by Greg Kroah-Hartman has announced the availability of a Linux Device Driver Kit; a CD image with a copy of the “Linux Device Drivers” book, pre-built copies of all in-kernel docbook documentation, and a copy of the Linux kernel source to build external modules and to take a look at the source. In coordination with the FreedomHEC, the attendees at said conference in Seattle will get a free copy.
I’m guessing that half the information in the DD kit will be obsolete by the time Linux 2.6.17 rolls out.
I’m sorry, didn’t Linus/Greg KH say that there’s no stable kernel API for device drivers?.
It doesn’t mean it will ALL change like that, and kernel releases for the last year or so have been pretty spaced, so I don’t think it’s the problem you’re making it to be.
I think this is great, and eases support for new developers, so please don’t start again the binary or not binary stable or not stable kernel api flamewar again.
Is it possible to write/code something for “X” piece of hardware which would do the following:
1. Evaluate all the hardware in use on a Windows machine/drivers/etc…
2. Create Linux drivers from the information in #1.
Sorry for my lack of understanding, just curious.
No
I think that problem belongs to the class of non-recursively enumerable languages. In other words, no chance in hell.
I have been scanning the internet for quite some time now looking for information about how one would go about using Eclipse, gdb (kgdb), strace, et al to write, debug and profile device drivers (and embedded apps/os). I had hoped upon seeing this kit that it would finally demonstrate how one would setup a complete Eclipse driver dev environment but from looking at the comments by the author I doubt it does. A single comprehensive source of how to go about using an IDE such as Eclipse to write & debug device drivers would go a long long long way it getting more folks into the arena.
I know of a couple commercial offerings that have put all the tools together to do the job but they are very expensive which is a barrier to almost everybody that doesn’t work for a company with deep pockets. I realize that most of the people who do drivers are old-school and just use text editors but the benefits of an IDE were so great for app writers I just cannot believe that those productivity enhancements could not be realized for driver/kernel hacks as well.
If any knowledable folks out there can help out in this area it would be greatly appreciated.