Recommendations for General Linux Overview? Courses/Videos/Manuals?

knewyousir · 2018-05-03 04:16:55

Hi all.

So through a lot of trial and error, and a lot of copying commands from various online sources, I got Arch working pretty nicely on my system.
It is glorious and beautiful and I am in love with it. I hope to be able to contribute to the code-base someday (have been learning c/c++ for awhile now).

Trouble is, I still don't feel all that comfortable with what is going on under the hood.

For example, I don't fully understand the concept of "the kernel", how mkinitcpio works, what really goes on during the bootstrapping process, how the system decides what to mount where, etc.

Are there any resources that you can recommend that will give a good overview of these types of topics? They don't necessarily have to be arch specific.

I don't mind reading technical documentation but sometimes I feel like have trouble getting the major concepts because the writers are focusing on "the trees" rather than "the forest".

Thanks!

Last edited by knewyousir (2018-05-03 04:17:09)

jasonwryan · 2018-05-03 04:54:05

Every major wiki page has a section at the bottom for more resources. Reading the page and then some of those links is a good place to start.

knewyousir · 2018-05-03 06:58:08

jasonwryan wrote:

Every major wiki page has a section at the bottom for more resources. Reading the page and then some of those links is a good place to start.

Anything more general and 'overview-ish' than that?
I feel like the arch wiki is a little more "the trees" than "the forest" when explaining what linux is doing...

jasonwryan · 2018-05-03 07:03:40

knewyousir wrote:

For example, I don't fully understand the concept of "the kernel", how mkinitcpio works, what really goes on during the bootstrapping process, how the system decides what to mount where, etc.

These are all "tree" topics, and can best be broached via the wiki (the kernel may be more of the forest type, though). I'm not aware of a good overview; most people I know just dive in to an area they are interested in and rabbit hole from there.

liara · 2018-05-03 07:13:49

Maybe you're looking for a course like this https://www.edx.org/course/introduction … -lfs101x-1?

ngoonee · 2018-05-03 07:18:46

jasonwryan wrote:

knewyousir wrote:
For example, I don't fully understand the concept of "the kernel", how mkinitcpio works, what really goes on during the bootstrapping process, how the system decides what to mount where, etc.
These are all "tree" topics, and can best be broached via the wiki (the kernel may be more of the forest type, though). I'm not aware of a good overview; most people I know just dive in to an area they are interested in and rabbit hole from there.

This needs emphasizing, the quickest way is to dive in to ONE specific part and branch out (slightly) from there, just enough to be useful.

Having an 'overview' of Linux isn't a very reasonable task if you actually want to contribute anywhere, for pretty much the same reason the CEO of a large MNC doesn't normally know what his downstream employees actually do on a daily basis.

frostschutz · 2018-05-03 08:01:24

Regarding initramfs (which mkinitcpio produces one flavor of), there is https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Custom_Initramfs which explains what it is and how to build one from scratch. You can ignore the Gentoo specific bits.

mkinitcpio is one way to automate that process (and you can read its code too), pretty much every distro has their own take on how initramfs should work.

If you are comfortable setting up a VM in Virtualbox or KVM, you could also go through one iteration of http://www.linuxfromscratch.org - Well, I did that years and years ago on real hardware (my main machine too) but it was too painful to keep around. I'm not familiar with the state of LFS nowadays but back then, it was a great learning experience that helped me understand the deeper-downs of a Linux system, and in a VM that does not affect your everday operation, you could go through it at your own pace and not suffer a machine that you can no longer work with until you fix it.

Last edited by frostschutz (2018-05-03 08:05:23)

Mr.Elendig · 2018-05-03 09:17:17

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Initial_ramdisk

liara · 2018-05-03 10:01:37

https://www.ibm.com/developerworks/library/l-linuxboot/

Trilby · 2018-05-03 11:14:23

There is no forest as a distinct entity. A forest is a collection of trees. If you understand a handful of trees, you understand a small forest. As you learn about more trees, you understand a larger forest. People who learn about the forest first are just being lied to (often they are lying to themselves).

Unlx/Linux is a collection of individual bits of software where one of the primary unifying ideas is that they should all work together through a few standard input/output methods. Originally these were mostly just text streams. Now there are some fancier communication methods, but each of these are implemented by the individual bits of software (the trees). So learn about each bit of software and how it communicates or interacts with other bits of software. From there the big picture emerges on how they can be used together and how you can change the functioning of "the forest" by replacing a single tree.

Last edited by Trilby (2018-05-03 11:17:35)

drcouzelis · 2018-05-03 13:10:51

knewyousir wrote:

For example, I don't fully understand the concept of "the kernel", how mkinitcpio works, what really goes on during the bootstrapping process, how the system decides what to mount where, etc.

Oh. Wow. When you asked for a "general Linux overview" I figured you were like me when I started using Linux...

"WHERE THE HECK IS THE C DRIVE???"

I'm serious. It took me forever to understand how drives worked in Linux.

dockland · 2018-05-03 14:42:05

I can recommend installing Gentoo Linux and read along while installing, the Gentoo Handbook is kind of deep and like Arch Linux has a lot of sub sections if you want to dig deeper. Linux From Scratch probably is educating as well, i'm going to try LFS sometime.

One trick i use is never ever copy and paste stuff, not during installation or when running and maintaining my installations.

Arch Linux it self is a great start, and is extremely quick and easy to install (and maintain) and if you have it to test in a VM you soon figure out the different parts of installation and maintaining. But, for me Gentoo kernel-insight and customization is a deal breaker.

seth · 2018-05-03 14:50:02

https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss … or+dummies

Arch Linux

#1 2018-05-03 04:16:55

Recommendations for General Linux Overview? Courses/Videos/Manuals?

#2 2018-05-03 04:54:05

Re: Recommendations for General Linux Overview? Courses/Videos/Manuals?

#3 2018-05-03 06:58:08

Re: Recommendations for General Linux Overview? Courses/Videos/Manuals?

#4 2018-05-03 07:03:40

Re: Recommendations for General Linux Overview? Courses/Videos/Manuals?

#5 2018-05-03 07:13:49

Re: Recommendations for General Linux Overview? Courses/Videos/Manuals?

#6 2018-05-03 07:18:46

Re: Recommendations for General Linux Overview? Courses/Videos/Manuals?

#7 2018-05-03 08:01:24

Re: Recommendations for General Linux Overview? Courses/Videos/Manuals?

#8 2018-05-03 09:17:17

Re: Recommendations for General Linux Overview? Courses/Videos/Manuals?

#9 2018-05-03 10:01:37

Re: Recommendations for General Linux Overview? Courses/Videos/Manuals?

#10 2018-05-03 11:14:23

Re: Recommendations for General Linux Overview? Courses/Videos/Manuals?

#11 2018-05-03 13:10:51

Re: Recommendations for General Linux Overview? Courses/Videos/Manuals?

#12 2018-05-03 14:42:05

Re: Recommendations for General Linux Overview? Courses/Videos/Manuals?

#13 2018-05-03 14:50:02

Re: Recommendations for General Linux Overview? Courses/Videos/Manuals?

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