Kaiwan N Billimoria - Hands-On System Programming with Linux: Explore Linux System Programming Interfaces, Theory, and Practice

Copyright 2018 Packt Publishing

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embedded in critical articles or reviews.

Every effort has been made in the preparation of this book to ensure the accuracy of the information presented. However, the information contained in this book is sold without warranty, either express or implied. Neither the author, nor Packt Publishing or its dealers and distributors, will be held liable for any damages caused or alleged to have been caused directly or indirectly by this book.

Packt Publishing has endeavored to provide trademark information about all of the companies and products mentioned in this book by the appropriate use of capitals. However, Packt Publishing cannot guarantee the accuracy of this information.

Commissioning Editor: Gebin George
Acquisition Editor: Rohit Rajkumar
Content Development Editor: Priyanka Deshpande
Technical Editor: Rutuja Patade
Copy Editor: Safis Editing
Project Coordinator: Drashti Panchal
Proofreader: Safis Editing
Indexer: Rekha Nair
Graphics: Tom Scaria
Production Coordinator: Arvindkumar Gupta

First published: October 2018

Production reference: 1311018

Published by Packt Publishing Ltd.
Livery Place
35 Livery Street
Birmingham
B3 2PB, UK.

ISBN 978-1-78899-847-5

www.packtpub.com

Mapt is an online digital library that gives you full access to over 5,000 books and videos, as well as industry leading tools to help you plan your personal development and advance your career. For more information, please visit our website.

• Spend less time learning and more time coding with practical eBooks and Videos from over 4,000 industry professionals

• Improve your learning with Skill Plans built especially for you

• Get a free eBook or video every month

• Mapt is fully searchable

• Copy and paste, print, and bookmark content

Did you know that Packt offers eBook versions of every book published, with PDF and ePub files available? You can upgrade to the eBook version at www.packt.com and as a print book customer, you are entitled to a discount on the eBook copy. Get in touch with us at customercare@packtpub.com for more details.

At www.packt.com , you can also read a collection of free technical articles, sign up for a range of free newsletters, and receive exclusive discounts and offers on Packt books and eBooks.

Kaiwan N Billimoria taught himself programming on his dad's IBM PC back in 1983. He was programming in C and Assembly on DOS until he discovered the joys of Unix (via Richard Steven's iconic book, UNIX Network Programming, and by writing C code on SCO Unix).

Kaiwan has worked on many aspects of the Linux system programming stack, including Bash scripting, system programming in C, kernel internals, and embedded Linux work. He has actively worked on several commercial/OSS projects. His contributions include drivers to the mainline Linux OS, and many smaller projects hosted on GitHub. His Linux passion feeds well into his passion for teaching these topics to engineers, which he has done for over two decades now. It doesn't hurt that he is a recreational ultra-marathoner too.

Tigran Aivazian has a master's degree in computer science and a master's degree in theoretical physics. He has written BFS and Intel microcode update drivers that have become part of the official Linux kernel. He is the author of a book titled Linux 2.4 Kernel Internals, which is available in several languages on the Linux documentation project. He worked at Veritas as a Linux kernel architect, improving the kernel and teaching OS internals. Besides technological pursuits, Tigran has produced scholarly Bible editions in Hebrew, Greek, Syriac, Slavonic, and ancient Armenian. Recently, he published The British Study Edition of the Urantia Papers. He is currently working on the foundations of quantum mechanics in a branch of physics called quantum infodynamics.

If you're interested in becoming an author for Packt, please visit authors.packtpub.com and apply today. We have worked with thousands of developers and tech professionals, just like you, to help them share their insight with the global tech community. You can make a general application, apply for a specific hot topic that we are recruiting an author for, or submit your own idea.

The Linux OS and its embedded and server applications are critical components of today's key software infrastructure in a decentralized and networked universe. Industry demand for proficient Linux developers is ever-increasing. This book aims to give you two things: a solid theoretical base, and practical, industry-relevant informationillustrated by codecovering the Linux system programming domain. This book delves into the art and science of Linux system programming, including system architecture, virtual memory, process memory and management, signaling, timers, multithreading, scheduling, and file I/O.

This book attempts to go beyond the use API X to do Y approach; it takes pains to explain the concepts and theory required to understand the programming interfaces, the design decisions, and trade-offs made by experienced developers when using them and the rationale behind them. Troubleshooting tips and industry best practices round out the book's coverage. By the end of this book, you will have the conceptual knowledge, as well as the hands-on experience, needed for working with Linux system programming interfaces.

Hands-On System Programming with Linux is for Linux professionals: system engineers, programmers, and testers (QA). It's also for students; anyone, really, who wants to go beyond using an API set to understand the theoretical underpinnings and concepts behind the powerful Linux system programming APIs. You should be familiar with Linux at the user level, including aspects such as logging in, using the shell via the command-line interface, and using tools such as find, grep, and sort. A working knowledge of the C programming language is required. No prior experience with Linux systems programming is assumed.