Section 1.1. Linux Versus Other Unix-Like Kernels
Section 1.2. Hardware Dependency
Section 1.3. Linux Versions
Section 1.4. Basic Operating System Concepts
Section 1.5. An Overview of the Unix Filesystem
Section 1.6. An Overview of Unix Kernels
Chapter 2. Memory Addressing
Section 2.1. Memory Addresses
Section 2.2. Segmentation in Hardware
Section 2.3. Segmentation in Linux
Section 2.4. Paging in Hardware
Section 2.5. Paging in Linux
Chapter 3. Processes
Section 3.1. Processes, Lightweight Processes, and Threads
Section 3.2. Process Descriptor
Section 3.3. Process Switch
Section 3.4. Creating Processes
Section 3.5. Destroying Processes
Chapter 4. Interrupts and Exceptions
Section 4.1. The Role of Interrupt Signals
Section 4.2. Interrupts and Exceptions
Section 4.3. Nested Execution of Exception and Interrupt Handlers
Section 4.4. Initializing the Interrupt Descriptor Table
Section 4.5. Exception Handling
Section 4.6. Interrupt Handling
Section 4.7. Softirqs, Tasklets, and Bottom Halves
Section 4.8. Returning from Interrupts and Exceptions
Chapter 5. Kernel Synchronization
Section 5.1. Kernel Control Paths
Section 5.2. When Synchronization Is Not Necessary
Section 5.3. Synchronization Primitives
Section 5.4. Synchronizing Accesses to Kernel Data Structures
Section 5.5. Examples of Race Condition Prevention
Chapter 6. Timing Measurements
Section 6.1. Hardware Clocks
Section 6.2. The Linux Timekeeping Architecture
Section 6.3. CPU's Time Sharing
Section 6.4. Updating the Time and Date
Section 6.5. Updating System Statistics
Section 6.6. Software Timers
Section 6.7. System Calls Related to Timing Measurements
Chapter 7. Memory Management
Section 7.1. Page Frame Management
Section 7.2. Memory Area Management
Section 7.3. Noncontiguous Memory Area Management
Chapter 8. Process Address Space
Section 8.1. The Process's Address Space
Section 8.2. The Memory Descriptor
Section 8.3. Memory Regions
Section 8.4. Page Fault Exception Handler
Section 8.5. Creating and Deleting a Process Address Space
Section 8.6. Managing the Heap
Chapter 9. System Calls
Section 9.1. POSIX APIs and System Calls
Section 9.2. System Call Handler and Service Routines
Section 9.3. Kernel Wrapper Routines
Chapter 10. Signals
Section 10.1. The Role of Signals
Section 10.2. Generating a Signal
Section 10.3. Delivering a Signal
Section 10.4. System Calls Related to Signal Handling
Chapter 11. Process Scheduling
Section 11.1. Scheduling Policy
Section 11.2. The Scheduling Algorithm
Section 11.3. System Calls Related to Scheduling
Chapter 12. The Virtual Filesystem
Section 12.1. The Role of the Virtual Filesystem (VFS)
Section 12.2. VFS Data Structures
Section 12.3. Filesystem Types
Section 12.4. Filesystem Mounting
Section 12.5. Pathname Lookup
Section 12.6. Implementations of VFS System Calls
Section 12.7. File Locking
Chapter 13. Managing I/O Devices
Section 13.1. I/O Architecture
Section 13.2. Device Files
Section 13.3. Device Drivers
Section 13.4. Block Device Drivers
Section 13.5. Character Device Drivers
Chapter 14. Disk Caches
Section 14.1. The Page Cache
Section 14.2. The Buffer Cache
Chapter 15. Accessing Files
Section 15.1. Reading and Writing a File
Section 15.2. Memory Mapping
Section 15.3. Direct I/O Transfers
Chapter 16. Swapping: Methods for Freeing Memory
Section 16.1. What Is Swapping?
Section 16.2. Swap Area
Section 16.3. The Swap Cache
Section 16.4. Transferring Swap Pages
Section 16.5. Swapping Out Pages
Section 16.6. Swapping in Pages
Section 16.7. Reclaiming Page Frame
Chapter 17. The Ext2 and Ext3 Filesystems
Section 17.1. General Characteristics of Ext2
Section 17.2. Ext2 Disk Data Structures
Section 17.3. Ext2 Memory Data Structures
Section 17.4. Creating the Ext2 Filesystem
Section 17.5. Ext2 Methods
Section 17.6. Managing Ext2 Disk Space
Section 17.7. The Ext3 Filesystem
Chapter 18. Networking
Section 18.1. Main Networking Data Structures
Section 18.2. System Calls Related to Networking
Section 18.3. Sending Packets to the Network Card
Section 18.4. Receiving Packets from the Network Card
Chapter 19. Process Communication
Section 19.1. Pipes
Section 19.2. FIFOs
Section 19.3. System V IPC
Chapter 20. Program Execution
Section 20.1. Executable Files
Section 20.2. Executable Formats
Section 20.3. Execution Domains
Section 20.4. The exec Functions
Appendix A. System Startup
Section A.1. Prehistoric Age: The BIOS
Section A.2. Ancient Age: The Boot Loader
Section A.3. Middle Ages: The setup( ) Function
Section A.4. Renaissance: The startup_32( ) Functions
Section A.5. Modern Age: The start_kernel( ) Function
Appendix B. Modules
Section B.1. To Be (a Module) or Not to Be?
Section B.2. Module Implementation
Section B.3. Linking and Unlinking Modules
Section B.4. Linking Modules on Demand
Appendix C. Source Code Structure