university studies?

university studies?

[peter revill]

Ok, im 16 and looking at heading into uni as soon as ive finished year 12.
I'm gonna head on over to uni, i am wondering out of curiosity what courses most kernel developers have done? im going to do either bachelour of computer science, or information technology, at a later date, when im done my studies im hoping to help with kernel developing, mozilla etc. etc., so i was wondering what people would consider the course that gives you "kernel development" sort of skillset-mindset
any feedback is appriciated, please CC it to my mail adress at arevill@bigpond.net.au 

Kind Regards and Cheers
Peter Revill


Peter Revill


-- 

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Re: university studies?

[Riley Williams]

Hi Peter.

 > Ok, im 16 and looking at heading into uni as soon as ive
 > finished year 12. I'm gonna head on over to uni, i am wondering
 > out of curiosity what courses most kernel developers have done?
 > im going to do either bachelour of computer science, or
 > information technology, at a later date, when im done my studies
 > im hoping to help with kernel developing, mozilla etc. etc., so
 > i was wondering what people would consider the course that gives
 > you "kernel development" sort of skillset-mindset any feedback
 > is appriciated, please CC it to my mail adress at
 > arevill@bigpond.net.au

Personally, I did "B.Sc. Computer Studies", but I suspect the actual
course title is irrelevant, and it's the modules you do in the course
that matter. Here's what I would regard as important:

 1. A thorough knowledge of programming in C. Knowledge of C++
    will help.

 2. Experience of programming hardware will definitely help.

 3. The ability to think logically is a definite advantage, and
    tends to result in 90%+ of your programs working first time.

Additions, anybody?

Best wishes from Riley.

Re: university studies?

[Erik Mouw]

On Wed, Aug 01, 2001 at 08:06:16AM +0100, Riley Williams wrote:
> Personally, I did "B.Sc. Computer Studies", but I suspect the actual
> course title is irrelevant, and it's the modules you do in the course
> that matter. Here's what I would regard as important:
> 
>  1. A thorough knowledge of programming in C. Knowledge of C++
>     will help.
> 
>  2. Experience of programming hardware will definitely help.
> 
>  3. The ability to think logically is a definite advantage, and
>     tends to result in 90%+ of your programs working first time.
> 
> Additions, anybody?

A couple of good books also helps:

- Brian Kernighan and Dennis Ritchie, "The C programming language"
  (ANSI edition)
- Brian Kernighan and Rob Pike, "The practice of programming"
- Jon Bentley, "Programming Pearls"

And of course don't wait with kernel programming until after you finish
your studies. Do it right now. Subscribe to linux-kernel, and follow
the discussions. Test patches and improve them, get your hands dirty.


Erik
[who did "M.Sc. Electrical Engineering"]

-- 
J.A.K. (Erik) Mouw, Information and Communication Theory Group, Department
of Electrical Engineering, Faculty of Information Technology and Systems,
Delft University of Technology, PO BOX 5031,  2600 GA Delft, The Netherlands
Phone: +31-15-2783635  Fax: +31-15-2781843  Email: J.A.K.Mouw@its.tudelft.nl
WWW: http://www-ict.its.tudelft.nl/~erik/

Re: university studies?

[Ian Stirling]

> 
> On Wed, Aug 01, 2001 at 08:06:16AM +0100, Riley Williams wrote:
> > Personally, I did "B.Sc. Computer Studies", but I suspect the actual
> > course title is irrelevant, and it's the modules you do in the course
> > that matter. Here's what I would regard as important:
> > 
> >  1. A thorough knowledge of programming in C. Knowledge of C++
> >     will help.
> > 
> >  2. Experience of programming hardware will definitely help.
> > 
> >  3. The ability to think logically is a definite advantage, and
> >     tends to result in 90%+ of your programs working first time.
> > 
> > Additions, anybody?
> 
> A couple of good books also helps:

Maths.
Can help lots in the generation of algorithms, for example
proving that one faster way of doing something is identical 
to a slower way.
Knowing the maths behind the algorithms can lead to ways to 
speed things up by orders of magnitude in some cases.

Re: university studies?

[Anders Peter Fugmann]

Ian Stirling wrote:
> 
> Maths.
> Can help lots in the generation of algorithms, for example
> proving that one faster way of doing something is identical 
> to a slower way.
> Knowing the maths behind the algorithms can lead to ways to 
> speed things up by orders of magnitude in some cases.
> 
> -
> To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in
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> Please read the FAQ at  http://www.tux.org/lkml/
> 
> 
Ont just that.

Math (especially descrete algebra) is very importent, just to prove that 
an algoritm is correct. Speed is of no importence if the algoritm is 
incorrect.
Also courses in parallel programming will be usefull.

But best of all, take cources in operating systems
(And read Tanenbaum's book).


Regards
Anders Fugmann

Re: university studies?

[Riley Williams]

Hi Erik.

 >> Personally, I did "B.Sc. Computer Studies", but I suspect the actual
 >> course title is irrelevant, and it's the modules you do in the course
 >> that matter. Here's what I would regard as important:
 >>
 >>  1. A thorough knowledge of programming in C. Knowledge of C++
 >>     will help.
 >>
 >>  2. Experience of programming hardware will definitely help.
 >>
 >>  3. The ability to think logically is a definite advantage, and
 >>     tends to result in 90%+ of your programs working first time.
 >>
 >> Additions, anybody?

 > A couple of good books also helps:
 >
 > - Brian Kernighan and Dennis Ritchie, "The C programming language"
 >   (ANSI edition)
 > - Brian Kernighan and Rob Pike, "The practice of programming"
 > - Jon Bentley, "Programming Pearls"

One thing I will add, from long experience: If you learned BASIC
first, then learn Pascal BEFORE you try to learn C or C++ as you'll
come out a much better programmer than trying to learn C or C++
directly after BASIC.

 > And of course don't wait with kernel programming until after you
 > finish your studies. Do it right now. Subscribe to linux-kernel,
 > and follow the discussions. Test patches and improve them, get
 > your hands dirty.

Also, and probably even more important, set up your own Linux based
system and actively write software for it, not just in C but in things
like bash shell script. Especially software that appears to be totally
unsuited to the language - I wrote a floppy diskette formatter
entirely in bash shell script as an exercise, and I still use the
program that resulted, simply because it gives me much more data space
on the floppies without sacrificing MS-DOS compatibility.

 > Erik [who did "M.Sc. Electrical Engineering"]

I understand there's somebody on here who did BA Spanish as their
degree...

Best wishes from Riley.

Re: university studies?

[Ignacio Vazquez-Abrams]

On Thu, 2 Aug 2001, Riley Williams wrote:

> One thing I will add, from long experience: If you learned BASIC
> first, then learn Pascal BEFORE you try to learn C or C++ as you'll
> come out a much better programmer than trying to learn C or C++
> directly after BASIC.

Once you've finished learning BASIC, unlearn all the crap you won't need for
Pascal.

Also, add Python for good programming style (or replace BASIC and Pascal
with it entirely if you're feeling brave) and some sort of FP to sharpen your
pure algorithmic skills. If you don't want to go into full-fledged Lisp, then
take a look at XSLT.

PHP is good if you're going to do anything web-oriented, but it's very similar
to C, so...

Also, Perl doesn't hurt, but I've found that it isn't entirely neccessary if
you can deal with sed and awk, which I also suggest you pick up.

-- 
Ignacio Vazquez-Abrams  <ignacio@openservices.net>

Re: university studies?

[Muzaffer Ozakca]

I don't think, one should learn all the "hot" languages of the day to
become a good programmer. A computer science student should (and will)
learn the theoretical background that lays beneath. Data structures,
graph theory, computational linguistics, compiler theory, OS, AI, so on.
Practical studies such as programming projects will let the students
solid the theory. These thoughts are not actually mine, most of the
computer science departments -more or less- follow a cirriculum
appreciating these ideas, I think. However, a kernel (or systems)
programmer should also know basics of microprocessors, interrupts, etc.
and programming in assembly, besides the theory given in a university.

After getting the theory and completing the understanding by practice,
learning a programming language is just a detail. Always solving
problems "C" style, may not be the best approach, a functional language
may better suit the needs -usually not in our course.

As far I could see, kernel programming (talking about the whole)
requires the use of computer science, heavily.


Ignacio Vazquez-Abrams wrote:
> 
> On Thu, 2 Aug 2001, Riley Williams wrote:
> 
> > One thing I will add, from long experience: If you learned BASIC
> > first, then learn Pascal BEFORE you try to learn C or C++ as you'll
> > come out a much better programmer than trying to learn C or C++
> > directly after BASIC.
> 
> Once you've finished learning BASIC, unlearn all the crap you won't need for
> Pascal.
> 
> Also, add Python for good programming style (or replace BASIC and Pascal
> with it entirely if you're feeling brave) and some sort of FP to sharpen your
> pure algorithmic skills. If you don't want to go into full-fledged Lisp, then
> take a look at XSLT.
> 
> PHP is good if you're going to do anything web-oriented, but it's very similar
> to C, so...
> 
> Also, Perl doesn't hurt, but I've found that it isn't entirely neccessary if
> you can deal with sed and awk, which I also suggest you pick up.
> 
> --
> Ignacio Vazquez-Abrams  <ignacio@openservices.net>
> 
> -
> To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in
> the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org
> More majordomo info at  http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
> Please read the FAQ at  http://www.tux.org/lkml/

-- 
Muzaffer Ozakca
Researcher/Software Engineer  -  muzaffer.ozakca@bilten.metu.edu.tr
TUBITAK-Bilten-ODTU - Communications Systems and Comp. Networks Group
ODTU, Ankara, Turkey
http://www.bilten.metu.edu.tr   tel: +90-312-210 1311

Re: university studies?

[Crutcher Dunnavant]

++ 02/08/01 14:36 +0300 - Muzaffer Ozakca:
> 
> I don't think, one should learn all the "hot" languages of the day to
> become a good programmer. A computer science student should (and will)
> learn the theoretical background that lays beneath. Data structures,
> graph theory, computational linguistics, compiler theory, OS, AI, so on.

Hmm. Thank you, Knuth.

> Practical studies such as programming projects will let the students
> solid the theory. These thoughts are not actually mine, most of the
> computer science departments -more or less- follow a cirriculum
> appreciating these ideas, I think. However, a kernel (or systems)
> programmer should also know basics of microprocessors, interrupts, etc.
> and programming in assembly, besides the theory given in a university.

They also need to understand large parts of security, and system API
design.

> After getting the theory and completing the understanding by practice,
> learning a programming language is just a detail.

I disagree. This is equivalent to saying, once I am an archetect, it is
easy for me to build houses. Tools and practices take incredible amounts
of time to master. Languages take years, and learning the
non-algorithmic parts of hacking, like techniques for keeping namespaces
clean, or designing APIs to be extensible, or just tracking code; all
these are time devouring.

> Always solving problems "C" style, may not be the best approach,
> a functional language may better suit the needs -usually not in our course.

But, ultimately, computers are procedural. FP helps /prove/ algorithms,
but it is a terible way to actually run them.

-- 
Crutcher        <crutcher@datastacks.com>
GCS d--- s+:>+:- a-- C++++$ UL++++$ L+++$>++++ !E PS+++ PE Y+ PGP+>++++
    R-(+++) !tv(+++) b+(++++) G+ e>++++ h+>++ r* y+>*$

Re: university studies?

[Ignacio Vazquez-Abrams]

On Thu, 2 Aug 2001, Muzaffer Ozakca wrote:

>
> I don't think, one should learn all the "hot" languages of the day to
> become a good programmer. A computer science student should (and will)
> learn the theoretical background that lays beneath. Data structures,
> graph theory, computational linguistics, compiler theory, OS, AI, so on.
> Practical studies such as programming projects will let the students
> solid the theory. These thoughts are not actually mine, most of the
> computer science departments -more or less- follow a cirriculum
> appreciating these ideas, I think. However, a kernel (or systems)
> programmer should also know basics of microprocessors, interrupts, etc.
> and programming in assembly, besides the theory given in a university.
>
> After getting the theory and completing the understanding by practice,
> learning a programming language is just a detail. Always solving
> problems "C" style, may not be the best approach, a functional language
> may better suit the needs -usually not in our course.
>
> As far I could see, kernel programming (talking about the whole)
> requires the use of computer science, heavily.

I absolutely agree that learning programming languages isn't enough. However,
just learning algorithms and structures and doing programming projects isn't
enough either.

AFAIK, around where I am institutes of higher learning don't usually have a
great track record for exposing students to a wide variety of languages.
Usually it's Pascal and/or C/C++, with some Java mixed in. While they are
"nice" languages, there's a lot more to other languages than can be learned
from those four.

And having the theoretical background doesn't actually help you program. To
illustrate, here's a snippet of code similar to something I saw on a monitor
where I went:

typedef class {
  ...
} C;

main()
{
  C c;

  c.C();
    ...
};

While the student knew that objects have a constructor, he never realized
(was never taught?) that constructors are called implicitly.

Also, I did mention FP; I mentioned Lisp and XSLT as examples of FP languages.
And Python can be used in both structed and FP ways.

And yes, a course or two in digital electronics and microprocessors never
hurts either.

-- 
Ignacio Vazquez-Abrams  <ignacio@openservices.net>

Re: university studies?

[Daniel Phillips]

On Thursday 02 August 2001 09:24, Riley Williams wrote:
>  > Erik [who did "M.Sc. Electrical Engineering"]
>
> I understand there's somebody on here who did BA Spanish as their
> degree...

And somebody who did B.Mus. :-)  But I also did computer science 
courses at the same time, and after that graduate CS courses.  I really 
think there is no substitute for university level education here.  Yes, 
there are great hackers who got that way without formal education in 
the field, but I'll bet that most of them wish they had not missed the 
opportunity.

I firmly believe that Comp Sci by itself is not balanced enough, you 
need to have deep knowledge of *some* unrelated field to obtain the 
required perspective needed not only to solve problems, but to know why 
you want to solve them.

Music in particular teaches you about form and balance, and also a deep 
respect for the need to practice and perfect the low-level skills 
prerequisite to the flashier achievements we all aspire to.  Not to 
mention helping speed up your typing.

--
Daniel

Re: university studies?

[Brad Stewart]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 594 bytes --]

On Thu, Aug 02, 2001 at 08:24:45AM +0100, Riley Williams wrote:
> One thing I will add, from long experience: If you learned BASIC
> first, then learn Pascal BEFORE you try to learn C or C++ as you'll
> come out a much better programmer than trying to learn C or C++
> directly after BASIC.

This makes me a little bit nervous...  I used to program a fair bit in BASIC ((Q|GW)BASIC mostly), and started learning C++ after that.  Could you elaborate a bit on the reasons?

Thanks

Brad Stewart
bradmont@bradmont.net

-- 

PGP/GPG public key: http://bradmont.net/brad_stewart.gpg

[-- Attachment #2: Type: application/pgp-signature, Size: 232 bytes --]

Re: university studies?

[Alan Cox]

> On Thu, Aug 02, 2001 at 08:24:45AM +0100, Riley Williams wrote:
> > One thing I will add, from long experience: If you learned BASIC
> > first, then learn Pascal BEFORE you try to learn C or C++ as you'll
> > come out a much better programmer than trying to learn C or C++
> > directly after BASIC.
> 
> This makes me a little bit nervous...  I used to program a fair bit in BASI=
> C ((Q|GW)BASIC mostly), and started learning C++ after that.  Could you ela=
> borate a bit on the reasons?

pascal is a language that teaches you structured programming by making it
excruciatingly painful to write anything else. You can write basic in C and
sometimes people going from one language to the other basically do that.

If you have few classes and a lot of 5000 line subroutines then worry, but
there is no reason to assume that every ex basic programmer isnt going to
pick up C++ and good software design practices just because they once 
wrote basic

Re: university studies?

[J . A . Magallon]

On 20010802 Alan Cox wrote:
>
>If you have few classes and a lot of 5000 line subroutines then worry, but
>there is no reason to assume that every ex basic programmer isnt going to
>pick up C++ and good software design practices just because they once 
>wrote basic
>-

I have seen several ex-Fortran programmers fill C code with wrappers to still
think on vectors ranging 1..N instead of 0..N-1. It is hard to loose traditions...

I would make students learn C++ first. There they can see how inneficient can be things
if misused, and how useless is Programming or Algorithmic Theory without low
level knowledge of the compiler system. Then you know that
database = databse + record is BAD, and database += record is not so bad...

Then go back to C and apply all you have learnt in C++.

-- 
J.A. Magallon                           #  Let the source be with you...        
mailto:jamagallon@able.es
Mandrake Linux release 8.1 (Cooker) for i586
Linux werewolf 2.4.7-ac3 #1 SMP Mon Jul 30 16:39:36 CEST 2001 i686

Re: university studies?

[Matthew Gardiner]

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Original Message <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<

On 8/3/01, 6:23:28 AM, Alan Cox <alan@lxorguk.ukuu.org.uk> wrote regarding 
Re: university studies?:


> > On Thu, Aug 02, 2001 at 08:24:45AM +0100, Riley Williams wrote:
> > > One thing I will add, from long experience: If you learned BASIC
> > > first, then learn Pascal BEFORE you try to learn C or C++ as you'll
> > > come out a much better programmer than trying to learn C or C++
> > > directly after BASIC.
> >
> > This makes me a little bit nervous...  I used to program a fair bit in 
BASI=
> > C ((Q|GW)BASIC mostly), and started learning C++ after that.  Could you 
ela=
> > borate a bit on the reasons?

> pascal is a language that teaches you structured programming by making it
> excruciatingly painful to write anything else. You can write basic in C 
and
> sometimes people going from one language to the other basically do that.

> If you have few classes and a lot of 5000 line subroutines then worry, 
but
> there is no reason to assume that every ex basic programmer isnt going to
> pick up C++ and good software design practices just because they once
> wrote basic

Hmm, my first programming experience was using BBC Basic, then I moved to 
COBOL, AMOS and now I am learning Java, which should be a interesting 
eXPerience.

Just a side issue, has any one noticed the decline in the quality of IT 
products over the last 15-20 years? Or is it just me?

Matthew Gardiner



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Re:(OT) university studies?

[szonyi calin]

> Just a side issue, has any one noticed the decline
> in the quality of IT 
> products over the last 15-20 years? Or is it just
> me?
> 
> Matthew Gardiner
> 

Well we must produce fast and much to make more (and 
more, and more ...) money
:-))
market economy ... 

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Re:(OT) university studies?

[asmith]

Hi

Could you mention a product so that I can understand your angle.
--

Andrew Smith in Edinburgh, Scotland

On Fri, 3 Aug 2001, szonyi calin wrote:

>
> > Just a side issue, has any one noticed the decline
> > in the quality of IT
> > products over the last 15-20 years? Or is it just
> > me?
> >
> > Matthew Gardiner
> >
>
> Well we must produce fast and much to make more (and
> more, and more ...) money
> :-))
> market economy ...
>
> __________________________________________________
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>
>

Re:(OT) university studies?

[szonyi calin]

--- asmith@14inverleith.freeserve.co.uk wrote:
> 
> Hi
> 
> Could you mention a product so that I can understand
> your angle.
> --
> 

Pc Processor's coolers 
I exchanged 2 in four months on our server.
Thank god i saw that they are not working because
there's any fire protection here :-)



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Re:(OT) university studies?

[asmith]

Hiszonyi,
That's a bit of hardware.  It's also a mechanicalmoving part.   It's the
type of thing that everyone would like to eliminate.  The lack of a fan
on an Apple iMac is one of its attractions.

Going back to your system  you could fit additional redundant fans.   The
failure of a processor fan is in my opinion unlikely to be a fire hazard
although running the chip at an elevated temperature could shorten its life.
If your system has a chip temperature sensor, then monitor use that.   If your
environment is dusty I would be more concerned about the power supply fan as
the mains voltages in there can cause arcing and therefore the dust could
ignite.

When you posted your initial message I thought you were thinking of software.
Windows products are I believe full of bugs basically because the source is
not available for scrutiny.

--

Andrew Smith in Edinburgh, Scotland

 On Fri, 3 Aug 2001, szonyi calin wrote:

>
> --- asmith@14inverleith.freeserve.co.uk wrote:
> >
> > Hi
> >
> > Could you mention a product so that I can understand
> > your angle.
> > --
> >
>
> Pc Processor's coolers
> I exchanged 2 in four months on our server.
> Thank god i saw that they are not working because
> there's any fire protection here :-)
>
>
>
> __________________________________________________
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> Please read the FAQ at  http://www.tux.org/lkml/
>
>

Re:(OT) university studies?

[szonyi calin]

--- asmith@14inverleith.freeserve.co.uk wrote:


> When you posted your initial message I thought you
> were thinking of software.
> Windows products are I believe full of bugs
> basically because the source is
> not available for scrutiny.
> 
> --

There are no bugs in windows, only features. :-))
(or it's a hardware problem :-) )
As i recall windows is not shiped with a
known-bugs.txt
or similar to tell you about it's hidden features.
:-))

Thanks for help in the fanning problem.  
I don't have a temperature sensor, so i have to
inspect
the case to see if the cooling fan is working.
Right now it's stopped (again)

Bye

P.S. Thanks again for the mail. I woldn't look at the
fan if you would'n write to me so something terrible
could happend... :-))



 

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Re: (OT) university studies?

[Chris Wedgwood]

On Sun, Aug 05, 2001 at 12:32:59PM +0100, asmith@14inverleith.freeserve.co.uk wrote:

    When you posted your initial message I thought you were thinking
    of software.  Windows products are I believe full of bugs
    basically because the source is not available for scrutiny.

Bah! I wish open-source advocates would leave this alone or at least
qualify things a bit better.


Yes, code scrutiny is often a good thing, but it doesn't make your
code bug free necessarily.  Sendmail and bind are good examples here
of code that is (was) widely deployed, had many eyes on it --- and yet
sucked in terrible ways :)

Plenty of other 'available source' packages have had nasties, such as
wu-ftpd, mutt, pine, lynx and nntpcache.

Every now and then (like once or twice a year), someone finds a nasty
in Linux too....





  --cw

Re: university studies?

[Sean Hunter]

I did a graduate diploma in Jazz, contemporary and popular music, and further
postgraduate music study.  I am now doing my MSc in computer science.  Lack of
a degree in computer science (or even a science-related subject!) has never
significantly hindered my career as a developer.

Sean

On Wed, Aug 01, 2001 at 08:06:16AM +0100, Riley Williams wrote:
> Hi Peter.
> 
>  > Ok, im 16 and looking at heading into uni as soon as ive
>  > finished year 12. I'm gonna head on over to uni, i am wondering
>  > out of curiosity what courses most kernel developers have done?
>  > im going to do either bachelour of computer science, or
>  > information technology, at a later date, when im done my studies
>  > im hoping to help with kernel developing, mozilla etc. etc., so
>  > i was wondering what people would consider the course that gives
>  > you "kernel development" sort of skillset-mindset any feedback
>  > is appriciated, please CC it to my mail adress at
>  > arevill@bigpond.net.au
> 
> Personally, I did "B.Sc. Computer Studies", but I suspect the actual
> course title is irrelevant, and it's the modules you do in the course
> that matter. Here's what I would regard as important:
> 
>  1. A thorough knowledge of programming in C. Knowledge of C++
>     will help.
> 
>  2. Experience of programming hardware will definitely help.
> 
>  3. The ability to think logically is a definite advantage, and
>     tends to result in 90%+ of your programs working first time.
> 
> Additions, anybody?
> 
> Best wishes from Riley.
> 
> -
> To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in
> the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org
> More majordomo info at  http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
> Please read the FAQ at  http://www.tux.org/lkml/
> 

Re: university studies?

[Rik van Riel]

On Wed, 1 Aug 2001,  peter revill wrote:

> i was wondering what people would consider the course that gives
> you "kernel development" sort of skillset-mindset any feedback
> is appriciated,

"Experience is that, which you get after you need it."

But seriously, I don't have the idea that there is any
university program which really prepares you for being
a kernel hacker.

At university, you will learn things like thinking in
a logically coherent way, proving that that your idea
was right, understanding exactly why your neat idea
was right and the ability to explain all of this to
others.

Oh, you might also learn things like C, physics,
math, molecular biology, philosophy or other in-depth
technical things. Which of these isn't too important,
just make sure you get the interesting ones ;)

Now, about preparing yourself to be a kernel hacker;
the only thing which really helps for that is to start
learning about the kernel and to start playing around
with making small changes to those parts of the kernel
you think are interesting.

The people at the Kernelnewbies project may have some info:

	http://kernelnewbies.org/

cheers,

Rik
--
Executive summary of a recent Microsoft press release:
   "we are concerned about the GNU General Public License (GPL)"


		http://www.surriel.com/
http://www.conectiva.com/	http://distro.conectiva.com/

Re: university studies?

[David Weinehall]

On Wed, Aug 01, 2001 at 01:22:00PM +0800,  peter revill wrote:
> Ok, im 16 and looking at heading into uni as soon as ive finished year
> 12.  I'm gonna head on over to uni, i am wondering out of curiosity
> what courses most kernel developers have done? im going to do either
> bachelour of computer science, or information technology, at a later
> date, when im done my studies im hoping to help with kernel
> developing, mozilla etc. etc., so i was wondering what people would
> consider the course that gives you "kernel development" sort of
> skillset-mindset any feedback is appriciated, please CC it to my mail
> adress at arevill@bigpond.net.au 

I'd suggest deep studies of Zen/Chan-buddhism, Taoism, logic,
discrete mathematics, c-programming, haskell or ml (functional
programming), algorithm-theory & analysis and a course or two
in operating-system theory.

At least, that's what I've studied. One could argue it didn't help
a lot, but...

The best thing of all to study is source-code, though. Learn from those
who already mastered the art of programming. I've head that Plan 9 is
available as source-code. Get it and learn from the best.


/David
  _                                                                 _
 // David Weinehall <tao@acc.umu.se> /> Northern lights wander      \\
//  Project MCA Linux hacker        //  Dance across the winter sky //
\>  http://www.acc.umu.se/~tao/    </   Full colour fire           </