I want to use win32com.client module on Linux.
So is there any problem to use it?
Is win32com library available on Linux?
Certainly not.
win32com looks like a Windows specific library, tied to the WinAPI.
Linux has a different operating system API (because Linux is not Windows and both are different OSes), mostly following the POSIX standards. For example, both Linux and Windows have files, directories, processes, executables, dynamic loading, users, etc... but the details about them vary greatly and significantly (and you need to understand them, since "the evil is in the details");
To learn the Linux operating system API, read a good Linux programming book. The ALP book is freely downloadable, even if it is a bit old (but most of its content still apply); and you could get (e.g. buy) newer books.
For more, read the man pages (which are the canonical documentation on Unix). In particular syscalls(2) and the many other pages refereed from it. You'll also need to look into the section 3 of man pages, since it is listing many functions usable in Linux.
Read also Operating Systems: Three Easy Pieces
You might find (but this is programming language specific) some framework libraries trying to provide some common abstractions above several OSes. Look (for C++) into Qt, POCO, Boost, etc....
At last, don't forget that Linux is made of free software. Sometimes, it is useful to download them and study their source code. In some occasions, that is a good approach to leaky abstractions.
PS. Budget several weeks of your time to read documentation and books, and perhaps study the source code of some free software similar to your goals.
Is it true that the Debian system uses FreeBSD kernel and the Redhat system uses GNU kernel. Does it make any difference to use Free BSD kernel or GNU kernel?
Well the comment grew too long so I might as well post an answer. It is quite unclear what you are asking for, since you don't present any specific problem. At first glance this question does not belong to SO. But I assume since posted here you ask about difference from coders point of view.
1st to clear up, the BSD kernel is rather the alternative one like Hurd, so a Debian system can use FreeBSD kernel, it's not default. Actually its status is "official port".
Probably the biggest difference lies in the philosophy the user believes and their peace of mind, alternatively the hood they grew up in. Unless you are a distro developer or work even lower on the system.
Generally as a programmer you work with standard library implementation (libc,libc++,libstdc++ or whatever), they need to follow the standard, and the differences are really small. On debian this is natively provided with gnu toolset. You can assume to work in gnu wonderland. The kernel lies even lower, and you would need to work on really low-level kernel related stuff to notice difference of the kernel itself. Usually you work few layers from it and kernel should pleasantly abstract.
So no need to worry unless you acutally run into trouble.
According to a comment in one of my previous Questions Linux System Calls. Linux wasn't implemented on 8086/88 Intel CPUs. So what was the first Intel CPU to support Linux and implement its system calls?
From the horse's mouth itself (with no insult intended to Linus):
Hello everybody out there using minix -
I'm doing a (free) operating system (just a hobby, won't be big and professional like gnu) for 386(486) AT clones.
This has been brewing since april, and is starting to get ready. I'd like any feedback on things people like/dislike in minix, as my OS resembles it somewhat (same physical layout of the file-system (due to practical reasons) among other things).
I've currently ported bash(1.08) and gcc(1.40), and things seem to work. This implies that I'll get something practical within a few months, and I'd like to know what features most people would want. Any suggestions are welcome, but I won't promise I'll implement them :-)
Linus (torvalds#kruuna.helsinki.fi)
PS. Yes – it's free of any minix code, and it has a multi-threaded fs. It is NOT portable (uses 386 task switching etc), and it probably never will support anything other than AT-harddisks, as that's all I have :-(.
This is from the August '91 Usenet posting where Linus first announced his baby.
Hence 386 was the first CPU it was implemented on.
Only those of us who suffered having to lock memory sections at their location in Windows real mode, to prevent the memory manager emulator from moving them around without telling you, will appreciate what a good move Linus made in not trying to shoehorn Linux on to earlier CPUs.
I particularly love the:
just a hobby, won't be big and professional like gnu
comment. If only Linus had realised how big this beast would become.
I would like to learn about linux/Unix kernel programming for scalable multi processors (smps). I found this book UNIX(R) Systems for Modern Architectures http://www.amazon.com/UNIX-Systems-Modern-Architectures-Multiprocessing/dp/0201633388/ref=pd_rhf_p_t_3 . Is there any other good resources or a better book since its released in 1994. Thank you very much in advance.
Thanks & Regards,
Mousey.
Definitely buy this excellent book! You will get thorough introduction into:
caches, their types, and how to deal with them in the kernel,
synchronization and what hardware primitives are behind it,
general kernel designs as related to concurrency (cli/sti, giant lock, cli+spinlock, etc.)
The book is general enough not to be out of date by now. The only thing I don't remember mentioned there is NUMA, but I don't think there are any good published texts on this subjects yet except for maybe Gorman's Linux memman paper (somebody correct me if I'm wrong here).
I think the book was really worth the money.
Understanding the Linux Kernel is a great book about how the Linux kernel is built, it describes Linux 2.2, 2.4 and 2.6 (Third Edition).
If you want to make drivers, there's Linux Device Drivers , and is also a reference about how Linux is built.
For Linux, Rusty's Unreliable Guide to Kernel Locking is a must-read. After that, you can also read the file Documentation/spinlocks.txt located in the Linux kernel sources.
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I'd like to gain better knowledge of operating system internals. Process management, memory management, and stuff like that.
I was thinking of learning by getting to know either linux or BSD kernel.
Which one kernel is better for learning purposes?
What's the best place to start?
Can you recommend any good books?
In college, I had an operating systems class where we used a book by Tanenbaum. In the class, we implemented a device driver in the Minix operating system. It was a lot of fun, and we learned a lot.
One thing to note though, if you pick Minix, it is designed for learning. It is a microkernel, while Linux and BSD are a monolithic kernel, so what you learn may not be 100% translatable to be able to work with Linux or BSD, but you can still gain a lot out of it, without having to process quite as much information.
As a side note, if you've read Just for Fun, Linus actually was playing with Minix before he wrote Linux, but it just wasn't enough for his purposes.
As a Linux user I'd say Linux has a great community for people to learn about the kernel. http://kernelnewbies.org is a great place to start asking questions and learning about how the kernel works. I can't make a book reccomendation, but once you've read the starting material on kernelnewbies the source is very well documented.
Aside from the good books already mentioned (Opeating System Design & Implementation is particularly good), get a hold of a 1.x release Linux Kernel, load it into VMWare or VirtualBox and start playing around from there.
You will need to spend a lot of time browsing source code. For this, check out http://lxr.linux.no/ which is a browsable linked version of the source and makes life a lot easier. For the very first version of Linux (0.01) check out http://lxr.linux.no/linux-old+v0.01/. The fun begins at http://lxr.linux.no/linux-old+v0.01/boot/boot.s. As you progress from version to version, check out the ChangeLog and dig into those parts that have changed to save you re-reading the whole thing again.
Once you've gotten a hold of the concepts, look at 2.0, then 2.2, etc. Be prepared to sink A LOT of time into the process.
Linux
Device Drivers
Linux Core Kernel Commentary
Operating Systems Design and Implementation
I had previously bought these books on recommendation for the same purpose but I never got to studying them myself so only take them as second-hand advice.
I recommend you the BSD kernels! BSD kernels have far fewer hackers so following their evolution is easier. Either BSD and Linux kernels have great hackers, but some people argue that BSD lower fame filters out novice ones. Also taking design decisions is easier when the sources are not being updated 100 times a day.
Among the BSD choices, my favorite one is NetBSD. It might not be the pain-free choice you want for your desktop, but because it has a strong focus on portability, the quality is quite good. I think this part say it all:
Some systems seem to have the philosophy of “If it works, it's right”. In that light NetBSD's philosophy could be described as “It doesn't work unless it's right”
If you have been working long enough, you will know that NetBSD is a quite joy for learning good coding. Although professionally you will find more chances with Linux
Whichever choice you take, start joining their mail lists, follow the discussions. Study some patches and finally try to do your own bug-fixing. Regarding books, search for Diomidis Spinellis articles and his book. It is not exactly a kernel book, but has NetBSD examples and helps a lot to tackle large software.
Noting the lack of BSDs here, I figured I'd chip in:
The Design and Implementation of the FreeBSD Operating System (dead-tree book)
Unix and BSD Courses (courses and videos)
FreeBSD Architecture Handbook (online book)
I haven't taken any of the courses myself, but I've heard Marshall Kirk McKusick speak on other occasions, and he is really good at what he does.
And of course the BSD man pages, which are an excellent resource as they are maintained to a far greater extent than your average Linux man-page. Take for instance the uvm(9) man-page, describing the virtual memory interface in OpenBSD.
Not quite related, but I'll also recommend the video History of the Berkeley Software Distributions as it gives a nice introduction to the BSD parts of the UNIX history and culture as well as plenty of hilarious anectodes from back when.
There's no substitute for diving into the code. Try to find a driver or subsystem that you're interested in and poke around with it. With tools like VMware Workstation it's super easy to make whatever changes you want, snapshot the VM, and run your modified kernel. If the kernel panics on boot, who cares? Just jump back to the snapshot and fix the problem.
For books, I strongly recommend Linux Kernel Development by Robert Love. It's a wonderfully written book -- lots of information, organized sanely, and humorous... not dry reading at all.
Take Mike Stone's advice and start with Minix. That's what Linus did! The textbook is really well written, and Tannenbaum does a great job of showing how the various features are implemented in a real system.
Nobody seems to have mentioned that code-wise BSD is much cleaner and more consistent. The documentation's way better too (as already mentioned). But since there's a whole lot of fiddling with whatever system you choose - I'd pick the one you use more often.
Linux and Minix are fun to learn. If you also want to learn how a modern micro-kernel operating system looks like, you can look at QNX. The complete documentation is available online and it is very accessible. For example, this online book.
When I was at uni I spent a semester studying operating systems, and as part of this had an assignment where we had to implement a RAM-based filesystem in Linux.
It was a fantastic way to get to understand the internals of the Linux keurnel and to get a grasp on how everything fits together - And a heck of a lot of fun playing around with how it interacts with standard tools too.
I haven't tried it myself, but you can go to Linux From Scratch and start building your own Linux distribution. Sounds like something that'll take a junkload of time, but will result in an intimate knowledge of the guts of the Linux kernel and how each part works. Of course, you can supplement this learning by following any of the other tips here.