Essential Linux Device Drivers
“Probably the most wide ranging and complete Linux device driver book I’ve read.”
--Alan Cox, Linux Guru and Key Kernel Developer
“Very comprehensive and detailed, covering almost every single Linux device driver type.”
--Theodore Ts’o, First Linux Kernel Developer in North America and Chief Platform Strategist of the Linux Foundation
The Most Practical Guide to Writing Linux Device Drivers
Linux now offers an exceptionally robust environment for driver development: with today’s kernels, what once required years of development time can be accomplished in days. In this practical, example-driven book, one of the world’s most experienced Linux driver developers systematically demonstrates how to develop reliable Linux drivers for virtually any device. Essential Linux Device Drivers is for any programmer with a working knowledge of operating systems and C, including programmers who have never written drivers before. Sreekrishnan Venkateswaran focuses on the essentials, bringing together all the concepts and techniques you need, while avoiding topics that only matter in highly specialized situations. Venkateswaran begins by reviewing the Linux 2.6 kernel capabilities that are most relevant to driver developers. He introduces simple device classes; then turns to serial buses such as I2C and SPI; external buses such as PCMCIA, PCI, and USB; video, audio, block, network, and wireless device drivers; user-space drivers; and drivers for embedded Linux–one of today’s fastest growing areas of Linux development. For each, Venkateswaran explains the technology, inspects relevant kernel source files, and walks through developing a complete example.
• Addresses drivers discussed in no other book, including drivers for I2C, video, sound, PCMCIA, and different types of flash memory
• Demystifies essential kernel services and facilities, including kernel threads and helper interfaces
• Teaches polling, asynchronous notification, and I/O control
• Introduces the Inter-Integrated Circuit Protocol for embedded Linux drivers
• Covers multimedia device drivers using the Linux-Video subsystem and Linux-Audio framework
• Shows how Linux implements support for wireless technologies such as Bluetooth, Infrared, WiFi, and cellular networking
• Describes the entire driver development lifecycle, through debugging and maintenance
• Includes reference appendixes covering Linux assembly, BIOS calls, and Seq files
Why Read This Book
You should read this book if you need a hands‑on, end‑to‑end guide to writing Linux kernel drivers for real hardware — it walks through module basics to complex device classes and real-world examples. You'll get practical patterns for interrupts, DMA, device model integration, and user/kernel interfaces that you can adapt to embedded ARM/RISC-V platforms.
Who Will Benefit
Embedded software engineers and firmware developers who write or maintain Linux kernel drivers for sensors, buses, storage, USB, PCI and SoC peripherals.
Level: Intermediate — Prerequisites: Comfortable C programming, basic Unix/Linux userland experience (shell, build tools), familiarity with compiling software and an understanding of interrupts and basic electronics; cross‑compilation experience is helpful but not required.
Key Takeaways
- Implement and debug loadable kernel modules and character/block device drivers
- Integrate devices with the Linux device model, sysfs and udev for stable user/kernel interfaces
- Handle interrupts, concurrency, locking, and wait/wakeup patterns safely in kernel context
- Manage memory and implement DMA and memory‑mapped I/O for high‑performance devices
- Write drivers for common buses and subsystems (PCI, USB, I2C/SPI, network) and understand driver probing/registration
- Apply practical debugging, testing and deployment techniques for embedded Linux driver development
Topics Covered
- Introduction to Linux Device Drivers and Kernel Build System
- Kernel Modules: Basics and Module Programming
- Character Device Drivers
- Block Device Drivers and Filesystem Interfaces
- Kernel Concurrency, Synchronization, and Tasklets/Workqueues
- Interrupt Handling and Deferred Work
- Memory Management, DMA and Memory-Mapped I/O
- PCI and Platform Device Drivers
- USB Device Drivers
- Network Device Drivers (Overview)
- I2C, SPI, GPIO and Other SoC Buses
- Device Model, sysfs, udev and Power Management
- Debugging, Testing and Performance Tuning
Languages, Platforms & Tools
How It Compares
More expansive in device coverage than the classic "Linux Device Drivers" (Rubini/Corbet/Kroah-Hartman) and more driver-focused than Robert Love's "Linux Kernel Development", though all three predate many recent kernel API changes.
