Schultz: Diving into the Linux Networking Stack, Part I

Michael Schultz has posted an introductory look at the Linux networking stack, focusing on driver initialization and packet reception. It's a "how it works" discussion, rather than a look at the actual code. "In general network drivers follow a fairly typical route in processing: the kernel boots up, initializes data structures, sets up some interrupt routines, and tells the network card where to put packets when they are received. When a packet is actually received, the card signals the kernel causing it to do some processing and then cleans up some resources. I'll talk about the fairly generic routines that network devices share in common and then move to a concrete example with the igb driver."

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