How to test my patches before submitting them to LKML?

[Valdis.Kletnieks at vt.edu]

On Fri, 07 Feb 2014 18:30:46 +0100, Matthias Beyer said:

> So you would say, I should start patching non-hardware driver code,
> FS for example, to get my feet wet with the kernel?

You might want to take a step back, be a bit more meta, and ask yourself
why, exactly, you want to do kernel hacking at all.  If there isn't an
obvious part of the kernel that interests you, maybe kernel hacking isn't
where you should be.

For instance, I mostly pay attention to "stuff that drops in linux-next
and breaks my laptop", and "stuff that will matter when it hits distro
enterprise kernels" (like a patch set a while ago that had implications
for stuff like malware scanners, compliance issues, and HSM storage).

It's sort of like when people learn I have 3 guitars, and they reply
"Oh, I've always wanted to play guitar".  And I tell them "No, you probably
just want to be able to *say* you play guitar.  If you *really* wanted to
play guitar, you'd have found a used one for $95 on Craigslist or something,
and taught yourself, and figured out where you can play at 2AM without
pissing anybody off".

So ask yourself - Why an I trying to do kernel hacking?  Once you know the
answer to that, you'll know what part of the kernel (if any) you should
be looking at.
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