Doug Abbott
Intellimetrix

The neat thing about Linux as an embedded operating system is that you get the source code. While most embedded developers will have no need to directly hack the kernel sources, we often have good reason to be able to configure the kernel to exactly match the specific requirements of a given hardware environment or application scenario. Fortunately, the process of configuring and building the kernel has improved substantially over the years to the point where it is now a good confidence-building exercise for developers new to Linux. This paper provides an overview of the Linux kernel configuration and building process.