Every day I see new Linux Kernel hackers fail at their first patch submission. I'm not an expert, but I've learned how the process works and most importantly I've learned how to avoid irritating Linux Kernel maintainers. The "maintainers" are the gate keepers to the Linux Kernel. If you piss them off you will never land any patches into the Linux Kernel. All Linux Kernel development takes place in the open and hundreds (thousands?) of Linux Kernel developers will see and possibly read your patch submissions. You will want to make every effort to submit the best possible patch you can. That's where I come in. If you follow my guide there's a better than average chance you will actually land your patch into the Linux Kernel. For a beginner I recommend working on the drivers/staging tree maintained by Greg Kroah-Hartman. Clone Greg KH's staging tree: > git clone git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/gregkh/staging.git This will take a while. After that you need to checkou