Jeremy C. Reed wrote:
> (I bcc'd this to tech-kern.)
>
> It seems like it would be very useful and quite interesting to have online 
> instruction covering:
>
> 1) how to port NetBSD
>
> 2) developing (or porting) drivers
>
> This would be useful for existing developers and for potential 
> developers.
>
> Porting the NetBSD class maybe could be done by using an emulator or cheap 
> hardware. (The instruction could be just one area of the porting, such as 
> boot loader.)
>
> And the driver class could be done by using some inexpensive hardware (or 
> maybe non-hardware based driver).
>
> The courses could be informal and students join as they please.
>
> But the actual class would have a defined start date, course session 
> times, and ending date.
>
> The class could include a weekly or twice weekly lesson (maybe an hour in 
> length). This lesson could be done as an HTML (or other presentation) and 
> using irc (or other). Then this would be immediately be made available as 
> a webpage for those who miss the class and for reference. (I am sure 
> students can help make the webpages.)
>
> The group of students and interested experts and instructors can have a 
> mailing list to discuss questions of the development.
>
> This could be done as a volunteer basis, or if instructors need to be paid 
> I am sure students could pay some.
>
> I can coordinate this.
>
> Basically the instructor(s) would:
>
> - choose the hardware they will cover, 
> - define their goals for the training sessions,
> - provide students with tasks to do and other exercises,
> - point the students to examples and documentation (and/or write new docs),
> - participate on the mailing list about class questions,
> - and select some dates for the training.
>
> Anyone interested in teaching?
>
> Anyone interested in participating?
>
>
>
> Jeremy C. Reed
>
>   
It sounds interessting. I (and possibly other pupils of my school) 
am/are interested in participating. Publishing is a very good idea!
Well, i heard alpha is good for learning such things like porting. Ok, 
there already is an alpha-port, but why not? I'am sure there is an alpha 
pc emulator.

Driver writing: There is a very common PCI Lan chip: rtl8139. There is a 
driver, too, but it isn't expensive and most people have compatible cards.

So you could take NetBSD source-code and erase all alpha and rtl8139 stuff.