The goal of this chapter is to explain the foundations of programming on Linux/Unix-based systems. This will provide a more complete picture of how a program executes on a Unix/Linux system, how to write more efficient code, and where to look when hard-to-find bugs arise.

To that end, this chapter starts by taking a comprehensive look at the Linux ABI, or more specifically, the System V ABI. In this section, we will review everything from the register and stack layout, to the System V calling conventions and ELF binary object specification.

The next section will briefly cover the Linux filesystem, including the standard layout and permissions. We will then provide a comprehensive review of Unix processes and how to program them, including considerations such as forking new processes and interprocess communication.

Finally, this chapter will conclude...