SEC-210 · Kernel Security · Practitioner
Stable, LTS & Vendor Tree Hygiene — full syllabus
Working with the upstream stable process and keeping a vendor tree that does not rot.
Duration2 full days in person · 4 half-days online
Cohortmax 14 in person · 20 online
Pricefrom SAR 5,250 in person · local pricing per city
Delivery35% principles · 20% guided investigation · 45% engineering studio
Who this course is for
Engineers maintaining a long-lived product kernel who want the tree to stay close enough to upstream that security fixes remain cheap.
Prerequisites
- git and kernel build experience
- Some exposure to maintaining out-of-tree patches
- SEC-201 recommended for the backporting side
Course outline
Day 1 — The stable machine
- How the stable and LTS process works: cadence, rules, review and the AUTOSEL story
- What stable-queue and stable-rc trees are and how to consume them
- Choosing an LTS base for a product: lifetime math and the cost of an odd choice
- Planning the migration to the next LTS before you are forced into it
- Reading a stable release: what got in, what got dropped and why
Day 2 — Keeping your tree rebaseable
- Inventorying local patches: board support, drivers and the 'temporary' hacks from three years ago
- Upstream-first as policy: what it buys, what it costs and how to argue for it
- Structuring local patches to rebase cleanly: topic branches, series files and quarantine
- Tooling for divergence: range-diff, patch tracking and drift reporting
- Deciding what to keep, what to upstream and what to drop at the next rebase
Hands-on labs
- Lab: Follow a stable release from -rc to final and catalogue what changed for your subsystem set
- Lab: Compute an LTS selection for a stated product lifetime and defend the choice
- Lab: Inventory a supplied vendor-style tree: classify every local patch as upstreamable, rebaseable or droppable
- Lab: Measure divergence from upstream with range-diff and produce a drift report with recommendations
- Lab: Rebase a small local patch series onto a newer stable point release and resolve what breaks
Capstone project
Produce a hygiene plan for a supplied vendor tree: an LTS base recommendation with lifetime math, a classified inventory of local patches with an upstream/drop/rebase decision for each, a measured divergence report and a concrete plan for the next LTS migration.
What you leave with
- Working knowledge of the stable/LTS cadence and how to consume it
- A defensible LTS-selection method with lifetime math
- A local-patch inventory and classification practice
- Divergence-measurement tooling you can run on your own tree the same week
Upcoming dates
| Dates | Where | Seats | Early bird | Regular | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 18 Oct – 19 Oct 20262 full days | RiyadhIn person · KAFD Conference Centre | 12 of 14 | — | SAR 5,250 | |
| 18 Oct – 19 Oct 20262 full days | Kuwait CityIn person · Al Hamra Tower | 7 of 14 | — | KWD 430 | |
| 25 Oct – 26 Oct 20262 full days | MuscatIn person · Knowledge Oasis Muscat | 12 of 14 | — | OMR 540 | |
| 1 Nov – 4 Nov 20264 half-days | Gulf bandLive online · 09:00–13:00 GMT+3 | 8 of 20 | — | US$1,000 | |
| 2 Nov – 3 Nov 20262 full days | OttawaIn person · Kanata North Tech Park | 7 of 14 | — | CAD 1,900 | |
| 2 Nov – 3 Nov 20262 full days | TorontoIn person · MaRS Discovery District | 12 of 14 | — | CAD 1,900 | |
| 2 Nov – 5 Nov 20264 half-days | Europe bandLive online · 09:00–13:00 CET | 13 of 20 | — | US$1,000 | |
| 9 Nov – 10 Nov 20262 full days | LondonIn person · Shoreditch Works | 7 of 14 | GBP 980until 10 Oct | ||
| 9 Nov – 12 Nov 20264 half-days | Americas bandLive online · 13:00–17:00 ET | 18 of 20 | US$900until 10 Oct | ||
| 16 Nov – 17 Nov 20262 full days | BerlinIn person · Factory Görlitzer Park | 12 of 14 | EUR 1,160until 17 Oct |
Book a seat, or bring this course to your team
Seats can be reserved online; private delivery runs on-site or live online, adapted to your stack.
Questions about fit or prerequisites? Email hello@kernelsystems.academy. To save this syllabus, print this page to PDF from your browser.