Chapter 1

There are several Linux commands that show you the details of the components in your computer. For example, lscpu will show you the details of your CPU:

$ lscpu
Architecture:             aarch64
  CPU op-mode(s):         32-bit, 64-bit
  Byte Order:             Little Endian
CPU(s):                   4
  On-line CPU(s) list:    0-3
Vendor ID:                ARM
  Model name:             Cortex-A76
    Model:                1
    Thread(s) per core:   1
    Core(s) per cluster:  4
    Socket(s):            -
    Cluster(s):           1
    Stepping:             r4p1
    CPU(s) scaling MHz:   100%
    CPU max MHz:          2400.0000
    CPU min MHz:          1500.0000
    BogoMIPS:             108.00
    Flags:                fp asimd evtstrm aes pmull sha1 sha2 crc32 atomics fphp asimdhp cpuid asimdrdm lrcpc dcpop asimddp
Caches (sum of all):      
  L1d:                    256 KiB (4 instances)
  L1i:                    256 KiB (4 instances)
  L2:                     2 MiB (4 instances)
  L3:                     2 MiB (1 instance)
Vulnerabilities:          
  Gather data sampling:   Not affected
  Itlb multihit:          Not affected
  L1tf:                   Not affected
  Mds:                    Not affected
  Meltdown:               Not affected
  Mmio stale data:        Not affected
  Reg file data sampling: Not affected
  Retbleed:               Not affected
  Spec rstack overflow:   Not affected
  Spec store bypass:      Mitigation; Speculative Store Bypass disabled via prctl
  Spectre v1:             Mitigation; __user pointer sanitization
  Spectre v2:             Mitigation; CSV2, BHB
  Srbds:                  Not affected
  Tsx async abort:        Not affected
  $

Other useful commands are free to see memory usage and lsusb to see your USB devices. Chapter 3 in Brian Ward’s How Linux Works. 2nd edition, No Starch Press, 2015, is devoted to getting information about the devices installed in your computer.