Vidhu
Sarwal.

Final-year CS student and open source contributor. Selected for the Linux Kernel Mentorship Program (LFX '26) and Google Summer of Code at BeagleBoard.org — writing C/C++ for Linux-hosted hardware testing with patches upstreamed to mainline. This blog is where I work things out in writing.

Writing through systems work.

I work on Linux kernel internals, distributed systems, and open source infrastructure. This site is where I write about what I'm building, reading, and debugging — technical notes without the fluff.

Kernel Developer Mentee — Linux Foundation · LFX

Selected for the Linux Kernel Mentorship Program under maintainer mentorship. Contributing to kernel bug triage, fixes, and upstream patch submission — building on mainline-upstreamed work from Google Summer of Code.

Software Engineering Intern — Google Summer of Code · BeagleBoard.org

Selected from 40,000+ global applicants. Wrote production C/C++ for Linux-hosted hardware testing: I2C bus scan, EEPROM dispatch, mikroBUS ClickID auto-detection. 30% performance improvement; patches CI-tested and upstreamed to mainline with DCO sign-off.

Engineering Intern — Embedded Systems & IoT · Sentinal Innovations

Built ESP32 firmware in Embedded C for an IoT relay control system with a real-time monitoring dashboard. Shipped to 50+ homes, cutting energy use 25%. Designed a firmware API layer keeping hardware and application layers independently deployable.

What the work keeps returning to

  • Linux kernel internals — memory management, scheduling, and the patch workflow
  • Distributed systems design and consensus protocols
  • Low-level debugging and systems observability
  • Open source contribution and upstream collaboration