This is my log of how I got started hacking the OSD. I'm going to log conversations and take copious notes on things I had to learn. It won't be much use for embedded Linux experts but if you've mostly been doing PC programming or don't have much experience with Linux, hopefully this will save you some pain. This series of chapters, blogs or whatever, will chronical the steps I take to get two projects running on the OSD, the first is a countdown machine that simply counts down the days until a certain deadline. Basically we'll hook the OSD up to a TV set and it will show "XX DAYS to LAUNCH" or something like that. The second project will be to get a simple IRC display client running on the OSD. This would allow IRC to scroll on a TV set for public display, like in our office, etc. Don't expect beautifully writen thoughtful essays here, it will mostly be collections of IRC conversations etc with folks helping me through the various steps, but again it could be helpful stuff if you're just getting started with embedded linux like I am.