A few books exist that try to restore some sort of "complete understanding" : Software programming starting from assembly language under linux : http://www.ama

A few books exist that try to restore some sort of "complete understanding" : Software programming starting from assembly language under linux : http://www.amazon.com/Programming-Ground-Up-Jonathan-Bartlett/dp/0975283847 http://www.amazon.com/Programming-Ground-Up-Jonathan-Bartlet... A study going from chip design to high level programming : http://www.amazon.com/Elements-Computing-Systems-Building-Principles/dp/026214087X http://www.amazon.com/Elements-Computing-Systems-Building-Pr... IHMO this "problem" of "incomplete vision" started when device drivers where introduced in general purpose OS. Professionnal application developpers started to target API instead of hardware. A milestone in this trend for me is Windows 3.0 (1990). This also marks the demise of fixed hardware computers that the hobbyist favored so far.