Full disclosure: I am not Italian. But, I make pasta dishes twice a week 52 weeks a year.
The directions from so many people are so often wrong (think oil in the water and pouring the pasta into a colander and rinsing it, really?). I truly wonder that someone has not settled this once and for all. Boiling dried pasta is simple. Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Add enough salt to make it taste salty but not like the sea….salt content in sea water varies around the world in any case. Add the pasta to water that is at a rolling boil and stir it if the pasta is spaghetti or linguine, once they have softened enough to do so. If you are cooking shells or rigatoni or penne, you can stir them once they have been in the water for about 30 seconds. After that, leave the pasta alone, reducing the heat so that the water bubbles vigorously without spilling over on the stove. You want the water to keep the pasta moving.
The only other issue is to determine “al dente,” also simple. When the pasta has been cooking a minute short of the lowest recommended time on the package, take a piece out and cut it with a small, sharp knife. If there is any opaque white (it almost looks chalky) at the center, put the piece back in the pot and continue cooking the pasta another minute. Check with another piece and if all opaque white is gone you are done. If you are going to cook the pasta a bit longer in the sauce, take the pasta out when there is still a little bit of opaque white at the center.