Operating Systems: Intro
Operating Systems
Concepts and Principles
monolithic and micro kernels
processes and threads
their management and synchronisation interprocess communication
interrupts and signals
virtual memory - paging and segmentation
Implementation Techniques
resource allocation time management - process scheduling memory management - usage models and page allocation file systems case studies - Kops, Linux, NT etc.
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Operating Systems: Intro
Coursework
To Be Announced
probably involving some programming
deadline - mid-term
Essay - in-depth comparison of PDA Operating Systems
structure, scheduling, memory management, security etc. deadline - end of term
Tutorials only when needed
Operating Systems: Intro
Textbooks
William Stallings, Operating Systems, Internals & Design Principles, 4th edition, Prentice-Hall, 2001. Abraham Silberschatz & Peter Galvin, Operating System Concepts, 5th edition, Addison-Wesley, 1998. Gary Nutt, Operating Systems, A Modern Perspective, 2nd edition, Addison-Wesley, 2000. D.A.Solomon & M.E.Russinovitch, Inside Windows 2000, 3rd edition, MicroSoft Press, 2000. D.Boling, Programming MicroSoft Windows CE, MicroSoft Press, 1998. Michael Beck et al., Linux Kernel Internals, 2nd edition, Addison-Wesley, 1997. John OGorman, Operating Systems with Linux, Palgrave, 2001.
Operating Systems: Intro
Motivation
An Automated Teller Machine (ATM) process
process to deposit an amount into an account:
deposit (account, amount) { read ( account, balance ); balance = balance + amount; // read balance from database // add deposit amount
write (account, balance );
}
// update database
process to withdraw an amount from an account: withdraw ( account, amount ) { read (account, balance); balance = balance - amount; write ( account, balance); } concurrent processes?
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// read balance from database // subtract withdrawal amount // update database
Operating Systems: Intro
To sum the elements of a matrix
in row order: sum = 0; for (row=0; row<row_max; row++) { for (col=0; col<col_max; col++) { sum = sum + array[row,col]; }} cout << Array Sum = << sum << endl; in column order: sum = 0; for (col=0; col<cp;_max; col++) { for (row=0; row<row_max; row++) { sum = sum + array[row,col]; }} cout << Array Sum = << sum << endl; any difference?
Operating Systems: Intro
Operating Systems
Main purpose is to facilitate the execution of user application programs
bare hardware is extremely messy and difficult for users to program
processors memory
peripheral devices
concurrency interrupts files networks
Operating Systems: Intro
Modern operating systems structured around concept of a process
process = program in execution
a process is not the same as a program programs are passive, processes are active a process consists of an executable program, associated data and its execution context
A process runs in a framework which provides a Virtual Machine for it
a Virtual Machine is a simplified machine with:
user-level processor virtual memory high-level facilities a machine with one user
Operating Systems: Intro
An OS supports execution of many concurrent processes
many co-existing virtual machines each run alternately - pseudo-concurrently OS issues revolve around process management
how and when to create & destroy processes
how to avoid interference between processes
how to achieve cooperation between processes
Operating Systems: Intro
An OS manages resource requirements of processes
time memory files I/O device access processors
An OS aims to be efficient
for user for system manager
Operating Systems: Intro
A process can be in one of several states
newly created running blocked
waiting for some event to occur in main memory moved out to disc
ready to run terminated
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Operating Systems: Intro
Overheads in swapping execution between processes
saving and restoring contexts
loss of cache contents
Places limits on how often execution should be swapped
performance will plummet if too frequent
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Operating Systems: Intro
A relatively new mechanism to improve overheads is the Thread
a lightweight process several threads within one process or virtual machine much smaller context to preserve must cooperate must not compete
can be separately scheduled
can run concurrently on multiprocessor systems often also a very convenient programming paradigm
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Operating Systems: Intro
Interfaces
user user user user user
application application application application application
process
process
process
process
process
Operating System
Hardware
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Operating Systems: Intro
Communications between OS and processes
from process to OS - system calls
from OS to process - signals
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Operating Systems: Intro
Communications between OS and Hardware
from OS to hardware - register & status settings
from hardware to OS - interrupts and exceptions
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Operating Systems: Intro
Communications between processes
signals message passing via buffers shared virtual memory pipes sockets
Communications between users and processes
keyboard, mouse, touch-screen bit-mapped text and graphics display screens with windows printers, plotters
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Operating Systems: Intro
Interrupts
An interruption in the normal execution flow of a processor
a mechanism for causing the processor to suspend its current computation and take up some new task
old context must be preserved control can be returned to the original task at some later time
new context started
Reasons:
control of asynchronous I/O devices
exceptional conditions arising from execution
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Operating Systems: Intro
OS sets up an Interrupt Vector with service routine entry points
one entry per I/O device or I/O channel a dormant context set up for each routine which can be activated on demand further interrupts usually switched off during initial interrupt servicing
Example: Intel x86 interrupt vector entries:
0: ... 14: 32: 33: ... 36: 37: 38: ... 46: divide error
page fault timer keyboard serial port 1 parallel port 2 floppy controller hard disc
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Operating Systems: Intro
An OS can be viewed as an event-driven system
just reacts to events as they occur
Interrupts need to be serviced carefully and quickly by the OS
cost similar to a process switch
too many interrupts will kill performance
Alternative to interrupts is Polling
process (or OS) continually polls I.e. inspects, device status registers awaiting some condition e.g. transfer completed wastes time looping until condition occurs much simpler to program than using interrupts but inefficient
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Operating Systems: Intro
Privilege
Processors run at various levels of privilege
user-level
only the types of instruction needed by applications programs only access to permitted areas of virtual memory
supervisor or kernel level
all types of instruction including I/O instructions access to system registers
- virtual memory registers - interrupt vectors
access to all areas of virtual memory ability to switch interrupts on and off
may be intermediate levels on some architectures
each level may have its own processor registers to speed context switching
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Operating Systems: Intro
Whats part of an Operating System?
Process management
Interrupt handling
Device drivers File system Networking Applications?
Web browser? Email?
Windows? Command interpreters?
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Operating Systems: Intro
Kinds of Operating System
For single-user workstation
For multiple-user server
file,compute, mail, web servers etc.
For mainframe systems
transaction processing
database systems
For real-time systems
time-critical applications
industrial process control
hard rather than soft deadlines
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Operating Systems: Intro
All built with the same concurrent multi-process organisation
Main difference is in process scheduling
single user system needs only to meet one users expectations
overall efficiency less important
multiple user system needs to be equitable between users
efficiency important
transaction processing system needs to give good response
database queries
real-time system may need to pre-allocate processor time to guarantee meeting deadlines
overall efficiency may need to suffer
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Operating Systems: Intro
Only exception to multiple-process organisation is embedded systems
dedicated single-purpose processors
multi-media, telecoms
- MPEG decoders, GSM phones, portable web browsers
- washing machine controllers!
avionics
- FADECs, GPS, FMS
absolute reliability required very conservatively programmed
System Level Integrated circuits
usually have a processing core which requires a real-time OS often multiprocessors with a general-purpose CPU plus a DSP processor
ARM + OAK
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Operating Systems: Intro
Operating System Structure
How to partition OS functions?
process management and scheduling, memory management, interrupt handling, device drivers etc.
Monolithic OS
each function coded as a separate procedure linked into one executable code object event-driven core which calls appropriate procedures when required
driven by interrupts and system calls from processes
Linux
modules can be dynamically linked and unlinked as required
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Operating Systems: Intro
Micro-kernel OS
each function coded as a separate process
system processes
only the minimum possible function in the core kernel
virtual memory organising interrupt handling process dispatching
appropriate system process activated as soon as possible to deal with all other functions
system processes will have higher privilege and usually higher priority than user processes
Windows NT
Intermediate flavours
some system processes but not a minimal micro-kernel
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Operating Systems: Intro
Windows NT Structure
Hardware
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Operating Systems: Intro
Advantages and disadvantages
monolithic:
faster switching to kernel functions simple interfaces between functions i.e. procedure calls easier access to data structures shared between functions larger memory resident core may become too large to maintain easily
micro-kernel
better partitioning - should be easier to implement and maintain smaller memory resident core slower switching to system processes inter-system-process communications may be slower
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