Information Technology Institute

Operating System Fundamentals

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Chapter Three
OPERATING SYSTEM
STRUCTURES
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 Table of Content

• System Components
• Operating System Services
• System Calls
• System Structure

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SYSTEM COMPONENTS

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 System Components

• Process management
• Main memory management
• File system management
• I/O system management
• Secondary storage management
• Networking
• Protection
• Command interpreter
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 Process Management

• A process is a program in execution. A process

needs certain resources, including CPU time,
memory, files, and I/O devices, to accomplish its
task.
• The operating system is responsible for the
following activities in connection with process
management.
• Process creation and deletion.
• process suspension and resumption.
• process communication

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 Main-Memory Management

• Memory is a large array of bytes, each with its own

address. It is a repository of quickly accessible data
shared by the CPU and I/O devices.
• Main memory is a volatile storage device. It loses its
contents in the case of system failure.
• The operating system is responsible for the following
activities in connections with memory management:
• Keep track of which parts of memory are currently being
used and by whom.
• Decide which processes to load when memory space
becomes available.
• Allocate and de-allocate memory space as needed
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 File Management

• A file is a collection of related information defined by

its creator. Commonly, files represent programs and
data.
• The operating system is responsible for the following
activities in connections with file management:
• File creation and deletion.
• Directory creation and deletion.
• Support of primitives for manipulating files and
directories.
• Mapping files onto secondary storage.
• File backup on stable (non-volatile) storage media.

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 I/O System Management

• OS hide particularities of I/O devices

• Device drivers
• Input: retrieve block of data
• Output: hardware instructions for controller

• I/O subsystem
• Memory management: spooling
• Drivers for specific hardware
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 Secondary-Storage Management

• Since main memory (primary storage) is volatile and too

small to accommodate all data and programs permanently,
the computer system must provide secondary storage to
back up main memory.
• Most modern computer systems use disks as the principle
on-line storage medium, for both programs and data.
• The operating system is responsible for the following
activities in connection with disk management:
• Free space management
• Storage allocation
• Disk scheduling

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 Networking (Distributed
Systems)
• A distributed system is a collection processors that do
not share memory or a clock. Each processor has its own
local memory.
• The processors in the system are connected through a
communication network.
• Communication takes place using a protocol.
• A distributed system provides user access to various
system resources.
• Access to a shared resource allows:
• Computation speed-up
• Increased data availability
• Enhanced reliability
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 Protection System

• Protection refers to a mechanism for

controlling access by programs, or users to
system resources.
• The protection mechanism must:
• distinguish between authorized and unauthorized
usage.
• specify the controls to be imposed.

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 Command-Interpreter System

• Many commands are given to the operating

system by control statements which deal with:
• process creation and management
• I/O handling
• secondary-storage management
• main-memory management
• file-system access
• Protection
• networking

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 Command-Interpreter System Cont’d

• The program that reads and interprets control

statements is called variously:
• command-line interpreter
• shell (in UNIX)

• Its function is to get and execute the next

command statement.

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OPERATING SYSTEM
SERVICES

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 Operating System Services

• Program execution
• System capability to load a program into memory and
to run it.
• I/O operations
• Since user programs cannot execute I/O operations
directly, the operating system must provide some
means to perform I/O.
• File-system manipulation
• Program capability to read, write, create, and delete
files.
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 Operating System Services Cont’d

• Communications
• Exchange of information between processes
executing either on the same computer or on
different systems tied together by a network.
Implemented via shared memory or message
passing.
• Error detection
• Ensure correct computing by detecting errors in
the CPU and memory hardware, in I/O devices,
or in user programs.
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SYSTEM CALLS

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 System Calls

• System calls provide the interface between a

running program and the operating system.
• Generally available as assembly-language
instructions.
• Languages defined to replace assembly language
for systems programming allow system calls to be
made directly (e.g., C, C++)

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 Copy Program Example

• Variable initialization
• open ( file1 )
• create ( file2 )
• read ( file1 )
• write ( file2 )
• close ( file1 )
• close ( file2 )
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 Types of System Calls

• Process control
• File management
• Device management
• Information maintenance
• Communications

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 System Calls Types
Process File Device Information Communications
Control Management Management Maintenance IPC

load, execute create file request get time create channel

end, abort delete file release set time delete channel

create open attach get system data send message

terminate close detach set system data receive message

get attributes read / write read get attributes

transfer status
set attributes reposition write set attributes

wait time, get attributes get attributes attach / detach

event, signal set attributes set attributes remote device

allocate memory
free memory

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 Communication Models
Message Passing Shared Memory

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SYSTEM STRUCTURE

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 OS System Design Structure

• Simple structure

• Layered approach

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MS-DOS Structure

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 Layered Approach

• The operating system is divided into a number

of layers (levels), each built on top of lower
layers. The bottom layer (layer 0), is the
hardware; the highest (layer N) is the user
interface.
• With modularity, layers are selected such that
each uses functions (operations) and services
of only lower-level layers.
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 Layered Approach Cont’d

• Advantage:
• Modularity
• Debugging
• Modification

• Disadvantage:
• Layering overhead to the system call

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OS/2 Layer Structure

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