Process Management in OS

A Program does nothing unless its instructions are executed by a CPU. A program in execution is
called a process. In order to accomplish its task, process needs the computer resources.

There may exist more than one process in the system which may require the same resource at
the same time. Therefore, the operating system has to manage all the processes and the
resources in a convenient and efficient way.

Some resources may need to be executed by one process at one time to maintain the
consistency otherwise the system can become inconsistent and deadlock may occur.

The operating system is responsible for the following activities in connection with Process
Management
1. Scheduling processes and threads on the CPUs.
2. Creating and deleting both user and system processes.
3. Suspending and resuming processes.
4. Providing mechanisms for process synchronization.
5. Providing mechanisms for process communication.
Attributes of a process

The Attributes of the process are used by the Operating System to create the process control
block (PCB) for each of them. This is also called context of the process. Attributes which are
stored in the PCB are described below.

1. Process ID

When a process is created, a unique id is assigned to the process which is used for unique
identification of the process in the system.

2. Program counter

A program counter stores the address of the last instruction of the process on which the process
was suspended. The CPU uses this address when the execution of this process is resumed.

3. Process State

The Process, from its creation to the completion, goes through various states which are new,
ready, running and waiting. We will discuss about them later in detail.

4. Priority

Every process has its own priority. The process with the highest priority among the processes
gets the CPU first. This is also stored on the process control block.

5. General Purpose Registers

Every process has its own set of registers which are used to hold the data which is generated
during the execution of the process.
6. List of open files

During the Execution, Every process uses some files which need to be present in the main
memory. OS also maintains a list of open files in the PCB.

7. List of open devices

OS also maintain the list of all open devices which are used during the execution of the process.

Process States

State Diagram

The process, from its creation to completion, passes through various states. The minimum
number of states is five.

The names of the states are not standardized although the process may be in one of the
following states during execution.

1. New

A program which is going to be picked up by the OS into the main memory is called a new
process.
2. Ready

Whenever a process is created, it directly enters in the ready state, in which, it waits for the CPU
to be assigned. The OS picks the new processes from the secondary memory and put all of them
in the main memory.

The processes which are ready for the execution and reside in the main memory are called ready
state processes. There can be many processes present in the ready state.

3. Running

One of the processes from the ready state will be chosen by the OS depending upon the
scheduling algorithm. Hence, if we have only one CPU in our system, the number of running
processes for a particular time will always be one. If we have n processors in the system then we
can have n processes running simultaneously.

4. Block or wait

From the Running state, a process can make the transition to the block or wait state depending
upon the scheduling algorithm or the intrinsic behavior of the process.

When a process waits for a certain resource to be assigned or for the input from the user then
the OS move this process to the block or wait state and assigns the CPU to the other processes.

5. Completion or termination

When a process finishes its execution, it comes in the termination state. All the context of the
process (Process Control Block) will also be deleted the process will be terminated by the
Operating system.

6. Suspend ready

A process in the ready state, which is moved to secondary memory from the main memory due
to lack of the resources (mainly primary memory) is called in the suspend ready state.

If the main memory is full and a higher priority process comes for the execution then the OS
have to make the room for the process in the main memory by throwing the lower priority
process out into the secondary memory. The suspend ready processes remain in the secondary
memory until the main memory gets available.

7. Suspend wait

Instead of removing the process from the ready queue, it's better to remove the blocked
process which is waiting for some resources in the main memory. Since it is already waiting for
some resource to get available hence it is better if it waits in the secondary memory and make
room for the higher priority process. These processes complete their execution once the main
memory gets available and their wait is finished.
Operations on the Process

1. Creation

Once the process is created, it will be ready and come into the ready queue (main memory) and
will be ready for the execution.

2. Scheduling

Out of the many processes present in the ready queue, the Operating system chooses one
process and start executing it. Selecting the process which is to be executed next, is known as
scheduling.

3. Execution

Once the process is scheduled for the execution, the processor starts executing it. Process may
come to the blocked or wait state during the execution then in that case the processor starts
executing the other processes.

4. Deletion/killing

Once the purpose of the process gets over then the OS will kill the process. The Context of the
process (PCB) will be deleted and the process gets terminated by the Operating system.
Process Scheduling in OS (Operating System)

Operating system uses various schedulers for the process scheduling described below.

1. Long term scheduler

Long term scheduler is also known as job scheduler. It chooses the processes from the pool
(secondary memory) and keeps them in the ready queue maintained in the primary memory.

Long Term scheduler mainly controls the degree of Multiprogramming. The purpose of long
term scheduler is to choose a perfect mix of IO bound and CPU bound processes among the
jobs present in the pool.

If the job scheduler chooses more IO bound processes then all of the jobs may reside in the
blocked state all the time and the CPU will remain idle most of the time. This will reduce the
degree of Multiprogramming. Therefore, the Job of long term scheduler is very critical and may
affect the system for a very long time.

2. Short term scheduler

Short term scheduler is also known as CPU scheduler. It selects one of the Jobs from the ready
queue and dispatch to the CPU for the execution.

A scheduling algorithm is used to select which job is going to be dispatched for the execution.
The Job of the short term scheduler can be very critical in the sense that if it selects job whose
CPU burst time is very high then all the jobs after that, will have to wait in the ready queue for a
very long time.

This problem is called starvation which may arise if the short term scheduler makes some
mistakes while selecting the job.
3. Medium term scheduler

Medium term scheduler takes care of the swapped out processes.If the running state processes
needs some IO time for the completion then there is a need to change its state from running to
waiting.

Medium term scheduler is used for this purpose. It removes the process from the running state
to make room for the other processes. Such processes are the swapped out processes and this
procedure is called swapping. The medium term scheduler is responsible for suspending and
resuming the processes.

It reduces the degree of multiprogramming. The swapping is necessary to have a perfect mix of
processes in the ready queue.
Process Queues

The Operating system manages various types of queues for each of the process states. The PCB
related to the process is also stored in the queue of the same state. If the Process is moved from
one state to another state then its PCB is also unlinked from the corresponding queue and
added to the other state queue in which the transition is made.

There are the following queues maintained by the Operating system.

1. Job Queue

In starting, all the processes get stored in the job queue. It is maintained in the secondary
memory. The long term scheduler (Job scheduler) picks some of the jobs and put them in the
primary memory.

2. Ready Queue

Ready queue is maintained in primary memory. The short term scheduler picks the job from the
ready queue and dispatch to the CPU for the execution.

3. Waiting Queue

When the process needs some IO operation in order to complete its execution, OS changes the
state of the process from running to waiting. The context (PCB) associated with the process gets
stored on the waiting queue which will be used by the Processor when the process finishes the
IO.
CPU Scheduling

In the uniprogrammming systems like MS DOS, when a process waits for any I/O operation to
be done, the CPU remains idol. This is an overhead since it wastes the time and causes the
problem of starvation. However, In Multiprogramming systems, the CPU doesn't remain idle
during the waiting time of the Process and it starts executing other processes. Operating System
has to define which process the CPU will be given.

In Multiprogramming systems, the Operating system schedules the processes on the CPU to
have the maximum utilization of it and this procedure is called CPU scheduling. The Operating
System uses various scheduling algorithm to schedule the processes.

This is a task of the short term scheduler to schedule the CPU for the number of processes
present in the Job Pool. Whenever the running process requests some IO operation then the
short term scheduler saves the current context of the process (also called PCB) and changes its
state from running to waiting. During the time, process is in waiting state; the Short term
scheduler picks another process from the ready queue and assigns the CPU to this process. This
procedure is called context switching.

What is saved in the Process Control Block?

The Operating system maintains a process control block during the lifetime of the process. The
Process control block is deleted when the process is terminated or killed. There is the following
information which is saved in the process control block and is changing with the state of the
process.

Why do we need Scheduling?

In Multiprogramming, if the long term scheduler picks more I/O bound processes then most of
the time, the CPU remains idol. The task of Operating system is to optimize the utilization of
resources.

If most of the running processes change their state from running to waiting then there may
always be a possibility of deadlock in the system. Hence to reduce this overhead, the OS needs
to schedule the jobs to get the optimal utilization of CPU and to avoid the possibility to
deadlock.
Scheduling Algorithms in OS (Operating System)

There are various algorithms which are used by the Operating System to schedule the processes
on the processor in an efficient way.

The Purpose of a Scheduling algorithm

There are the following algorithms which can be used to schedule the jobs.

1. First Come First Serve

It is the simplest algorithm to implement. The process with the minimal arrival time will get the
CPU first. The lesser the arrival time, the sooner will the process gets the CPU. It is the non-
preemptive type of scheduling.

2. Round Robin

In the Round Robin scheduling algorithm, the OS defines a time quantum (slice). All the
processes will get executed in the cyclic way. Each of the process will get the CPU for a small
amount of time (called time quantum) and then get back to the ready queue to wait for its next
turn. It is a preemptive type of scheduling.

3. Shortest Job First

The job with the shortest burst time will get the CPU first. The lesser the burst time, the sooner
will the process get the CPU. It is the non-preemptive type of scheduling.

4. Shortest remaining time first

It is the preemptive form of SJF. In this algorithm, the OS schedules the Job according to the
remaining time of the execution.

5. Priority based scheduling

In this algorithm, the priority will be assigned to each of the processes. The higher the priority,
the sooner will the process get the CPU. If the priority of the two processes is same then they
will be scheduled according to their arrival time.

6. Highest Response Ratio Next

In this scheduling Algorithm, the process with highest response ratio will be scheduled next. This
reduces the starvation in the system.