Operating Systems

Chapter 2: Operating-System
Structures

Dr. Marwa Elseddik

Lecturer, Department of Robotics and
Intelligent Machines - College of Artificial
Intelligence, Kafrelsheikh University
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2025
 Ch. 2: Operating-System Structures

• Operating System Services

• User Operating System Interface
• System Calls
• Types of System Calls
• System Programs
• Operating System Design and Implementation
• Operating System Structure

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 Operating System Services (1/4)

• Operating systems provide an environment for execution

of programs and services to programs and users.

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 Operating System Services (2/4)

• One set of operating-system services provides functions

that are helpful to the user: (1/3)
➢ User interface - Almost all operating systems have a user
interface (UI).
• Varies between Command-Line (CLI), Graphics User
Interface (GUI), Batch.

➢ Program execution - The system must be able to load a

program into memory and to run that program, end execution,
either normally or abnormally (indicating error).
➢ I/O operations - A running program may require I/O, which
may involve a file or an I/O device.
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 Operating System Services (2/4)

• One set of operating-system services provides functions

that are helpful to the user: (2/3)
➢ File-system manipulation – The file system is of particular
interest. Programs need to read and write files and directories,
create and delete them, search them, list file Information,
permission management.
➢ Communications – Processes may exchange information, on
the same computer or between computers over a network.
• Communications may be via shared memory or through
message passing (packets moved by the OS).

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 Operating System Services (2/4)

• One set of operating-system services provides functions

that are helpful to the user: (3/3)
➢ Error detection – OS needs to be constantly aware of possible
errors.
• May occur in the CPU and memory hardware, in I/O
devices, in user program.
• For each type of error, OS should take the appropriate
action to ensure correct and consistent computing.
• Debugging facilities can greatly enhance the user’s and
programmer’s abilities to efficiently use the system.

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 Operating System Services (3/4)

• Another set of OS functions exists for ensuring the

efficient operation of the system itself via resource
sharing: (1/2)
➢ Resource allocation - When multiple users or multiple jobs
running concurrently, resources must be allocated to each of
them.
• Many types of resources - CPU cycles, main memory, file
storage, I/O devices.
➢ Accounting - To keep track of which users use how much and
what kinds of computer resources.

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 Operating System Services (3/4)

• Another set of OS functions exists for ensuring the

efficient operation of the system itself via resource
sharing: (2/2)
➢ Protection and security - The owners of information stored in
a multiuser or networked computer system may want to
control use of that information, concurrent processes should
not interfere with each other.
• Protection involves ensuring that all access to system resources
is controlled.

• Security of the system from outsiders requires user

authentication, extends to defending external I/O devices from
invalid access attempts.
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Operating System Services (4/4)

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 User Operating System Interface (1/5)

• CLI or command interpreter allows direct command

entry.
➢ Sometimes implemented in kernel, sometimes by systems
program.
➢ Sometimes multiple flavors implemented – shells
➢ Primarily fetches a command from user and executes it.
➢ Sometimes commands built-in, sometimes just names of
programs.

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 User Operating System Interface (2/5)

• Bourne Shell Command Interpreter

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 User Operating System Interface (3/5)

• Graphics User Interface (GUI)

• User-friendly desktop metaphor interface
➢ Usually mouse, keyboard, and monitor.
➢ Icons represent files, programs, actions, etc.
➢ Various mouse buttons over objects in the interface cause various
actions (provide information, options, execute function, open
directory (known as a folder).

• Many systems now include both CLI and GUI interfaces.

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 User Operating System Interface (4/5)

• Touchscreen Interfaces
• Touchscreen devices require new interfaces.
➢ Mouse not possible or not desired.
➢ Actions and selection based on gestures.
➢ Virtual keyboard for text entry.

• Voice commands.

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 User Operating System Interface (5/5)

• The Mac OS X GUI

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 System Calls (1/6)

• Programming interface to the services provided by the

OS.
• Typically written in a high-level language (C or C++).
• Mostly accessed by programs via a high-level
Application Programming Interface (API) rather than
direct system call use.
• Three most common APIs are Win32 API for Windows,
POSIX API for POSIX-based systems (including
virtually all versions of UNIX, Linux, and Mac OS X),
and Java API for the Java virtual machine (JVM).
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 System Calls (2/6)

• Example: System call sequence to copy the contents of

one file to another file.

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 System Calls (3/6)

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 System Calls (4/6)

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 System Calls (5/6)

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 System Calls (6/6)

• C program invoking printf() library call, which calls

write() system call

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 Types of System Calls (1/6)

1. Process control
➢ create process, terminate process
➢ end, abort
➢ load, execute
➢ get process attributes, set process attributes
➢ wait for time
➢ wait event, signal event
➢ allocate and free memory
➢ Debugger for determining bugs, single step execution
➢ Locks for managing access to shared data between processes

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 Types of System Calls (2/6)

2. File management
➢ create file, delete file
➢ open, close file
➢ read, write, reposition
➢ get and set file attributes

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 Types of System Calls (3/6)

3. Device management
➢ request device, release device
➢ read, write, reposition
➢ get device attributes, set device attributes
➢ logically attach or detach devices

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 Types of System Calls (4/6)

4. Information maintenance
➢ get time or date, set time or date
➢ get system data, set system data
➢ get and set process, file, or device attributes

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 Types of System Calls (5/6)

5. Communications
➢ create, delete communication connection
➢ send, receive messages if message passing model to host name
or process name
➢ From client to server
➢ Shared-memory model create and gain access to memory
regions
➢ transfer status information
➢ attach and detach remote devices

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 Types of System Calls (6/6)

6. Protection
➢ Control access to resources
➢ Get and set permissions
➢ Allow and deny user access

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 System Programs (1/5)

• System programs provide a convenient environment for

program development and execution.
• They can be divided into:
➢ File manipulation
➢ Status information sometimes stored in a File modification
➢ Programming language support
➢ Program loading and execution
➢ Communications
➢ Background services
➢ Application programs
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 System Programs (2/5)

• File management - Create, delete, copy, rename, print,

dump, list, and generally manipulate files and
directories.
• Status information
➢ Some ask the system for info - date, time, amount of available
memory, disk space, number of users.
➢ Others provide detailed performance, logging, and debugging
information.
➢ Typically, these programs format and print the output to the
terminal or other output devices.

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 System Programs (3/5)

• File modification
➢ Text editors to create and modify files.
➢ Special commands to search contents of files or perform
transformations of the text.

• Programming-language support - Compilers,

assemblers, debuggers and interpreters sometimes
provided.

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 System Programs (4/5)

• Communications - Provide the mechanism for creating

virtual connections among processes, users, and
computer systems.
➢ Allow users to send messages to one another’s screens,
browse web pages, send electronic-mail messages, log in
remotely, transfer files from one machine to another.

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 System Programs (5/5)

• Background Services
➢ Launch at boot time.
• Some for system startup, then terminate.
• Some from system boot to shutdown.
➢ Provide facilities like disk checking, process scheduling, error
logging, printing.

• Application programs
➢ Don’t pertain to system.
➢ Run by users.
➢ Not typically considered part of OS.

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 OS Design and Implementation (1/3)

• Design and Implementation of OS not “solvable”, but

some approaches have proven successful.
• Internal structure of different Operating Systems can
vary widely.
• Start the design by defining goals and specifications.
• Affected by choice of hardware, type of system.

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 OS Design and Implementation (2/3)

• User goals and System goals

➢ User goals – operating system should be convenient to use,
easy to learn, reliable, safe, and fast.
➢ System goals – operating system should be easy to design,
implement, and maintain, as well as flexible, reliable, error-
free, and efficient.

• Specifying and designing an OS is highly creative task of

software engineering.

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 OS Design and Implementation (3/3)

• Much variation
➢ Early OSes in assembly language.
➢ Then system programming languages like Algol, PL/1
➢ Now C, C++

• Actually usually a mix of languages

➢ Lowest levels in assembly
➢ Main body in C
➢ Systems programs in C, C++, scripting languages like PERL,
Python, shell scripts.
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Operating System Structure (1/8)

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 Operating System Structure (2/8)

• General-purpose OS is very large program.

• Various ways to structure ones:
➢ Simple structure – MS-DOS
➢ More complex – UNIX
➢ Layered
➢ Microkernel – Mach

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 Operating System Structure (3/8)

Simple structure – MS-DOS

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 Operating System Structure (4/8)

The UNIX OS consists of two separable parts:

• Systems programs
• The kernel
➢ Consists of everything below the system-call interface and
above the physical hardware.
➢ Provides the file system, CPU scheduling, memory
management, and other operating-system functions; a large
number of functions for one level.

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 Operating System Structure (5/8)

Traditional UNIX System Structure

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 Operating System Structure (6/8)

Layered Approach

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 Operating System Structure (7/8)

Microkernel System Structure

• Moves as much from the kernel into user space
• Mach example of microkernel
• Mac OS X kernel (Darwin) partly based on Mach

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 Operating System Structure (7/8)

Microkernel System Structure

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 Operating System Structure (8/8)

Microkernel System Structure

Application File Device user

Program System Driver mode

messages messages

Interprocess memory CPU kernel

Communication managment scheduling mode

microkernel

hardware

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Dr. Marwa Elseddik

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