Multistep Processing of a User

Program
 User programs go
through several steps
before being run.

 Program components
do not necessarily
know where in RAM
they will be loaded
 RAM deals with
absolute addresses
 Logical addresses need
to be bound to physical
addresses at some
point.

Operating System Concepts 9.1 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne 2002

 Binding of Addresses to Memory

Address binding of instructions and data to memory addresses can

happen at three different stages.

 Compile time: If memory location known a

priori, absolute code can be generated; must
recompile code if starting location changes.
 Load time: Must generate relocatable code if
memory location is not known at compile
time.
 Loader does relocation
 Execution time: Binding delayed until run
time if the process can be moved during its
execution from one memory segment to
another.
 Need hardware support for address maps (e.g.,
base and limit registers).

Operating System Concepts 9.2 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne 2002

 Swapping

 A process can be swapped temporarily out of

memory to a backing store, and then brought
back into memory for continued execution.
 E.g., after quantum of round robin
 Return to same place if no dynamic relocation
 Return anywhere if dynamic relocation (useful
for defragmentation)
 Major part of swap time is transfer time; total
transfer time is directly proportional to the
amount of memory swapped (slow)
 Backing store – fast disk large enough to
accommodate copies of all memory images
for all users; must provide direct access to
these memory images (beware DMA)
 Roll out, roll in – swapping variant used for
priority-based scheduling algorithms; lower-
priority process is swapped out so higher-
priority process can be loaded and executed.
Operating System Concepts 9.3 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne 2002
 Schematic View of Swapping

Operating System Concepts 9.4 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne 2002

 Logical vs. Physical Address
Space
 The concept of a logical address space that is
bound to a separate physical address space is
central to proper memory management.
 Logical address – generated by the CPU; also
referred to as virtual address.
 Physical address – address seen by the memory
unit.
 Logical and physical addresses are the same in
compile-time and load-time address-binding
schemes; logical (virtual) and physical addresses
differ in execution-time address-binding scheme.
 Memory-Management Unit (MMU)
 Hardware device that maps virtual to physical
address.
 The user program deals with logical addresses; it
never sees the real physical addresses.

Operating System Concepts 9.5 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne 2002

 Contiguous Memory Allocation

 Main memory usually into

two partitions:
 Resident operating system,
usually held in low memory
with interrupt vector.
 User processes then held in
high memory.

Operating System Concepts 9.6 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne 2002

 Contiguous Memory Relocation
 Relocation-register scheme used to protect
user processes from each other, and from
changing operating-system code and data.
 Relocation register contains value of smallest
physical address; limit register contains range
of logical addresses – each logical address
must be less than the limit register.

Operating System Concepts 9.7 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne 2002

 Multiple Partition Allocation

 Hole – block of available memory; holes of

various size are scattered throughout
memory.
 When a process arrives, it is allocated
contiguous memory from a hole large enough
to accommodate it.
 Operating system maintains information
about:
OS OS OS OS
a) allocated partitions b) free partitions
process process process process
(hole)
5 5 5 5
process process
9 9
process process
8 10

process process process process

2 2 2 2

Operating System Concepts 9.8 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne 2002

 Multiple Partition Allocation

Operating System Concepts 9.9 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne 2002

 Dynamic Storage-Allocation
Problem
 How to satisfy a request of size n from a list of
free holes
 First-fit: Allocate the first hole that is big
enough (fast, but fragments)
 Best-fit: Allocate the smallest hole that is big
enough; must search entire list, unless ordered
by size (slow, but small fragments).
 Worst-fit: Allocate the largest hole; must also
search entire list (slow, but leaves large holes)

 First-fit and best-fit better than worst-fit in

terms of speed and storage utilization.

Operating System Concepts 9.10 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne 2002

 Fragmentation

 Internal Fragmentation – allocated memory

may be slightly larger than requested memory;
this size difference is memory internal to a
partition, but not being used.
 Occurs when memory is allocated in fixed size
pieces

Operating System Concepts 9.11 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne 2002

 External Fragmentation
 Total memory space exists to satisfy a request,
but it is not contiguous. (Stats indicate 1/3
wastage)
 Reduce external fragmentation
by compaction
Shuffle memory contents to place
all free memory together in one
large block.
Compaction is possible only if
relocation is dynamic (i.e., registers
can be updated), and is done at
execution time.
I/O problem
Latch job in memory while it is
involved in I/O.
Do I/O only into OS buffers.

Operating System Concepts 9.12 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne 2002

 Compaction Options

Operating System Concepts 9.13 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne 2002