Chapter 2: Operating-System

Structures

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Operating System Services
 Operating systems provide an environment for execution of programs
and services to programs and users
 One set of operating-system services provides functions that are
helpful to the user:
 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

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 2.2 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Operating System Services (Cont.)

 One set of operating-system services provides functions that are helpful to

the user (Cont.):
 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)
 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

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 2.3 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Operating System Services (Cont.)
 Another set of OS functions exists for ensuring the efficient operation of the
system itself via resource sharing
 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
 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

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 2.4 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 A View of Operating System Services

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 User Operating System Interface - CLI

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
 If the latter, adding new features doesn’t require shell
modification

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 Bourne Shell Command Interpreter

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 User Operating System 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)
 Invented at Xerox PARC
 Many systems now include both CLI and GUI interfaces
 Microsoft Windows is GUI with CLI “command” shell
 Apple Mac OS X is “Aqua” GUI interface with UNIX kernel
underneath and shells available
 Unix and Linux have CLI with optional GUI interfaces (CDE,
KDE, GNOME)

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 2.8 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 The Mac OS X GUI

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 System Calls
 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)

Note that the system-call names used throughout this

text are generic

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 Example of System Calls

 System call sequence to copy the contents of one file to another file

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 System Call Implementation

 Typically, a number associated with each system call

 System-call interface maintains a table indexed according to
these numbers
 The system call interface invokes the intended system call in OS
kernel and returns status of the system call and any return values
 The parameters to the system call can be passed through these 3
approaches – registers, block/table, stack.
 The caller need know nothing about how the system call is
implemented
 Just needs to obey API and understand what OS will do as a
result call
 Most details of OS interface hidden from programmer by API
 Managed by run-time support library (set of functions built
into libraries included with compiler)

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 API – System Call – OS Relationship

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 Examples of Windows and Unix System Calls

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 Standard C Library Example

 C program invoking printf() library call, which calls write() system call

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 Operating System Design and Implementation

 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

 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

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 Operating System Kernel
 A kernel is a central component of an operating system.

 It acts as an interface between the user applications and the hardware.

 The sole aim of the kernel is to manage the communication between the
software (user level applications) and the hardware (CPU, disk memory
etc.).

 The main tasks of the kernel are :

 Process management
 Device management
 Memory management
 Interrupt handling, I/O communication, and File system.

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 2.17 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Types of kernels
 Classified mainly in two categories
 Monolithic (Mono means single, Lithic means layer)
 Micro Kernel.
 Monolithic
 Older approach
 Basic system services like process and memory management,
interrupt handling etc. were packed into a single module in kernel
space.
 Some serious problems like,
 Size was huge,
 Poor maintainability (bug fixing and addition of new features resulted
in recompilation of the whole kernel code which could consume
hours.
 E.g. MS-DOS

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 2.18 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Types of kernels

 Micro Kernel
 Modern Kernel approach (Modular Approach)

 Kernel consists of different modules which can be dynamically loaded and

un-loaded.

 Easy extension of OS’s capabilities.

 Maintainability became so easy as only the concerned module needs to

be loaded and unloaded every time if there is change or bug fix in a
particular module.

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 Micro Kernel
 This solve the problem of ever growing size of kernel code which we could not
control in monolithic approach.
 This architecture allows some basic services like,
 Device driver management
 Protocol stack
 File system etc. to run in user space.

 It reduces the kernel size and increases the security and stability of OS e.g., if
network service crashes due to buffer overflow, then only the networking
services memory would be corrupted, leaving the rest of the system still
functional.

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 Monolithic Kernel vs. Micro Kernel

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 Instruction Execution

 Once a program is in memory it has to be executed.

 To do this, each instruction must be looked at, decoded and acted upon in
turn until the program is completed.

 This is achieved by the use of what is termed the “instruction execution

cycle”, which is the cycle by which each instruction in turn is processed.

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 2.22 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Instruction Execution(IE)
 The process in which CPU reads instruction from memory and execute each
instruction
 The processing required for single instruction called instruction cycle.
 At the beginning of each instruction cycle, CPU fetches instruction from
memory.
 PC holds the address of the next instruction to be executed.
 The fetched instruction is loaded into IR.

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 Jobs types
 There are two types of jobs
 I/O limited jobs
 If in an application most of the tasks are I/O oriented then it is called
I/O jobs.
 For (k=0;k<=5;k++)
– cout<<k;
 CPU limited jobs
 If a program only needs computation/processing then this is called
CPU limited jobs.
 Sum=0;
 For (k=0;k<=5;k++)
– sum=sum+k;

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 2.24 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Interrupt processing
 Interrupt
 An Interrupt is an event that alters the sequence in which the processor
executes instructions.
 When an I/O device completes an I/O operation some events occurs,
 The device issue an interrupt signal to the CPU.
 The processor finishes the execution of the current instruction before
responding to the interrupt and save the state of the interrupted process.
 The OS analyses the interrupt and passes the control to the appropriate
interrupt handling routine.
 The IHR handles the interrupt.
 The state of the interrupted process restored.
 The interrupted process executes.

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 2.25 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Interrupt Handling
 While executing a process, an interrupt triggers.
 It is handled by the IHR.
 The process starts its execution again.

 However what will happen if while handling an interrupt, another interrupt

triggers?

 It can be handled using two approaches

 Sequential approach
 Nested approach

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 Sequential Interrupt Handling

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 Nested Interrupt Handling

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 Operating System Structure
 General-purpose OS is very large program
 Various ways to structure ones
 Simple structure – MS-DOS
 More complex -- UNIX
 Layered – an abstrcation
 Microkernel -Mach

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 Simple Structure -- MS-DOS

 MS-DOS – written to provide the

most functionality in the least
space
 Not divided into modules
 Although MS-DOS has some
structure, its interfaces and
levels of functionality are not
well separated

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 Non Simple Structure -- UNIX

UNIX – limited by hardware functionality, the original UNIX

operating system had limited structuring. 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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 Traditional UNIX System Structure
Beyond simple but not fully layered

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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

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 2.33 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 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
 Communication takes place between user modules using
message passing
 Benefits:
 Easier to extend a microkernel
 Easier to port the operating system to new architectures
 More reliable (less code is running in kernel mode)
 More secure
 Detriments:
 Performance overhead of user space to kernel space
communication

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 2.34 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 Hybrid Systems

 Most modern operating systems are actually not one pure model
 Hybrid combines multiple approaches to address
performance, security, usability needs
 Linux and Solaris kernels in kernel address space, so
monolithic, plus modular for dynamic loading of functionality
 Windows mostly monolithic, plus microkernel for different
subsystem personalities
 Apple Mac OS X hybrid, layered, Aqua UI plus Cocoa
programming environment
 Below is kernel consisting of Mach microkernel and BSD Unix
parts, plus I/O kit and dynamically loadable modules (called
kernel extensions)

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 2.35 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
 End of Chapter 2

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013