Operating System

Chapter 2: Operating-System
Structures
Operating System Concepts – 8th Edition, Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne

Chapter 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
 Virtual Machines
 Operating System Debugging
 Operating System Generation
 System Boot
Operating System Concepts – 8th Edition 2.2 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne
Objectives
 To describe the services an operating system provides to
users, processes, and other systems
 To discuss the various ways of structuring an operating
system
 To explain how operating systems are installed and
customized and how they boot
Operating System Services
 One set of operating-system services provides functions
that are helpful to the user:
a) User interface - Almost all operating systems have a
user interface (UI)
 Varies between Command-Line (CLI), Graphics User
Interface (GUI), Batch
one is a Command line interface ,which uses text
commands and a method for entering.
Another is a batch interface in which commands and
directives to control those commands are entered into files,
and those files are executed.
Most commonly, a graphical user interface is used.
Here, the interface is a window system with a pointing
device to direct I/0, choose from menus, and make
selections and a keyboard to enter text.
b) 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)
c) I/O operations - A running program may
require I/O, which may involve a file or an I/O device
d) File-system manipulation - The file system
is of particular interest. Obviously, programs need to
read and write files and directories, create and delete
them, search them, list file Information, permission
management.
A View of Operating System Services
Operating System Services (Cont)
 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 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 - Some (such as CPU cycles, main memory,
and file storage) may have special allocation code, others (such as
I/O devices) may have general request and release code
 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
 If a system is to be protected and secure, precautions must be
instituted throughout it. A chain is only as strong as its weakest link.
User Operating System Interface - CLI
Command Line Interface (CLI) or command interpreter

allows direct command entry
 Some operating systems include the command
interpreter in the kernel.
 Others, such as Windows XP and UNIX, treat the
command interpreter as a special program that is
running when a job is initiated or when a user first
logs on (on interactive systems).
 On systems with multiple command interpreters to
choose from, the interpreters are known as shells
 The main function of the command interpreter is to
get and execute the next user-specified command.
Many of the commands given at this level manipulate
files: create, delete, list, print, copy, execute, and so
on
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 as “Aqua” GUI interface with UNIX kernel
underneath and shells available
 Solaris is CLI with optional GUI interfaces
System Calls
 System calls provide an interface to the
services made available by an operating
system. System calls provide the interface
between a process and the operating system.
 Typically written in a high-level language (C
or C++)
 The API specifies a set of functions that are
available to an application programmer/
including the parameters that are passed to
each function and the return values the
programmer can expect.
 Mostly accessed by programs via a high-level
Application Program 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)
 Why use APIs rather than system calls?
-One benefit of programming according to an API
concerns
program portability:
An application programmer designing a program using
an API can expect her program to compile and run on
any system that supports the same API (although in
reality/ architectural differences often make this more
difficult than it may appear).
 Furthermore/ actual system calls can often be more
detailed and difficult to work with than the API
available to an application programmer.
Example of System Calls
 System call sequence to copy the contents of one file to
another file
Example of Standard API
 Consider the ReadFile() function in the
 Win32 API—a function for reading from a file
 A description of the parameters passed to ReadFile()

 HANDLE file—the file to be read
 LPVOID buffer—a buffer where the data will be read into and written
from
 DWORD bytesToRead—the number of bytes to be read into the buffer
 LPDWORD bytesRead—the number of bytes read during the last read
 LPOVERLAPPED ovl—indicates if overlapped I/O is being used
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 intended system call in OS
kernel and returns status of the system call and any return
values
 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)
API – System Call – OS Relationship
Standard C Library Example
 let's assume a C program invokes the
printf () statement
 C library intercepts this call and invokes
the necessary system call(s) in the
operating system-in this instance, the
write() system call.
 The C library takes the value returned by
write() and passes it back to the user
program.
.
System Call Parameter Passing
 Often, more information is required than
simply identity of desired system call
 Exact type and amount of information vary
according to OS and call
For example ,to get input, we may need to
specify the file or device to use as a
source, as well as the address and length
of the memory buffer into which the input
should be read,
 Three general methods used to pass parameters to the OS
 Simplest: pass the parameters in registers
 In some cases, may be more parameters than
registers
 Parameters stored in a block, or table, in memory, and
address of block passed as a parameter in a register
 This approach taken by Linux and Solaris
 Parameters placed, or pushed, onto the stack by the
program and popped off the stack by the operating
system
Block and stack methods do not limit the number or length

of parameters being passed
Parameter Passing via Table
Types of System Calls
 Process control
 File management
 Device management
 Information maintenance
 Communications
 Protection
 Process control
end, abort
load, execute
create process, terminate process
get process attributes, set process attributes
wait for time
wait event, signal event
allocate and free memory
 Device management
request device, release device
read, write, reposition
get device attributes, set device attributes
logically attach or detach devices
 Information maintenance
get time or date, set time or date
get system data, set system data
get process, file, or device attributes
set process, file, or device attributes
 Communications
create, delete communication
connection
send, receive messages
transfer status information
attach or detach remote devices
 File management
create file, delete file
open, close
read, write, reposition
get file attributes, set file attributes
Examples of Windows and Unix System Calls
MS-DOS execution
(a) At system startup (b) running a

program
System Programs
 System programs provide a convenient environment
for program development and execution. The can be
divided into:
 File manipulation
 Status information
 File modification
 Programming language support
 Program loading and execution
 Communications
 Application programs
 Most users’ view of the operation system is defined
by system programs, not the actual system calls
System Programs
 Provide a convenient environment for program development and
execution
 Some of them are simply user interfaces to system calls; others
are considerably more complex
 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
 Some systems implement a registry - used to store and retrieve
configuration information
System Programs (cont’d)
 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
 Program loading and execution- Absolute loaders,
relocatable loaders, linkage editors, and overlay-loaders,
debugging systems for higher-level and machine language
 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
Operating System Design and Implementation
 In this section, we discuss problems we face in designing

and implementing an operating system. There are, of course,
no complete solutions to such problems, but there are
approaches that have proved successful.
 Internal structure of different Operating Systems can vary
widely
 the design of the system will be affected by the choice of
hardware and the type of system: batch, time shared, single
user, multiuser, distributed, real time, or general purpose.
Affected by choice of hardware, type of system
 It is much harder to specify the requirement.
 The requirements be divided into two basic groups. 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
 A similar set of requirements can be defined by those
people who must design, create, maintain, and operate
the system.
 The system should be easy to design, implement, and
maintain; and it should be flexible, reliable, error free,
and efficient.
Operating System Design and Implementation (Cont)
 Important principle to separate

Policy: What will be done?
Mechanism: How to do it?
 Mechanisms determine how to do something, policies decide
what will be done
 The separation of policy from mechanism is a very
important principle, it allows maximum flexibility if policy
decisions are to be changed later
 Policies are likely to change across places or over
time. A change in policy would then require
redefinition of only certain parameters of the system.
For instance, consider a mechanism for giving priority
to certain types of programs over others
 Policy decisions are important for all resource
allocation. Whenever it is necessary to decide whether
or not to allocate a resource, a policy decision must be
made. Whenever the question is how rather than what,
it is a mechanism that must be determined.
Operating system structure
 A system as large and complex as a modern
operating system must be engineered
carefully if it is to function properly and be
modified easily.
 A common approach is to partition the task
into small components rather than have one
monolithic system.
 Each of these modules should be a well-
defined portion of the system, with carefully
defined inputs, outputs, and functions.
Simple Structure
 Many commercial operating systems do not have well-defined
structures.
 Frequently, such systems started as small, simple, and limited systems
and
hen grew beyond their original scope.
 MS-DOS is an example of such a system
 It was originally designed and implemented by a few people who had
no idea that it would become so popular. It was written to provide the
most
 functionality in the least space, so it was not divided into modules
carefully.
 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
 In MS-DOS, the interfaces and levels of
functionality are not well separated.
 instance, application programs are able to
access the basic I/O routines to write directly
to the display and disk drives.
 Such freedom leaves MS-DOS vulnerable to
errant (or malicious) programs, causing entire
system crashes when user programs fail.
MS-DOS Layer Structure
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
Traditional UNIX System 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
 The main advantage of the layered approach is simplicity of
constructionand debugging.
 The layers are selected so that each uses functions
(operations) and services of only lower-level layers.
 This approach simplifies debugging and .system verification.
 The first layer can be debugged without any concern for the
rest of the system. Once the first layer is debugged, its
correct functioning can be assumed while the second layer
is debugged, and so on. If an error is found during the
debugging of a particular layer, the error must be on that
layer, because the layers below it are already debugged.
 Thus, the design and implementation of the system are
simplified.
 Each layer is implemented with only those
operations provided by lowerlevel layers.
 A layer does not need to know how these
operations are implemented; it needs to know
only what these operations do.
 Hence, each layer hides the existence of
certain data structures, operations, and
hardware from higher-level layers.
 The major difficulty with the layered
approach involves appropriately defining
the various layers.
 Other requirements may not be so
obvious
 Less efficient than other types
 Each layer adds overhead to the system
call; the net result is a system call that
takes longer than does one on a
nonlayered system.
Layered Operating System
Microkernels
 In the mid-1980s, researchers at Carnegie Mellon
University developed an operating system called
Mach that modularized the kernel using the
microkernel approach.
 This method structures the operating system by
removing all nonessential components from the kemel
and implementing them as system and user level
program. The result is smaller kernel.
 There is little consensus regarding which services
should remain in the kernel and which should be
implemented in user space. Typically, however,
microkernels provide minimal process and memory
management, in addition to a communication facility.
Microkernels
 The main function of the microkernel is to
provide a communication facility between the
client program and the various services that
are also running in user space.
Communication is provided by message
passing.
 For example ,if the client program wishes to
access a file, it must interact with the file
server. The client program and service never
interact directly. Rather they communicate by
exchanging message with the microkernel.
Microkernel System Structure
 Moves as much from the kernel into “ user” space
 Benefits:
 One benefit of the microkernel approach is ease of
extending the operating system. All new services are
added to user space and consequently do not require
modification of the kernel.
 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
Modules
 Most modern operating systems implement kernel modules
 Operating system design involves using object-oriented
programming techniques to create a modular kernel.
 Each core component is separate
 Each talks to the others over known interfaces
 Each is loadable as needed within the kernel
 Overall, similar to layers but with more flexible
Modules…..
 For example the Solaris operating

system structure is organized
around a core kernel with seven
types of loadable kernel modules.
Solaris Modular Approach
Virtual Machines
 The fundamental idea behind a virtual machine is to
abstract the hardware of a single computer (the CPU,
memory, disk drives, network interface cards, and so
forth) into several different execution environments,
thereby creating the illusion that each separate
execution environment is running its own private
computer.
Virtual Machines
 A virtual machine takes the layered approach to

its logical conclusion. It treats hardware and the
operating system kernel as though they were all
hardware
 A virtual machine provides an interface identical
to the underlying bare hardware
 The operating system host creates the illusion
that a process has its own processor and (virtual
memory)
 Each guest provided with a (virtual) copy of
underlying computer
Virtual Machines History
 Virtual machines first appeared commercially on IBM
mainframes via the VM Operating system in 1972.VM
has evolved and still available, and many of the
original concepts are found in other system.
 A major difficulty with the VM virtual machine
approach involved disk systems. Suppose that the
physical machine had three disk drives but wanted to
support seven virtual machines.
 The solution was to provide virtual disks-termed
minidisks in IBM's VM operating system -that are
identical in all respects except size.
 Once these virtual machines were created, users could
run any of the operating systems or software packages
that were available on the underlying machine.
Virtual Machines Benefits
 Fundamentally, multiple execution environments (different
operating systems) can share the same hardware
 Protect from each other
 Some sharing of file can be permitted, controlled
 Commutate with each other, other physical systems via
networking
Virtual Machines Benefits…….
 A virtual-machine system is a perfect vehicle for operating-
systems
research and development. Normally, changing an operating
system is a difficult task. Operating systems are large and
complex programs, and it is difficult to be sure that a change
in one part will not cause obscure bugs to appear in some
other part. The power of the operating system makes
changing it particularly dangerous. Thus, it is necessary to
test all changes to the operating system carefully.
 Another advantage of virtual machines for developers is that multiple operating
systems can be running on the developer's workstation concurrently. This virtualized
workstation allows for rapid porting and testing of programs in varying
environments.
 Similarly, quality-assurance engineers can test their applications in multiple
environments without buying, powering, and maintaining a computer for each
environment.
Virtual Machines Benefits
 A major advantage of virtual machines in
production data-center use is system
consolidation, which involves taking two or
more separate systems and running them in
virtual machines on one system. Such
physical-to-virtual conversions result in
resource optimization, as many lightly used
systems can be combined to create one more
heavily used system.
Virtual Machines (Cont)
Non-virtual Machine Virtual Machine
(a) Nonvirtual machine (b) virtual

machine
Para-virtualization
 Presents guest with system similar but not identical to
hardware
 Guest must be modified to run on paravirtualized hardwareF
 Guest can be an OS, or in the case of Solaris 10 applications
running in containers
 paravirtualization is a virtualization
technique that presents a software interface
to virtual machines that is similar but not
identical to that of the underlying hardware.
 In this system, only one kernel is installed, and the
hardware is not virtualized. Rather, the operating
system and its devices are virtualized, providing
processes within a container with the impression that
they are the only processes on the system. One or
more containers can be created, and each can have its
own applications, network stacks, network address
and ports, user accounts, and so on. CPU resources
can be divided up among the containers and the
system wide processes.
Solaris 10 with Two Containers
VMware Architecture
The Java Virtual Machine
Operating-System Debugging
 Debugging is finding and fixing errors, or bugs
 OSes generate log files containing error information
 Failure of an application can generate core dump file capturing
memory of the process
 Operating system failure can generate crash dump file containing
kernel memory
 Beyond crashes, performance tuning can optimize system
performance
 Kernighan’s Law: “Debugging is twice as hard as writing the code in
the ﬁrst place. Therefore, if you write the code as cleverly as
possible, you are, by deﬁnition, not smart enough to debug it.”
 DTrace tool in Solaris, FreeBSD, Mac OS X allows live
instrumentation on production systems
 Probes fire when code is executed, capturing state data and
sending it to consumers of those probes
Operating System Generation
 Operating systems are designed to run on any of a class of
machines; the system must be configured for each specific
computer site
 SYSGEN program obtains information concerning the
specific configuration of the hardware system
 Booting – starting a computer by loading the kernel
 Bootstrap program – code stored in ROM that is able to
locate the kernel, load it into memory, and start its
execution
System Boot
 Operating system must be made available to hardware so
hardware can start it
 Small piece of code – bootstrap loader, locates the
kernel, loads it into memory, and starts it
 Sometimes two-step process where boot block at fixed
location loads bootstrap loader
 When power initialized on system, execution starts at a
fixed memory location
 Firmware used to hold initial boot code

Operating System

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Operating System

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Description:

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Operating System

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Chapter 2: Operating-System

Operating System Concepts – 8th Edition, Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne

 Operating System Services

Command Line Interface (CLI) or command interpreter

Win32 API for Windows,

 A description of the parameters passed to ReadFile()

Block and stack methods do not limit the number or length

(a) At system startup (b) running a

 In this section, we discuss problems we face in designing

 Important principle to separate

 MS-DOS – written to provide the most functionality in the least space

 UNIX – limited by hardware functionality, the original

 For example the Solaris operating

 A virtual machine takes the layered approach to

Non-virtual Machine Virtual Machine

(a) Nonvirtual machine (b) virtual

You might also like