Chapter 2: Operating-System

Structures

Operating System Concepts – 10th Edition Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2018
 Chapter 2: Operating-System Structures

■ Operating System Services

■ User and Operating System-Interface
■ System Calls
■ System Services
■ Linkers and Loaders
■ Why Applications are Operating System Specific
■ Operating-System Design and Implementation
■ Operating System Structure
■ Building and Booting an Operating System
■ Operating System Debugging

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 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).
4 Varies between Command-Line (CLI), Graphics User
Interface (GUI), touch-screen, 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 (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
4 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
4 May occur in the CPU and memory hardware, in I/O devices, in user
program
4 For each type of error, OS should take the appropriate action to
ensure correct and consistent computing
4 Debugging facilities can greatly enhance the user s and
programmer s abilities to efficiently use the system

Operating System Concepts – 10th Edition 2.5 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2018
 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
4 Many types of resources - CPU cycles, main memory, file storage,
I/O devices.
● Logging - 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
4 Protection involves ensuring that all access to system resources is
controlled
4 Security of the system from outsiders requires user authentication,
extends to defending external I/O devices from invalid access
attempts

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 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
4 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)
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 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

Operating System Concepts – 10th Edition 2.11 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2018
 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,
Note that thePOSIX API for
system-call POSIX-based
names systemsthis
used throughout
(including
text virtually all versions of UNIX, Linux,
are generic
and Mac OS X), and Java API for the Java
virtual machine (JVM)

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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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 Example of Standard API

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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 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
4 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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 Types of System Calls
■ 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
● Dump memory if error
● Debugger for determining bugs, single step execution
● Locks for managing access to shared data between
processes

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 Types of System Calls (cont.)

■ File management
● create file, delete file
● open, close file
● read, write, reposition
● get and set file attributes
■ 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 (Cont.)
■ Information maintenance
● get time or date, set time or date
● get system data, set system data
● get and set process, file, or device attributes
■ Communications
● create, delete communication connection
● send, receive messages if message passing model to host name
or process name
4 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 (Cont.)

■ Protection
● Control access to resources
● Get and set permissions
● Allow and deny user access

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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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 System Services

■ 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
● Programming language support
● Program loading and execution
● Communications
● Background services
● Application programs
■ Most users view of the operation system is defined by
system programs, not the actual system calls

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 System Services (cont.)
■ 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
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 System Services (Cont.)
■ 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

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 System Services (Cont.)
■ Background Services
● Launch at boot time
4 Some for system startup, then terminate
4 Some from system boot to shutdown
● Provide facilities like disk checking, process scheduling, error logging,
printing
● Run in user context not kernel context
● Known as services, subsystems, daemons

■ Application programs
● Don’t pertain to system
● Run by users
● Not typically considered part of OS
● Launched by command line, mouse click, finger poke
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 Linkers and Loaders
■ Source code compiled into object files designed to be loaded into any physical
memory location – relocatable object file
■ Linker combines these into single binary executable file
● Also brings in libraries
■ Program resides on secondary storage as binary executable
■ Must be brought into memory by loader to be executed
● Relocation assigns final addresses to program parts and adjusts code and
data in program to match those addresses
■ Modern general purpose systems don’t link libraries into executables
● Rather, dynamically linked libraries (in Windows, DLLs) are loaded as
needed, shared by all that use the same version of that same library (loaded
once)
■ Object, executable files have standard formats, so operating system knows how
to load and start them
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 The Role of the Linker and Loader

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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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 Implementation

■ 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
■ More high-level language easier to port to other hardware
● But slower
■ Emulation can allow an OS to run on non-native hardware

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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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 Monolithic Structure – Original 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
4 Consists of everything below the system-call
interface and above the physical hardware
4 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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 Linux System Structure

Monolithic plus modular design

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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

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 Microkernels
■ 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

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 Microkernel System Structure

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 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)

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 macOS and iOS Structure

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 Darwin

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 Android
■ Developed by Open Handset Alliance (mostly Google)
● Open Source
■ Similar stack to IOS
■ Based on Linux kernel but modified
● Provides process, memory, device-driver management
● Adds power management
■ Runtime environment includes core set of libraries and Dalvik virtual
machine
● Apps developed in Java plus Android API
4 Java class files compiled to Java bytecode then translated to
executable than runs in Dalvik VM
■ Libraries include frameworks for web browser (webkit), database (SQLite),
multimedia, smaller libc
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 Android Architecture

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 Building and Booting Linux

■ Download Linux source code (http://www.kernel.org)

■ Configure kernel via “make menuconfig”
■ Compile the kernel using “make”
● Produces vmlinuz, the kernel image
● Compile kernel modules via “make modules”
● Install kernel modules into vmlinuz via “make modules_install”
● Install new kernel on the system via “make install”

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 System Boot
■ When power initialized on system, execution starts at a fixed memory
location
■ Operating system must be made available to hardware so hardware can
start it
● Small piece of code – bootstrap loader, BIOS, stored in ROM or
EEPROM locates the kernel, loads it into memory, and starts it
● Sometimes two-step process where boot block at fixed location
loaded by ROM code, which loads bootstrap loader from disk
● Modern systems replace BIOS with Unified Extensible Firmware
Interface (UEFI)
■ Common bootstrap loader, GRUB, allows selection of kernel from multiple
disks, versions, kernel options
■ Kernel loads and system is then running
■ Boot loaders frequently allow various boot states, such as single user
mode
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 Operating-System Debugging
■ Debugging is finding and fixing errors, or bugs
■ Also performance tuning
■ OS 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
● Sometimes using trace listings of activities, recorded for analysis
● Profiling is periodic sampling of instruction pointer to look for statistical
trends
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.
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 Tracing

■ Collects data for a specific event, such as steps involved

in a system call invocation
■ Tools include
■ strace – trace system calls invoked by a process
■ gdb – source-level debugger
■ perf – collection of Linux performance tools
■ tcpdump – collects network packets

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 End of Chapter 2

Operating System Concepts – 10th Edition Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2018