Scribd
Upload
201 views

Dbit 403 Computer Operating Systems

The document is an exam for a university course on computer operating systems. It contains 3 questions about public domain software, system calls, process scheduling, file operations, memory management, and different types of computer memory. The exam expects students to answer all questions in a written report and upload it by the deadline.

Uploaded by

Kimpai Lekutuk
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
201 views

Dbit 403 Computer Operating Systems

The document is an exam for a university course on computer operating systems. It contains 3 questions about public domain software, system calls, process scheduling, file operations, memory management, and different types of computer memory. The exam expects students to answer all questions in a written report and upload it by the deadline.

Uploaded by

Kimpai Lekutuk
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 3

UNIVERSITY EXAMINATIONS: 2019/2020

EXAMINATION FOR THE DIPLOMA IN BUSINESS INFORMATION


TECHNOLOGY

DBIT 403: COMPUTER OPERATING SYSTEMS

OPEN BOOK EXAM

DATE: AUGUST, 2020 TIME: 6 HOURS

INSTRUCTIONS: Attempt ALL Questions

You are expected to compile an assignment report documenting the answers for
the given questions and upload the prepared file via the Moodle platform. The
assignment report must have the cover page documenting your registration
number, name, the course you are taking and your campus.

Note: Any form of plagiarism will not be tolerated.

Page 1 of 3
QUESTION ONE [20 MARKS]

A) Public domain software refers to software that is not protected by copyright and thus
may be duplicated by anyone at will. Explain four reasons behind developing and
distributing public domain software [4 Marks]
B) System calls are part of most modern operating systems. Required:-
(i) Explain the term “system call” and state the purpose of a system call [4
Marks]
(ii) Discuss the mechanism used to implement system calls? [4 Marks]
C) Process scheduling can be preemptive or non-preemptive. Required: - Compare and
contrast these approaches, commenting on issues of simplicity, fairness, performance
and required hardware support [8 Marks]

QUESTION TWO [20 MARKS]

A) From the point of view of the application programmer, data may be read from a
device in a blocking, non-blocking or asynchronous fashion. Using a keyboard as an
example of a device, describe the expected behavior in each case [6 Marks]
B) Discuss the possible effects of a crash, causing loss of main memory, at various points
during file creation and deletion operations supported by operating systems [6 marks]
C) The operating system typically provides each process with the illusion that it runs in a
contiguous piece of memory.
(i) State the problem of external fragmentation in memory where processes have
variably sized memory partitions. [3 Marks]
(ii) Describe how paged virtual memory solves this problem, and any time and space
costs it introduces. [5 Marks]

QUESTION THREE [10 MARKS]

A) Modern computers store data in a variety of “memories”, each with differing size and
access speeds. Briefly describe each of the following:-
(i) Cache memory [1 Mark]
(ii) Main memory [1 Mark]
(iii) Registers [1 Mark]

Page 2 of 3
B) Give an example situation in which operating systems effectively consider disk
storage to be a fourth type of “memory” [2 Marks]
C) A researcher proposes using fast non-volatile memory for all data, rather than using
the four separate kinds of “memory” mentioned above. Comment on the pros and
cons of this approach [5 Marks]

Page 3 of 3

You might also like