Chapter 10

Management of
Network Functions

Understanding Operating Systems,

Fourth Edition
 Objectives
You will be able to describe:
• The complexities introduced to operating systems
by network capabilities
• Network operating systems (NOS) compared to
distributed operating systems (DO/S)
• How a DO/S performs memory, process, device,
and file management
• How a NOS performs memory, process, device,
and file management
• Important features of DO/S and NOS

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 2

 History of Networks

• Networks were created initially to share expensive

hardware resources
• OSs were enhanced with network capabilities to
give users easy access to centralized information
resources
• Development of network operating system followed
by the more powerful distributed operating system
• Use of distributed processing allows
– Even greater access to centralized information
– Users to work together to complete common tasks

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 3

Comparison of Network and Distributed
Operating Systems
Network Operating Systems (NOS):
• Gives local operating systems extended powers
• Handles interfacing details and coordinates remote
processing
• Coordinates communications between local
operating systems
• Limitation: Doesn’t take global control over
memory management, process management,
device management, or file management
– Sees them as autonomous local functions

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 4

Comparison of Network and Distributed
Operating Systems (continued)

Figure 10.1: A NOS environment

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 5
Comparison of Network and Distributed
Operating Systems (continued)

Distributed Operating Systems (DO/S):

• Need for global control of assets by OS led to the
development of DO/S
• Provide a unified environment designed to optimize
operations for the network as a whole
• Typically constructed with replicated kernel OS
• Network and intricacies are hidden from users so
they can use network as single logical system

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 6

Comparison of Network and Distributed
Operating Systems (continued)

Figure 10.2: A DO/S environment

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 7

Comparison of Network and Distributed
Operating Systems (continued)

Table 10.1: Comparison of NOS and DO/S

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 8

 DO/S Development

• Manages entire group of resources within the

network in a global fashion
– Resource allocation based on negotiation and
compromise among equally important peer sites

• Advantage: Ability to support file copying, e- mail,

and remote printing without installation of special
server software on local machines

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 9

 Memory Management

• Memory Manager uses a kernel with a paging

algorithm to track the amount of available memory

• Memory allocation and deallocation depend on

scheduling and resource-sharing schemes

• Memory Manager accepts requests for memory

from both local and global sources

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 10

 Memory Management (continued)

• Functions of Memory Manager in DO/S:

– Allocates pages based on the local policy (on a local
level)
– Receives requests from the Process Manager to
provide memory to new or expanding client or server
processes (on a global level)
– Uses local resources to perform garbage collection
in memory, perform compaction
– Decide which are most and least active processes
– Determine which processes to preempt to provide
space for others

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 11

 Memory Management (continued)
• Functions of Memory Manager: (continued)
– To control demand, it handles requests to allocate &
deallocate space based on network’s usage patterns
– Automatically brings requested page into memory
– Examines the total free memory table before
allocating space
– Manages virtual memory
• Allocates and deallocates virtual memory
• Reads and writes to virtual memory
• Swaps virtual pages to disk
• Locks virtual pages in memory, and protects the
pages that need to be protected

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 12

 Memory Management (continued)

Table 10.2: Protection checks performed on pages

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 13
 Process Management

• Provides policies and mechanisms to create,

delete, abort, name, rename, find, schedule, block,
run, and synchronize processes, and to provide
real-time priority execution if required
• Manages the states of execution: READY,
RUNNING, and WAIT
– Each CPU in the network is required to have its own
run-time kernel

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 14

 Process Management (continued)

Kernel:
• Each kernel assumes the role of helping the
system reach its operational goals
• Kernel’s states are dependent on the global
system’s process scheduler and dispatcher
• System’s scheduling function has three parts:
– Decision mode
– Priority function
– Arbitration rule

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 15

 Process Management (continued)

Figure 10.3: Each kernel controls each piece of hardware

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 16

 Process Management (continued)

• Decision mode: Determines which policies to use

when scheduling a resource
– Options: Preemptive, nonpreemptive, round robin etc.
• Priority function: Gives scheduling algorithm the
policy that’s used to assign an order to processes in
the execution cycle
– Example: Most time remaining (MTR), LTR, etc.
• Arbitration rule: Used to resolve conflicts between
jobs of equal priority
– Example: Last-in first-out (LIFO), FIFO

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 17

 Process Management (continued)

• Advances in job scheduling rely on:

– Queuing theory
– Statistical decision theory
– Estimation theory:
• Maximizes system’s throughput by using durations to
compute and schedule optimal way to interleave
process chunks
• Processes are created, located, synchronized and
deleted using specific procedures

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 18

 Process Management (continued)

Functions of Processor Manager:

• To create process, it creates PCB with additional
information identifying process’s location in network
• To locate process, it uses system directory or
process that searches all kernel queue spaces
– Requires system support for interprocess
communications
• To synchronize processes, uses message passing
or remote procedure calls
• To delete or terminate process, it finds PCB,
accesses it, and deletes it

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 19

 Process Management (continued)

• Two ways to design DO/S:

– Process based DO/S
• Network resources are managed as a large
heterogeneous collection
– Object-based DO/S
• Clumps each type of hardware with its necessary
operational software into discrete objects that are
manipulated as a unit

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 20

 Process-Based DO/S

• Provides for process management via client/server

processes synchronized and linked together
through messages & ports (channels or pipes)
• Emphasizes processes and messages and how
they provide basic features essential to process
management
• Processes can be managed from single OS copy,
from multiple cooperating peers, or some
combination of two

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 21

 Process-Based DO/S (continued)

• High level of cooperation and sharing of actions &

data
• Synchronization is a key issue in network process
management
• Interrupts represented as messages sent to proper
process for service

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 22

 Object-Based DO/S

• System is viewed as a collection of objects

– Example: Hardware (CPUs, memory), software
(files, programs), or a combination of the two
• Objects are viewed as abstract entities
– Objects have a set of unchanging properties
• Process management becomes object
management, with processes acting as discrete
objects
• Two components of process management:
– Kernel level and process manager

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 23

 The Kernel Level

• Provides basic mechanisms for building OS by

dynamically creating, managing, scheduling,
synchronizing, and deleting objects
• Maintains network’s capability lists
• Responsible for process synchronization and
communication support
• Communication between distributed objects can be
in the form of shared data objects, message
objects, or control interactions
• Must have a scheduler with a consistent and robust
mechanism for scheduling objects
Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 24
 The Process Manager

• Creates its own primitives if kernel doesn’t already

have primitives (test and set, P and V)
• Responsible for:
– Creating, dispatching, and scheduling objects
– Synchronizing operations on objects
– Communicating among objects and deleting objects
• Uses kernel environment to perform above tasks
• Objects contain all of their state information

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 25

 Device Management

• Devices must be opened, read from, written to, and

closed
• Device parameters must be initialized and status
bits must be set or cleared
– Can be done on a global, cluster, or localized basis
• Allocates and deallocates devices to users
– Only when a process issues OPEN and CLOSE
command
• Keeps a global accounting of each network device
and its availability

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 26

 Device Management (continued)

Figure 10.4: All devices are operated by their individual device

managers or device drivers using specific status data that’s
controlled by the DO/S Device Manager
Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 27
 Process-Based DO/S

• All resources in process-based DO/S are controlled

by servers called “guardians” or “administrators”,
which are responsible for:
– Accepting requests for service on the individual
devices they control
– Processing each request fairly
– Providing service to the requestor, and returning to
serve others

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 28

 Process-Based DO/S (continued)

• Many systems have clusters of resources

– To control these clusters as a group, most process-
based systems are configured around complex
server processes
• The administrator process is configured as a
Device Manager and includes software needed to
– Accept local and remote requests for service
– Decipher their meaning, and act on them
• A server process is made up of one or more device
drivers, a Device Manager, and a network server
component
Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 29
 Process-Based DO/S (continued)

Figure 10.5: A process-based DO/S

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 30

 Object-Based DO/S

• Each device is managed the same way throughout

the network
• Physical device is considered an object, surrounded
by a layer of software
• Physical device is manipulated by a set of
operations, that mobilize the device to perform its
designated functions
• Objects can be assembled to communicate and
synchronize with each other
– If local device manager can’t satisfy user’s request,
the request is sent to another device manager
Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 31
 Object-Based DO/S (continued)

• Users don’t need to know if the network’s resources

are centralized or distributed
• Device Manager object at each site needs to
maintain a current directory of device objects at all
sites

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 32

 File Management

• To provide transparent mechanisms to find and

open, read, write, close, create, and delete files
• Subset of database managers; implemented as
distributed database management systems as part
of LANs
• Tasks involve:
– Concurrency control
– Data redundancy
– Location transparency and distributed directory
– Deadlock resolution or recovery
– Query processing
Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 33
 File Management (continued)

Table 10.3: Typical file management functions and the

necessary reactions of the File Manager
Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 34
 File Management (continued)

Table 10.3 (continued): Typical file management functions

and the necessary reactions of the File Manager

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 35

 File Management (continued)

• Concurrency Control: Gives the system the ability

to perform concurrent reads and writes, provided
these actions don’t jeopardize database
– Provides a serial execution view on a database
• Data Redundancy: Makes files much faster and
easier to read
– Allows a process to read the copy that’s closest or
easiest to access
– Read request can be split into several different
requests for a larger file

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 36

 File Management (continued)

• Data Redundancy: (continued)

– Advantage: Disaster recovery easy
– Disadvantage: Task of keeping multiple copies of
the same file up-to-date at all times
• Updates to be performed at all sites
• Location Transparency and Distributed Directory:
– Users not concerned with physical location of their
files, deal with the network as a single system
– Provided by mechanisms and directories that map
logical data items to physical locations

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 37

 File Management (continued)

• Location Transparency and Distributed Directory:

– Distributed directory manages transparency of
data location and enhances data recovery for users
and contains:
• Definitions dealing with the physical and logical
structure for the stored data
• Policies and mechanisms for mapping between the
two
• Systemwide names of all resources and addressing
mechanisms for locating and accessing them

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 38

 Deadlock Resolution or Recovery

• Deadlock Resolution or Recovery are critical issues

in distributed systems
– Most important function is to detect and recover from
a circular wait
• Complex and difficult to detect because it involves
multiple processes and multiple resources
• Detection, prevention, avoidance, and recovery are
all strategies used by a distributed system

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 39

 Deadlock Resolution or Recovery
(continued)
• To recognize circular waits, system uses directed
resource graphs and looks for cycles
• To prevent circular waits, system tries to delay the
start of a transaction until it has all the resources
• To avoid circular waits, system tries to allow
execution only when it knows that the transaction
can run to completion
• To recover, system selects the best victim, kills the
victim, reallocates its resources to the waiting
processes
Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 40
 Query Processing

• Function of processing requests for information

• Tries to increase the effectiveness of global query
execution sequences, local site processing
sequences, and device processing sequences
• To ensure consistency of the entire system’s
scheduling scheme
– Query processing strategy must be an integral part
of the processing scheduling strategy

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 41

 Network Management

• Network Manager provides policies to provide

intrasite and intersite communication
• Network Manager’s responsibilities include:
– Locate processes in the network
– Send messages throughout the network, and track
media use
– Reliably transfer data
– Code and decode messages, retransmit errors
– Perform parity checking, do cyclic redundancy
checks, establish redundant links
– Acknowledge messages and replies, if necessary

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 42

 Network Management (continued)

• Links processes or objects together through a port

when they need to communicate with each other
• Provides routing functions
• Keeps statistics on network use
– For use in message scheduling, fault localizations,
and rerouting
• Provides mechanisms to aid process time
synchronization

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 43

 Network Management (continued)

Process-Based DO/S:
– Interprocess communication is transparent to users
– Network Manager assumes full responsibility for:
• Allocating ports to the processes
• Identifying every process in the network
• Controlling flow of messages
• Guaranteeing transmission and acceptance of
messages without errors
– Routinely acts as interfacing mechanism for every
process in the system
– As traffic operator, it accepts and interprets each
process’s commands to send and receive
Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 44
 Network Management (continued)

Object-Based DO/S:
– Network Manager object makes both intermode and
intramode communications among cooperative
objects easy
– User doesn’t need to know the location of receiver
• Only needs to know the receiver’s name
– Provides the message’s proper routing to the
receiver
– A process can also invoke an operation that’s part of
its local object environment
– Network Manager services are usually provided at
the kernel level
Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 45
 Network Management (continued)

Table 10.4: Communications sent by the Network Manager

allow objects to perform at least one of four functions
Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 46
 NOS Development

• NOS typically runs on a computer called a server

and performs services for network workstations
called clients
• Network management functions come into play
only when the system needs to use the network
• Focus is on sharing resources instead of running
programs
• Best NOS choice depends on following factors:
– Applications to be run on the server
– Technical support required
– User’s level of training
Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 47
 Important NOS Features

• Provides support for standard local area network

technologies and client desktop operating systems
• Must have a robust architecture that adapts easily
to new technologies
– Must provide strong support for every operating
system in the corporate information network
• Able to operate wide range of third-party software
applications and hardware devices
• Supports software for multiuser network
applications
• Must blend efficiency with security
Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 48
 Major NOS Functions

• Allows users to access hardware or software at a

remote site
– Example: Internet’s telnet command
• Security is a critical function of the NOS
– Must verify every attempt to log in and have policies
in place to handle unsuccessful attempts
• Throughout the telnet session, NOS handles the
networking functions
• To let users transfer files from one computer to
another
– Example: FTP program
Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 49
 Summary

• NOS didn’t take full advantage of global resources

available to all connected sites, while DO/S
specifically addressed that need
• Every networked system, whether a NOS or a
DO/S, has specific requirements
• Each must be secure from unauthorized access yet
accessible to authorized users
• Each must monitor its available system resources,
as well as its communications links
• Each must perform the required networking tasks

Understanding Operating Systems, Fourth Edition 50