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
• Operating System Debugging
• Operating System Generation
• System Boot
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
• 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 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 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
A View of Operating System Services
 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
Bourne Shell Command Interpreter
 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)
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.
The Mac OS X GUI
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
 Example of System Calls

• System call sequence to copy the contents of one file to another file
Example of Standard API
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
• Managed by run-time support library (set of functions built into
libraries included with compiler)
API – System Call – OS Relationship
 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
• 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
• 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
 Types of System Calls

• 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
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
• From client to server
• Shared-memory model create and gain access to
memory regions
• transfer status information
• attach and detach remote devices
 Types of System Calls (Cont.)

• Protection
• Control access to resources
• Get and set permissions
• Allow and deny user access
Examples of Windows and Unix System Calls
Standard C Library Example
• C program invoking printf() library call, which calls
write() system call
Example: MS-DOS

• Single-tasking
• Shell invoked when
system booted
• Simple method to run
program
• No process created
• Single memory space
• Loads program into
memory, overwriting all
but the kernel
• Program exit -> shell At system startup running a
reloaded program
Example: FreeBSD
• Unix variant
• Multitasking
• User login -> invoke user’s choice of
shell
• Shell executes fork() system call to
create process
• Executes exec() to load program into
process
• Shell waits for process to terminate
or continues with user commands
• Process exits with:
• code = 0 – no error
• code > 0 – error code
System Programs
• 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
modification
• 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
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.)
• 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
 System Programs (Cont.)
• Background Services
• Launch at boot time
• Some for system startup, then terminate
• 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
 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
 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 (example – timer)
• Specifying and designing an OS is highly
creative task of software engineering
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
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
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
 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
Traditional UNIX System Structure
Beyond simple but not fully layered
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
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
Microkernel System Structure
Modules
• Many modern operating systems implement
loadable kernel modules
• Uses object-oriented approach
• 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
• Linux, Solaris, etc
Solaris Modular Approach
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)
Mac OS X Structure
iOS

• Apple mobile OS for iPhone, iPad

• Structured on Mac OS X, added
functionality
• Does not run OS X applications natively
• Also runs on different CPU architecture
(ARM vs. Intel)
• Cocoa Touch Objective-C API for
developing apps
• Media services layer for graphics, audio,
video
• Core services provides cloud computing,
databases
• Core operating system, based on Mac OS
X kernel
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
• 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
Android Architecture
 Operating-System Debugging
• Debugging is finding and fixing errors, or bugs
• 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.”
 Performance Tuning

• Improve
performance by
removing bottlenecks
• OS must provide
means of computing
and displaying
measures of system
behavior
• For example, “top”
program or Windows
Task Manager
DTrace

 DTrace tool in Solaris,

FreeBSD, Mac OS X
allows live
instrumentation on
production systems
 Probes fire when code
is executed within a
provider, capturing
state data and sending
it to consumers of
those probes

 Example of following
XEventsQueued
system call move from
libc library to kernel
and back
Dtrace (Cont.)

 DTrace code to record

amount of time each
process with UserID
101 is in running mode
(on CPU) in
nanoseconds
 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
Used to build system-specific compiled kernel or
system-tuned
Can general more efficient code than one
general kernel
System Boot
• When power initialized on system, execution starts at a
fixed memory location
• Firmware ROM used to hold initial boot code
• Operating system must be made available to hardware so
hardware can start it
• Small piece of code – bootstrap loader, 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
• Common bootstrap loader, GRUB, allows selection of
kernel from multiple disks, versions, kernel options
• Kernel loads and system is then running
 End of Chapter 2

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