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Explain Single User, Multi User and Batch Processing System.
Operating
System is system software. This is software acts as an interface between the
user and the computer. It also controls and coordinates different operations of
computer. These operating systems are categorized of basis of users and their
tasks.
Single user:
a) Single user, Single Task: As the name implies, this operating system is designed to manage the computer so that one user can effectively do one thing at a time. The Palm OS for Palm handheld computers is a good example of a modern single-user, single-task operating system. When you are using MS-DOS it is a single user single task operating system.
b) Single user, Multi-tasking: This is the type of operating system most people use on their desktop and laptop computers today. Microsoft’s Windows and Apple’s MacOS platforms are both examples of operating systems that will let a single user have several programs in operation at the same time. For example, it’s entirely possible for a Windows user to write a letter and at the same time the printing of another letter can be done or at the same Internet browsing can be done.
So in Single user operating systems there is one keyboard and one monitor that you interact with.
Consider a typical home computer. There is a single keyboard and mouse that accept input commands, and a single monitor to display information output. There may also be a printer for the printing of documents and images.
In essence, a single-user operating system provides access to the computer system by a single user at a time. If another user needs access to the computer system, they must wait till the current user finishes what they are doing and leaves.
Multi-user:
A multi-user operating system allows many different users to take advantage of the computer’s resources simultaneously. The operating system must make sure that the requirements of the various users are balanced, and that each of the programs they are using has sufficient and separate resources so that a problem with one user doesn’t affect the entire community of users. Unix, VMS and mainframe operating systems are examples of multi-user operating systems.
A multi-user operating system lets more than one user access the computer
system at one time. Access to the computer system is normally provided via
a network, so that users access the computer remotely using a terminal or
other computer.
These terminals nowadays are generally personal computers and use a network to send and receive information to the multi-user computer system. Examples of multi-user operating systems are UNIX, Linux and mainframes such as the IBM AS400.
The multi user operating systems must manage and run all user requests, ensuring they do not interfere with each other. Devices which can only be used by one user at a time, like printers and disks must be shared amongst all those requesting them so that all the output documents are not jumbled up. If each user tried to send their document to the printer at the same time, the end result would be garbage. Instead, documents sent are placed in a queue, and each document is printed in its entirety before the next document to be printed is retrieved from the queue. It is similar to a situation where in you are waiting for your turn in a ticket counter to get a ticket. The ticket issuer issues the ticket when your turn comes. Here also all the printing jobs wait in a queue and jobs are printed one after the other. Some priority can also be set to some jobs so that they can be taken up early according to some priority.
Batch Processing Systems:
In these kinds of systems the user feeds his job into the computer and waits for the completion of his job. New job can not be started until the old job is not completed. Thus the jobs required to be processed are kept in ready state and whenever one job is completed the next job is automatically taken and executed.
Batch processing has these benefits:
It allows sharing of computer
resources among many users,
It shifts the time of job processing
to when the computing resources are less busy,
It avoids idling the computing
resources with minute-by-minute human interaction and supervision,
By keeping high overall rate of
utilization, it better amortizes the cost of a computer especially an expensive
one.
Operating System Questions
- Explain the concept of Reentrancy.
Answer:
It is a useful, memory-saving technique for multiprogrammed
timesharing systems. A Reentrant Procedure is one in which multiple users can
share a single copy of a program during the same period. Reentrancy has 2 key
aspects: The program code cannot modify itself, and the local data for each user process
must be stored separately. Thus, the permanent part is the code, and the
temporary part is the pointer back to the calling program and local variables
used by that program. Each execution instance is called activation. It executes
the code in the permanent part, but has its own copy of local
variables/parameters. The temporary part associated with each activation is the
activation record. Generally, the activation record is kept on the stack. Note: A reentrant procedure can be
interrupted and called by an interrupting program, and still execute correctly
on returning to the procedure.
- Explain Belady's Anomaly.
Answer:
Also called FIFO anomaly. Usually, on increasing the number of
frames allocated to a process' virtual memory, the process execution is faster, because fewer page faults
occur. Sometimes, the reverse happens, i.e., the execution time increases even
when more frames are allocated to the process. This is Belady's Anomaly. This
is true for certain page reference patterns.
- What is a binary semaphore? What is its use?
Answer:
A binary semaphore is one, which takes only 0 and 1 as values.
They are used to implement mutual exclusion and synchronize concurrent
processes.
- What is thrashing?
Answer:
It is a phenomenon in virtual memory schemes when the
processor spends most of its time swapping pages, rather than executing
instructions. This is due to an inordinate number of page faults.
- List the Coffman's conditions that lead to a deadlock.
Answer:
o
Mutual Exclusion: Only
one process may use a critical resource at a time.
o
Hold & Wait: A
process may be allocated some resources while waiting for others.
o
No Pre-emption: No
resource can be forcible removed from a process holding it.
o
Circular Wait:
A closed chain of processes exist such that each process holds at least one
resource needed by another process in the chain.
- What are short-, long- and medium-term scheduling?
Answer:
Long term scheduler determines which programs are admitted to
the system for processing. It controls the degree of multiprogramming. Once
admitted, a job becomes a process. Medium term scheduling is part of the
swapping function. This relates to processes that are in a blocked or suspended
state. They are swapped out of real-memory until they are ready to execute. The
swapping-in decision is based on memory-management criteria.
Short term scheduler, also know as a dispatcher executes most
frequently, and makes the finest-grained decision of which process should
execute next. This scheduler is invoked whenever an event occurs. It may lead
to interruption of one process by preemption.
- What are turnaround time and response time?
Answer:
Turnaround time is the interval between the submission of a job
and its completion. Response time is the interval between submission of a
request, and the first response to that request.
- What are the typical elements of a process image?
Answer:
o
User data: Modifiable part of
user space. May include program data, user stack area, and
o
programs that may be
modified.
o
User program: The
instructions to be executed.
o
System Stack: Each
process has one or more LIFO stacks associated with it. Used to store
o
parameters and calling
addresses for procedure and system calls.
o
Process control Block
(PCB): Info needed by the OS to control processes.
- What is the Translation Lookaside Buffer (TLB)?
Answer:
In a cached system, the base addresses of the last few
referenced pages is maintained in registers called the TLB that aids in faster
lookup. TLB contains those page-table entries that have been most recently
used. Normally, each virtual memory reference causes 2 physical memory accesses--
one to fetch appropriate page-table entry, and one to fetch the desired data.
Using TLB in-between, this is reduced to just one physical memory access in
cases of TLB-hit.
- What is the resident set and working set of a process?
Answer:
Resident set is that portion of the process image that is actually
in real-memory at a particular instant. Working set is that subset of resident
set that is actually needed for execution. (Relate this to the variable-window
size method for swapping techniques.)
- When is a system in safe state?
Answer:
The set of dispatchable processes is in a safe state if there
exists at least one temporal order in which all processes can be run to
completion without resulting in a deadlock.
- What is cycle stealing?
Answer:
We encounter cycle stealing in the context of Direct Memory
Access (DMA). Either the DMA controller can use the data bus when the CPU does
not need it, or it may force the CPU to temporarily suspend operation. The
latter technique is called cycle stealing. Note that cycle stealing can be done
only at specific break points in an instruction cycle.
- What is meant by arm-stickiness?
Answer:
If one or a few processes have a high access rate to data on one
track of a storage disk, then they may monopolize the device by repeated
requests to that track. This generally happens with most common device
scheduling algorithms (LIFO, SSTF, C-SCAN, etc). High-density multisurface
disks are more likely to be affected by this than low density ones.
- What are the stipulations of C2 level security?
Answer:
C2 level security provides for:
o
Discretionary Access
Control
o
Identification and
Authentication
o
Auditing
o
Resource reuse
- What is busy waiting?
Answer:
The repeated execution of a loop of code while waiting for an
event to occur is called busy-waiting. The CPU is not engaged in any real
productive activity during this period, and the process does not progress
toward completion.
- Explain the popular multiprocessor thread-scheduling strategies.
Answer:
o
Load Sharing:
Processes are not assigned to a particular processor. A global queue of threads
is maintained. Each processor, when idle, selects a thread from this queue.
Note that load balancing refers to a scheme where work is allocated to processors on a
more permanent basis.
o
Gang Scheduling: A set
of related threads is scheduled to run on a set of processors at the same time,
on a 1-to-1 basis. Closely related threads / processes may be scheduled this
way to reduce synchronization blocking, and minimize process switching. Group
scheduling predated this strategy.
o
Dedicated processor
assignment: Provides implicit scheduling defined by assignment of threads to
processors. For the duration of program execution, each program is allocated a
set of processors equal in number to the number of threads in the program.
Processors are chosen from the available pool.
o
Dynamic scheduling:
The number of thread in a program can be altered during the course of
execution.
- When does the condition 'rendezvous' arise?
Answer:
In message passing, it is the condition in which, both, the
sender and receiver are blocked until the message is delivered.
- What is a trap and trapdoor?
Answer:
Trapdoor is a secret undocumented entry point into a program
used to grant access without normal methods of access authentication. A trap is
a software interrupt, usually the result of an error condition.
- What are local and global page replacements?
Answer:
Local replacement means that an incoming page is brought in only
to the relevant process'address space.
Global replacement policy allows any page frame from any process to be replaced.
The latter is applicable to variable partitions model only.
- Define latency, transfer and seek time with respect to disk I/O.
Answer:
Seek time is the time required to move the disk arm to the
required track. Rotational delay or latency is the time it takes for the
beginning of the required sector to reach the head.Sum of seek time (if any) and latency is the access
time. Time taken to actually transfer a span of data is transfer time.
- Describe the Buddy system of memory allocation.
Answer:
Free memory is maintained in linked lists, each of equal sized
blocks. Any such block is of size 2^k. When some memory is required by a
process, the block size of next higher order is chosen, and broken into two.
Note that the two such pieces differ in address only in their kth bit. Such
pieces are called buddies. When any used block is freed, the OS checks to see
if its buddy is also free. If so, it is rejoined, and put into the original
free-block linked-list.
- What is time-stamping?
Answer:
It is a technique proposed by Lamport, used to order events in a
distributed system without the use of clocks. This scheme is intended to order
events consisting of the transmission of messages. Each system 'i' in the
network maintains a counter Ci. Every time a system transmits a message, it
increments its counter by 1 and attaches the time-stamp Ti to the message. When
a message is received, the receiving system 'j' sets its counter Cj to 1 more
than the maximum of its current value and the incoming time-stamp Ti. At each site, the ordering of
messages is determined by the following rules: For messages x from site i and y
from site j, x precedes y if one of the following conditions holds....(a) if
Ti<j.<="" blockquote="">
23.
How
are the wait/signal operations for monitor different from those for semaphores?
Answer:
If a process in a monitor signal and no task is waiting on the
condition variable, the signal is lost. So this allows easier program design.
Whereas in semaphores, every operation affects the value of the semaphore, so
the wait and signal operations should be perfectly balanced in the program.
24.
In
the context of memory management, what are placement and replacement
algorithms?
Answer:
Placement algorithms determine where in available real-memory to
load a program. Common methods are first-fit, next-fit, best-fit. Replacement
algorithms are used when memory is full, and one process (or part of a process)
needs to be swapped out to accommodate a new program. The
replacement algorithm determines
which are the partitions to be swapped out.
25.
In
loading programs into memory, what is the difference between load-time dynamic
linking and run-time dynamic linking?
Answer:
For load-time dynamic linking: Load module to be loaded is read
into memory. Any reference to a target external module causes that module to be
loaded and the references are updated to a relative address from the start base
address of the application module. With run-time dynamic loading: Some of the
linking is postponed until actual reference during execution. Then the correct
module is loaded and linked.
26.
What
are demand- and pre-paging?
Answer:
With demand paging, a page is brought into memory only when a
location on that page is actually referenced during execution. With pre-paging,
pages other than the one demanded by a page fault are brought in. The selection
of such pages is done based on common access patterns, especially for secondary
memory devices.
27.
Paging
a memory management function, while multiprogramming a processor management
function, are the two interdependent?
Answer:
Yes.
28.
What
is page cannibalizing?
Answer:
Page swapping or page replacements are called page
cannibalizing.
29.
What
has triggered the need for multitasking in PCs?
Answer:
Increased speed and memory capacity of microprocessors together
with the support fir virtual memory and Growth of client server computing
30.
What
are the four layers that Windows NT have in order to achieve independence?
Answer:
o
Hardware abstraction
layer
o
Kernel
o
Subsystems
o
System Services.
- What is SMP?
Answer:
To achieve maximum efficiency and reliability a mode of
operation known as symmetric multiprocessing is used. In essence, with SMP any
process or threads can be assigned to any processor.
- What are the key object oriented concepts used by Windows NT?
Answer:
Encapsulation
Object class and instance
Object class and instance
- Is Windows NT a full blown object oriented operating system? Give reasons.
Answer:
No Windows NT is not so, because its not implemented in object
oriented language and the data structures reside within one executive component
and are not represented as objects and it does not support object oriented
capabilities .
- What is a drawback of MVT?
Answer:
It does not have the features like
- ability to support multiple processors
- virtual storage
- source level debugging
- What is process spawning?
Answer:
When the OS at the explicit request of another process creates a
process, this action is called process spawning.
- How many jobs can be run concurrently on MVT?
Answer:
15 jobs
- List out some reasons for process termination.
Answer:
- Normal completion
- Time limit exceeded
- Memory unavailable
- Bounds violation
- Protection error
- Arithmetic error
- Time overrun
- I/O failure
- Invalid instruction
- Privileged instruction
- Data misuse
- Operator or OS intervention
- Parent termination.
- What are the reasons for process suspension?
Answer:
- swapping
- interactive user request
- timing
- parent process request
- What is process migration?
Answer:
It is the transfer of sufficient amount of the state of process from one machine to
the target machine
- What is mutant?
Answer:
In Windows NT a mutant provides kernel mode or user mode mutual
exclusion with the notion of ownership.
- What is an idle thread?
Answer:
The special thread a dispatcher will execute when no ready thread is found.
- What is FtDisk?
Answer:
It is a fault tolerance disk driver for
Windows NT.
- What are the possible threads a thread can have?
Answer:
o
Ready
o
Standby
o
Running
o
Waiting
o
Transition
o
Terminated.
- What are rings in Windows NT?
Answer:
Windows NT uses protection mechanism called rings provides by
the process to implementseparation between
the user mode and kernel mode.
- What is Executive in Windows NT?
Answer:
In Windows NT, executive refers to the operating system code
that runs in kernel mode.
- What are the sub-components of I/O manager in Windows NT?
Answer:
o
Network redirector/
Server
o
Cache manager.
o
File systems
o
Network driver
o
Device driver
- What are DDks? Name an operating system that includes this feature.
Answer:
DDks are device driver kits, which are equivalent to SDKs for
writing device drivers.
Windows NT includes DDks.
- What level of security does Windows NT meets?
Answer:
C2 level security.
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