Operating Systems

Start Lecture #5

1.7.5 Virtual Machines

Use a hypervisor (i.e., beyond supervisor, i.e. beyond a normal OS) to switch between multiple Operating Systems. A more modern name for a hypervisor is a Virtual Machine Monitor (VMM).

VM/370

The hypervisor idea was made popular by IBM's CP/CMS (now VM/370). CMS stood for Cambridge Monitor System since it was developed at IBM's Cambridge (MA) Science. It was renamed, with the same acronym (an IBM specialty, cf. RAID) to Conversational Monitor System.

• Each App/CMS runs on a virtual 370.
• CMS is a single user OS.
• A system call in an App (application) traps to the corresponding CMS.
• CMS believes it is running on the actual hardware so issues I/O instructions but ...
• ... I/O instructions in CMS trap to VM/370.
• This idea is still used but the guest OS is now normally a full-featured operating system rather than a simple system like CMS. For example, the newest IBM systems can run multiple instances of linux as well as multiple instances of traditional IBM Operating Systems on a single hardware platform.

Virtual Machines Redicovered

Recently, virtual machine technology has moved to machines (notably x86) that are not fully virtualizable. Recall that when CMS executed a privileged instruction, the hardware trapped to the real operating system. On x86, privileged instructions are ignored when executed in user mode, so running the guest OS in user mode won't work. Bye bye (traditional) hypervisor. But a new style emerged where the hypervisor runs, not on the hardware, but on the host operating system. See the text for a sketch of how this (and another idea paravirtualization) works. An important academic advance was Disco from Stanford that led to the successful commercial product VMware.

Sanity Restored

Both AMD and Intel have extended the x86 architecture to better support virtualization. The newest processors produced today (2008) by both companies now support an additional (higher) privilege mode for the VMM. The guest OS now runs in the old privileged mode (for which it was designed) and the hypervisor/VMM runs in the new higher privileged mode from which it is able to monitor the usage of hardware resources by the guest operating system(s).

The Java Virtual Machine

The idea is that a new (rather simple) computer architecture called the Java Virtual Machine (JVM) was invented but not built (in hardware). Instead, interpreters for this architecture are implemented in software on many different hardware platforms. Each interpreter is also called a JVM. The java compiler transforms java into instructions for this new architecture, which then can be interpreted on any machine for which a JVM exists.

This has portability as well as security advantages, but at a cost in performance.

Of course java can also be compiled to native code for a particular hardware architecture and other languages can be compiled into instructions for a software-implemented virtual machine (e.g., pascal with its p-code).

1.8 The World According to C

1.8.1 The C Language

Assumed knowledge.

1.8.2 Header Files

Assumed knowledge.

1.8.3 Large Programming Projects

Mostly assumed knowledge. Linker's are very briefly discussed. Our earlier discussion was much more detailed.

1.8.4 The model of Run Time

Extremely brief treatment with only a few points made about the running of the operating itself.

• The text (code) segment is normally read only.
• The stack is initially of size zero; it grows and shrinks as functions are called and return.
• The data segment is initially not empty, with some of it is initialized. It can grow under program control and perhaps can shrink.

1.11 Metric Units

Assumed knowledge. Note that what is covered is just the prefixes, i.e. the names and abbreviations for various powers of 10.

1.12 Summary

Skipped, but you should read and be sure you understand it (about 2/3 of a page).

Chapter 2 Process and Thread Management

Tanenbaum's chapter title is Processes and Threads. I prefer to add the word management. The subject matter is processes, threads, scheduling, interrupt handling, and IPC (InterProcess Communication—and Coordination).

2.1 Processes

Definition: A process is a program in execution.

• We are assuming a multiprogramming OS that can switch from one process to another.
• Sometimes this is called pseudoparallelism since one has the illusion of a parallel processor.
• The other possibility is real parallelism in which two or more processes are actually running at once because the computer system is a parallel processor, i.e., has more than one processor.
• We do not study real parallelism (parallel processing, distributed systems, multiprocessors, etc) in this course.

2.1.1 The Process Model

Even though in actuality there are many processes running at once, the OS gives each process the illusion that it is running alone.

• Virtual time: The time used by just this processes. Virtual time progresses at a rate independent of other processes. (Actually, this is false, the virtual time is typically incremented a little during the systems calls used for process switching; so if there are other processes, overhead virtual time occurs.)
  
  
• Virtual memory: The memory as viewed by the process. Each process typically believes it has a contiguous chunk of memory starting at location zero. Of course this can't be true of all processes (or they would be using the same memory) and in modern systems it is actually true of no processes (the memory assigned to a single process is not contiguous and does not include location zero).
  
  Think of the individual modules that are input to the linker. Each numbers its addresses from zero; the linker eventually translates these relative addresses into absolute addresses. That is the linker provides to the assembler a virtual memory in which addresses start at zero.

Virtual time and virtual memory are examples of abstractions provided by the operating system to the user processes so that the latter experiences a more pleasant virtual machine than actually exists.

2.1.2 Process Creation

From the users' or external viewpoint there are several mechanisms for creating a process.

1. System initialization, including daemon (see below) processes.
2. Execution of a process creation system call by a running process.
3. A user request to create a new process.
4. Initiation of a batch job.

But looked at internally, from the system's viewpoint, the second method dominates. Indeed in early Unix only one process is created at system initialization (the process is called init); all the others are decendents of this first process.

Why have init? That is why not have all processes created via method 2?
Ans: Because without init there would be no running process to create any others.

Definition of Daemon

Many systems have daemon process lurking around to perform tasks when they are needed. I was pretty sure the terminology was related to mythology, but didn't have a reference until a student found The {Searchable} Jargon Lexicon at http://developer.syndetic.org/query_jargon.pl?term=demon

daemon: /day'mn/ or /dee'mn/ n. [from the mythological meaning, later rationalized as the acronym `Disk And Execution MONitor'] A program that is not invoked explicitly, but lies dormant waiting for some condition(s) to occur. The idea is that the perpetrator of the condition need not be aware that a daemon is lurking (though often a program will commit an action only because it knows that it will implicitly invoke a daemon). For example, under {ITS}, writing a file on the LPT spooler's directory would invoke the spooling daemon, which would then print the file. The advantage is that programs wanting (in this example) files printed need neither compete for access to nor understand any idiosyncrasies of the LPT. They simply enter their implicit requests and let the daemon decide what to do with them. Daemons are usually spawned automatically by the system, and may either live forever or be regenerated at intervals. Daemon and demon are often used interchangeably, but seem to have distinct connotations. The term `daemon' was introduced to computing by CTSS people (who pronounced it /dee'mon/) and used it to refer to what ITS called a dragon; the prototype was a program called DAEMON that automatically made tape backups of the file system. Although the meaning and the pronunciation have drifted, we think this glossary reflects current (2000) usage.

As is often the case, wikipedia.org proved useful. Here is the first paragraph of a more thorough entry. The wikipedia also has entries for other uses of daemon.

In Unix and other computer multitasking operating systems, a daemon is a computer program that runs in the background, rather than under the direct control of a user; they are usually instantiated as processes. Typically daemons have names that end with the letter "d"; for example, syslogd is the daemon which handles the system log.

2.1.3 Process Termination

Again from the outside there appear to be several termination mechanism.

1. Normal exit (voluntary).
2. Error exit (voluntary).
3. Fatal error (involuntary).
4. Killed by another process (involuntary).

And again, internally the situation is simpler. In Unix terminology, there are two system calls kill and exit that are used. Kill (poorly named in my view) sends a signal to another process. If this signal is not caught (via the signal system call) the process is terminated. There is also an uncatchable signal. Exit is used for self termination and can indicate success or failure.

2.1.4 Process Hierarchies

Modern general purpose operating systems permit a user to create and destroy processes.

• In unix this is done by the fork system call, which creates a child process, and the exit system call, which terminates the current process.
• After a fork both parent and child keep running (indeed they have the same program text) and each can fork off other processes.
• A process tree results. The root of the tree is a special process created by the OS during startup.
• A process can choose to wait for children to terminate. For example, if C issued a wait() system call it would block until G finished.

Old or primitive operating system like MS-DOS are not fully multiprogrammed, so when one process starts another, the first process is automatically blocked and waits until the second is finished. This implies that the process tree degenerates into a line.

2.1.5 Process States and Transitions

The diagram on the right contains much information. I often include it on exams.

• Consider a running process P that issues an I/O request
  • The process blocks
  • At some later point, a disk interrupt occurs and the driver detects that P's request is satisfied.
  • P is unblocked, i.e. is moved from blocked to ready
  • At some later time the operating system scheduler looks for a ready job to run and picks P.
  
  
• A preemptive scheduler has the dotted line preempt;
  A non-preemptive scheduler doesn't.
  
  
• The number of processes changes only for two arcs: create and terminate.
  
  
• Suspend and resume are medium term scheduling
  • Done on a longer time scale.
  • Involves memory management as well. As a result we study it later.
  • Sometimes called two level scheduling.

Homework: 1.

One can organize an OS around the scheduler.

• Write a minimal kernel (a micro-kernel) consisting of the scheduler, interrupt handlers, and IPC (interprocess communication).
  
  
• The rest of the OS consists of kernel processes (e.g. memory, filesystem) that act as servers for the user processes (which of course act as clients).
  
  
• The system processes also act as clients (of other system processes).
  
  
• The above is called the client-server model and is one Tanenbaum likes. His Minix operating system works this way.
  
  
• Indeed, there was reason to believe that the client-server model would dominate OS design. But that hasn't happened.
  
  
• Such an OS is sometimes called server based.
  
  
• Systems like traditional unix or linux would then be called self-service since the user process serves itself. That is, the user process switches to kernel mode (via the TRAP instruction) and performs the system call itself without transferring control to another process.

2.1.6 Implementation of Processes

The OS organizes the data about each process in a table naturally called the process table. Each entry in this table is called a process table entry or process control block (PCB).

(I have often referred to a process table entry as a PTE, but this is bad since I also use PTE for Page Table Entry. Since the latter usage is very common, I must stop using PTE to abbreviate the former. Please correct me if I slip up.)

Characteristics of the process table.

• One entry per process.
  
  
• The central data structure for process management.
  
  
• A process state transition (e.g., moving from blocked to ready) is reflected by a change in the value of one or more fields in the PCB.
  
  
• We have converted an active entity (process) into a data structure (PCB). Finkel calls this the level principle an active entity becomes a data structure when looked at from a lower level.
  
  
• The PCB contains a great deal of information about the process. For example,
  • Saved value of registers including the program counter (i.e., the address of the next instruction) when the process not running.
  • Stack pointer
  • CPU time used
  • Process id (PID)
  • Process id of parent (PPID)
  • User id (uid and euid)
  • Group id (gid and egid)
  • Pointer to text segment (memory for the program text)
  • Pointer to data segment
  • Pointer to stack segment
  • UMASK (default permissions for new files)
  • Current working directory
  • Many others