CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION TO
OPERATING SYSTEMS

GS KAYALVIZHI
ASSISTANT PROFESSOR
1.1 General Definition

 An OS is a program which acts as an interface

between computer system users and the
computer hardware.
 It provides a user-friendly environment in which
a user may easily develop and execute programs.
 Otherwise, hardware knowledge would be
mandatory for computer programming.
 So, it can be said that an OS hides the
complexity of hardware from uninterested users.
1.1 General Definition

 In general, a computer system has some

resources which may be utilized to solve a
problem. They are 
› Memory
› Processor(s)
› I/O
› File System
› etc.
1.1 General Definition

Mainboard
GOALS OF AN OPERATING
SYSTEM
 The primary objective of a computer is to execute an instruction
in an efficient manner and to increase the productivity of
processing resources attached with the computer system such as
hardware resources, software resources and the users.
 In other words, we can say that maximum CPU utilisation is the
main objective, because it is the main device which is to be used
for the execution of the programs or instructions.
 We can brief the goals as: · The primary goal of an operating
system is to make the computer convenient to use.
 The secondary goal is to use the hardware in an efcient
manner.
History of Operating Systems

 It all started with computer hardware in about

1940s.
History of Operating Systems

 ENIAC (Electronic Numerical Integrator and

Computer), at the U.S. Army's Aberdeen Proving
Ground in Maryland.
› built in the 1940s,
› weighed 30 tons,
› was eight feet high, three feet deep, and 100 feet long
› contained over 18,000 vacuum tubes that were cooled
by 80 air blowers.
› The actual operation of these early computers took
place without the benefit of an operating system
History of Operating Systems
1st genereation

Computers were using vacuum tube

technology.
. The mode was called “closed shop” and was
characterized by the appearance of hired operators who
would select the job to be run, initial program load the
system, run the user’s program, and then select another
job, and so forth.

ENIAC’s vacuum tubes

History of Operating Systems

ENIAC’s backside
Programs were loaded into memory manually using switches,
punched cards, or paper tapes.
1.2 History of Operating Systems
1.2 History of Operating Systems

Babbage’s analytical engine

(designed in 1840’s by Charles Babbage, but cold not be constructed by him.
An earlier and simpler version is constructed in 2002, in London )

http://www.computerhistory.org/babbage/
Second Generation of Computer
( 1956 to 1963 )
 Second generation computers generated a lot of heat but much less than the first
generation computers. They required less maintenance than the first generation
computers.
 Hardware Technology
 Transistors replaced the vacuum tubes of the first generation of computers.
Transistors allowed computers to become smaller, faster, cheaper, energy efficient
and reliable. The second generation computers used magnetic core technology for
primary memory. They used magnetic tapes and magnetic disks for secondary
storage. The input was still through punched cards and the output using printouts.
They used the concept of a stored program, where instructions were stored in the
memory of computer.
 The instructions were written using the assembly language
 High-level programming languages, such as early versions of COBOL and
FORTRAN were also developed during this period.
Third Generation of Computer ( 1964 to 1971 )

 The third generation computers used less power and generated less heat than the second
generation computers. The cost of the computer reduced significantly, as individual
components of the computer were not required to be assembled manually. The
maintenance cost of the computers was also less compared to their predecessors.

 Hardware Technology
 The third generation computers used the Integrated Circuit (IC) chips.. In an IC chip,
multiple transistors are placed on a silicon chip. Silicon is a type of semiconductor. The
use of IC chip increased the speed and the efficiency of computer, manifold. The
keyboard and monitor were used to interact with the third generation computer, instead
of the punched card and printouts.
 The keyboard and the monitor were interfaced through the operating system. Operating
system allowed different applications to run at the same time. High-level languages
were used extensively for programming, instead of machine language and assembly
lang.
Fourth Generation of Computer ( 1971 to present
)

 The microprocessor has resulted in the fourth generation computers being

smaller and cheaper than their predecessors. The fourth generation
computers are also portable and more reliable. They generate much lesser
heat and require less maintenance compared to their predecessors. GUI
and pointing devices facilitate easy use and learning on the computer.
Networking has resulted in resource sharing and communication among
different computers.

 Hardware Technology
 They use the Large Scale Integration (LSI) and the Very Large Scale
Integration (VLSI) technology. Thousands of transistors are integrated on
a small silicon chip using LSI technology. VLSI allows hundreds of
thousands of components to be integrated in a small chip. This era is
marked by the development of microprocessor.
Context Switch Figure 2: Process Control Block Structure A
context switch (also sometimes referred to as a process switch
or a task switch) is the switching of the CPU (central
processing unit) from one process or to another. 35
Create: In response to the create call the operating system
creates a new process with the specified or default attributes
and identifier.
Some of the parameters definable at the process creation time
include: level of privilege, such as system or user  priority 
size and memory requirements  maximum data area and/or
stack size  memory protection information and access rights
 other system dependent data. Delete: The delete service is
also called destroy, terminate or exit. It
Delete: The delete service is also called destroy, terminate or
exit. Its execution causes the operating system to destroy the
designated process and remove it from the system.
Abort: It is used to terminate the process forcibly. Although a
process could conceivably abort itself, the most frequent use
of this call is for involuntary terminations, such as removal of
malfunctioning process from the system.
Fork/Join:Another method of process creation and termination
is by means of FORK/ JOIN pair, originally introduced as
primitives for multiprocessor system.
Suspend: The suspend system call is also called BLOCK in
some systems. The designated process is suspended
indenitely and placed in the suspend state. A process may be
suspended itself or another process when authorized to do so.
Resume: The resume system call is also called WAKEUP in
some systems. This call resumes the target process, which is
presumably suspended. Obviously a suspended process can
not resume itself because a process must be running to have its
operating system call processed.
PROCESS
SCHEDULING