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Process management
Interrupts
Memory management
Device drivers
Networking
Security
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An operating system (OS) is an interface between hardware and user which is responsible for
the management and coordination of activities and the sharing of the resources of the computer
that acts as a host for computing applications run on the machine. As a host, one of the purposes
of an operating system is to handle the details of the operation of the hardware. This relieves
application programs from having to manage these details and makes it easier to write
In computing, a system call is the mechanism used by an application program to request service
from the operating system based on the monolithic kernel or to system servers on operating
systems based on the microkernel-structure.
Contents
[hide]
1 Background
4 Typical implementations
6 References
7 External links
[edit] Background
A system call is a request made by any program to the operating system for performing tasks
picked from a predefined setwhich the said program does not have required permissions to
execute in its own flow of execution. System calls provide the interface between a process
and the operating system. Most operations interacting with the system require permissions not
available to a user level process, e.g. I/O performed with a device present on the system or any
form of communication with other processes requires the use of system calls.
The fact that improper use of the system call can easily cause a system crash necessitates some
level of control. The design of the microprocessor architecture on practically all modern systems
(except some embedded systems) offers a series of privilege levels -- the (low) privilege level in
which normal applications execute limits the address space of the program so that it cannot
access or modify other running applications nor the operating system itself. It also prevents the
application from directly using devices (e.g. the frame buffer or network devices). But obviously
many normal applications need these abilities; thus they can call the operating system. The
operating system executes at the highest level of privilege and allows the applications to request
services via system calls, which are often implemented through interrupts. If allowed, the system
enters a higher privilege level, executes a specific set of instructions which the interrupting
program has no direct control over, then returns control to the former flow of execution. This
concept also serves as a way to implement security.
With the development of separate operating modes with varying levels of privilege, a mechanism
was needed for transferring control safely from lesser privileged modes to higher privileged
modes. Less privileged code could not simply transfer control to more privileged code at any
point and with any processor state. To allow it to do so would allow it to break security. For
instance, the less privileged code could cause the higher privileged code to execute in the wrong
order, or provide it with a bad stack.
are designed to quickly transfer control to the OS for a system call without the overhead of an
interrupt. Linux 2.5 began using this on the x86, where available; formerly it used the INT
instruction, where the system call number was placed in the EAX register before interrupt 0x80
was executed.[1]
An older x86 mechanism is called a call gate and is a way for a program to literally call a kernel
function directly using a safe control transfer mechanism the OS sets up in advance. This
approach has been unpopular, presumably due to the requirement of a far call which uses x86
memory segmentation and the resulting lack of portability it causes, and existence of the faster
instructions mentioned above.
For IA64 architecture, EPC (Enter Privileged Mode) instruction is used. The first eight system
call arguments are passed in registers, and the rest are passed on the stack.
end, abort
load, execute
2.File management.
open, close
3. Device Management.
4. Information Maintenance.
5. Communication.
A wizard is a user interface element where the user is presented with a sequence of
dialog boxes. Through these dialog boxes, the user is led through a series of steps,
performing tasks in a specific sequence. Sometimes it may be easier to perform tasks
using a wizard, especially for complex or infrequently performed tasks where the user is
unfamiliar with the steps involved.
Web applications, such as an airline booking site, also make use of the wizard paradigm
to complete lengthy interactive processes. Oracle Designer also uses wizards extensively.
By contrast, expert systems guide the user through a series of (usually yes/no) questions
to solve a problem, and tend to make use of artificial intelligence or other complex
algorithms. Some consider expert systems as a general category that includes all
problem-solving programs including wizards.
Wizards were controversial among user interface designers when they first gained
widespread use. This controversy centered around the fact that wizards encourage modal
windows, which its opponents consider antithetical to proper human interface design.
Microsoft Manual of Style for Technical Publications (Version 3.0) urges technical
writers to refer to these assistants as "wizards" and to use lowercase letters. In countries
where the concept of wizard does not convey the idea of helpfulness or is offensive, the
manual suggests using the term "assistant" instead.
When you improperly shut down your computer does it harm your computer
hardware, or anything else in your computer?
I had found 2 views on this topic.Hope you fing them useful....
By http://askthegeek.kennyhart.com/
by "improperly shut down," I assume you mean pressing the power button instead
of clicking Start->Shut Down from Windows. This won't harm any of your
hardware. After all, Windows powers off the PC, too, when you do a "normal"
shutdown. Think of it this way: Your computer is made from components similar to
those in any other electronic device--like a stereo or TV--and you turn them on and
off all the time without any bad effects. However, the data on your hard drive can
be damaged by an improper shutdown.
This was a big problem back in the days of Windows 95 and 98. When you
restarted after an improper shutdown, the operating system would come up
asking you to run scandisk to correct hard disk errors. It's not as big a problem
with Windows XP, but it does happen. If you remove power from the system while
data is being written to your hard disk, the data will be incomplete and appear
corrupt. Usually, though, a system hang severe enough to warrant pushing the
power button is the result of a problem reading or loading a file and your PC won't
suffer any ill effects if you power it down.
By Syschat.com
What is the significance of proper shut down? If an improper shut down occurs
(probably due to a power supply failure, pulled plug, or the user just didnt know how
to use the computer), your registry files are forced to stop its operation without
saving your recent works and other necessary settings that have been changed. In
order to save works, make sure that before turning off your pc, you have saved your
current work. In windows, after saving all the changes, a turn off button is pressed to
finally confirm the shut down process. If you just want to reboot your computer,
there is also a restart button for this. Also take note that once you have initiated the
machine to shut down, do not turn off or pull the power plug of the device
immediately unless your computer has literally stopped running. This is usually
noted if the monitor has no more output and the mouse and keyboard input
When you improperly shut down your computer does it harm your computer hardware, or
anything else in your computer?
Valania, by "improperly shut down," I assume you mean pressing the power button
instead of clicking Start->Shut Down from Windows. This won't harm any of your
hardware. After all, Windows powers off the PC, too, when you do a "normal" shutdown.
Think of it this way: Your computer is made from components similar to those in any
other electronic device--like a stereo or TV--and you turn them on and off all the time
without any bad effects. However, the data on your hard drive can be damaged by an
improper shutdown.
This was a big problem back in the days of Windows 95 and 98. When you restarted
after an improper shutdown, the operating system would come up asking you to run
scandisk to correct hard disk errors. It's not as big a problem with Windows XP, but it
does happen. If you remove power from the system while data is being written to your
hard disk, the data will be incomplete and appear corrupt. Usually, though, a system
hang severe enough to warrant pushing the power button is the result of a problem
reading or loading a file and your PC won't suffer any ill effects if you power it down.
Cheers!
The Geek
Technorati tags: shutdown, system hang, data loss
P O S T E D B Y K E N N Y H A R T AT 2 : 2 0 P M
1 COMMENTS:
Anonymous said...
Thanks Geek,
I was quite worried over this for a while. Actually my UPS is not functioning properly,
and power supply also flactuates quite often, so my PC restarts again and again.
Now, I think I don't need to worry that my PC is getting harmed.
Thanks for inputs
1:32 PM
SYMPTOMS
CAUSE
RESOLUTION
MORE INFORMATION
AN UNMANAGED SHUTDOWN CAN OCCUR DUE TO A POWER INTERRUPTION OR FAILURE, A BSOD, OR THE PRESSING OF THE
SYSTEM RESET OR POWER BUTTON. AN UNSTABLE SYSTEM CAN ALSO LEAD TO AN IMPROPER WINDOWS SHUTDOWN. SOME
OF THE CAUSES OF AN UNSTABLE SYSTEM ARE:
OVERCLOCKING
UNSTABLE BIOS
BAD SYSTEM COMPONENTS, I.E. MOTHERBOARD, CPU, PSU, MODEMS, VIDEO CARDS, ETC.
Unclean Shutdowns
When a system is properly shut down, all memory-based file system changes are written to disk and the file
systems on disk are marked as being clean. However, if an improper shutdown (for example, a power failure)
occurs, the memory-based information might not be written to disk and therefore certain file systems will not
have their clean flag set (because, in fact, they might have structural problems as a result of the memorybased information not being written to disk).
When this happens, a special activity occurs during the boot process. The file system consistency checker
(fsck), when checking for clean flags on all file systems represented in the file /etc/fstab, will detect that
file systems exist that do not have clean flags set. For these file systems, fsck will perform a check/repair
operation to locate and fix any problems that resulted from the improper shutdown. In nearly all cases, fsck can
find and fix all of the structural problems and the file system can then be marked clean.
On rare occasions, the file system corruption is beyond what fsck can automatically correct. In these cases
fsck will terminate with an error message indicating that you need to use it in an interactive mode to fix the
more serious problems. In these cases data loss is likely. Before using fsck in interactive mode, try to back up
any critical files by moving them to another file system or backing them up to tape, if a back-up copy of them
does not already exist.
For a more detailed discussion of using fsck to repair file systems, refer to the following manpages:
fsck(1M)
Real-time operating system (RTOS) - Real-time operating systems are used to control machinery,
scientific instruments and industrial systems. An RTOS typically has very little user-interface capability, and no enduser utilities, since the system will be a "sealed box" when delivered for use. A very important part of an RTOS is
managing the resources of the computer so that a particular operation executes in precisely the same amount of
time, every time it occurs. In a complex machine, having a part move more quickly just because system resources
are available may be just as catastrophic as having it not move at all because the system is busy.
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.
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 be writing a note in a word processor while downloading a file from the Internet while printing the
text of an e-mail message.
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, such as MVS,
are examples of multi-user operating systems.
It manages the hardware and software resources of the system. In a desktop computer, these resources
include such things as the processor, memory, disk space and more (On a cell phone, they include the keypad, the
screen, the address book, the phone dialer, the battery and the network connection).
It provides a stable, consistent way for applications to deal with the hardware without having to know all the
details of the hardware.
The first task, managing the hardware and software resources, is very important, as various programs and input
methods compete for the attention of the central processing unit (CPU) and demand memory, storage and
input/output (I/O) bandwidth for their own purposes. In this capacity, the operating system plays the role of the good
parent, making sure that each application gets the necessary resources while playing nicely with all the other
applications, as well as husbanding the limited capacity of the system to the greatest good of all the users and
applications.
2008 HowStuffWorks
The operating system controls every task your computer
carries out and manages
system resources.
The second task, providing a consistent application interface, is especially important if there is to be more than one
of a particular type of computer using the operating system, or if the hardware making up the computer is ever open
to change. A consistent application program interface (API) allows a software developer to write an application on
one computer and have a high level of confidence that it will run on another computer of the same type, even if the
amount of memory or the quantity of storage is different on the two machines.
Even if a particular computer is unique, an operating system can ensure that applications continue to run when
hardware upgrades and updates occur. This is because the operating system -- not the application -- is charged with
managing the hardware and the distribution of its resources. One of the challenges facing developers is keeping their
operating systems flexible enough to run hardware from the thousands of vendors manufacturing computer
equipment. Today's systems can accommodate thousands of different printers, disk drives and special peripherals in
any possible combination.
Today, these terminals 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 (a UNIX clone) and mainframes such as the IBM AS400.
The operating system for a large multi-user computer system with many terminals is much more
complex than a single-user operating system. It must manage and run all user requests, ensuring
they do not interfere with each other. Devices that are serial in nature (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
are sent to a queue, and each document is printed in its entirety before the next document to be
printed is retrieved from the queue. When you wait inline at the cafeteria to be served you are in
a queue. Imagine that all the people in the queue are documents waiting to be printed and the
cashier at the end of the queue is the printer
The functions of devices attached. with the computer are controlled by the special system software
called device drivers. The device driver tells the operating system how to communicate with a device.
Each device has its own device driver. When you boot a computer, the operating system loads each
devices driver. If you attach a new device or hardware such as scanner to computer then you have to
install its driver. Usually the operating system has the built-in device drivers for commonly used
input/output devices such as mouse, keyboard, etc. The operating system automatically installs these
drivers.
The Windows clipboard is used to temporarily store stuff. This "stuff" can come in the form of just about
anything. Images, files, documents, etc.they can all be placed on the clipboard. Once something has
been copied to the clipboard it can be pasted into another location.
The clipboard isn't a program you can actually access and play with. It's a built-in windows component
that works transparently. When you copy or cut, the info is put onto this clipboard. When you paste, the
information that's on the clipboard is put into whatever it is you're working on.
For instance, if I have some information on a web page that I want to put into a word processing
document, this is what would happen:
1. I highlight and copy (CTRL-C) the text from the web page. When I do this, the text is placed on the
clipboard.
2. Now, I open my word processor (MS Word 2000 and up must be open before you copy). Right now, the
info is still sitting on the clipboard and can be pasted into my word processor or any other program that
can handle text.
3. OK, now I right-click a blank area of my word processing document and choose Paste from the
resulting menu (or just use CTRL-V) . This will take the info that's currently sitting on the clipboard (i.e. the
web page text in this case) and attempt to put it into my word processing document.
I say "attempt to put the info on the clipboard into the word processor" because sometimes the info that's
on your clipboard is not compatible with the program you're using. For example, if you try to paste a
picture into notepad, that just isn't going to work.
For example, lets say you were working on a report in MS Word and you would like to quote some
information you uncovered on the web. Rather than printing out the web page and re-typing the block of
text you would like to quote, you can highlight the text on the webpage and copy it to the clipboard
(highlight by holding down your left mouse button and dragging it over the section of text you would like to
have. Copy it by right-clicking that section of text and selecting Copy from the menu that pops up).
Now, head back to MS Word and position the cursor where you would like to insert the text. Hit CRTL-V
(or click the Edit menu, Paste ), and presto, the web page text you copied has now been pasted into your
Word doc.
A filename extension is a suffix to the name of a computer file applied to indicate the encoding
convention (file format) of its contents.
In some operating systems (for example Unix) it is optional, while in some others (such as DOS)
it is a requirement. Some operating systems limit the length of the extension (such as DOS and
OS/2, to three characters) while others (such as Unix) do not. Some operating systems (for
example RISC OS) do not use filename extensions. Unix accepts the separator dot as a legal
character but does not give it a special recognition on the OS level.
Last modified: Friday, January 18, 2008
(1) Refers to the condition of a disk in which files are divided into pieces scattered around
the disk. Fragmentation occurs naturally when you use a disk frequently, creating, deleting,
and modifying files. At some point, the operating system needs to store parts of a file in
noncontiguous clusters. This is entirely invisible to users, but it can slow down the speed at
which data is accessed because the disk drive must search through different parts of the
disk to put together a single file.
In DOS 6.0 and later systems, you can defragment a disk with the DEFRAG command. You can also buy software
utilities, called disk optimizers or defragmenters, that defragment a disk.
See "Learn How to Defrag Your Hard Drive" in the Did You Know...? section of Webopedia.
(2) Fragmentation can also refer to RAM that has small, unused holes scattered throughout it. This is called external
fragmentation. With modern operating systems that use a paging scheme, a more common type of RAM
fragmentation is internal fragmentation. This occurs when memory is allocated in frames and the frame size is larger
than the amount of memory requested