July, 2004 (Old Syllabus B3.

4: OPERATING
SYSTEMS)
Note:

1. Answer question 1 and any FOUR questions from 2 to 7.

2. Parts of the same question should be answered together and in the same sequence.

Time: 3 Hours Total Marks:100

1.
1. Describe the hierarchical as model.
2. Explain the working of the following schedulers:
1. Event driven scheduling
2. Least Laxity scheduling
3. State the difference between
1. Deadlock and Live lock
2. Starvation and busy waiting
3. Strong and Weak semaphores
4. Reusable and consumable resources.
4. A 1 Mbyte block of memory is allocated using the buddy system. Show
the results of the following sequence with a help of neat diagram. Request
A (70K), Request B (35K), Request C (80K), Return A, Request D (60K),
Return B, Return D, Return C.
5. What is a link? What are its types? Compare.
6. What are the advantages and disadvantages of Distributed processing?
7. Explain, how caching can improve performance?

(7x4)

2.
1. Derive the waiting time in a Batch system for:
1. FCFS scheduling
2. Shortest job first scheduling.
2. As a Computer Systems Designer with both hardware and software
expertise, you have been given the task of designing an ultra-high
reliability multiprocessing system. Discuss the hardware and software
techniques you would employ.
3. Explain how Unix file system is implemented.

(6+6+6)

3.
1. Show that, if the wait and signal operations are not executed
automatically, then mutual exclusion may be violated.
 2. Consider a distributed system with two sites, A and B. Consider whether
site A can distinguish among the following:
1. B goes down.
2. the link between A and B goes down.
3. B is extremely overloaded and response time is 100 times longer
than normal. What implications does your answer have for
recovery in distributed systems?
3. Explain the operation of a TSR program. What are the problems
associated with TSR?

(6+6+6)

4.
1. Describe the variety of mechanism of interprocess communication and
synchronization provided by UNIX.
2. Explain' how virtual memory can be implemented by using both
segmentation and paging.
3. Differentiate extended and expanded memory.

(7+8+3)

5.
1. Explain the function of the following system calls.
1. Append
2. Unlink
3. Seek
2. What are the instructions used in Multiprocessor synchronization? Explain
their use with examples.
3. A computer has four page frames. The time of loading, time of last access
and the R and M bits for each page are as shown below (the times are in
clock ticks):

Page Loaded Last Ref. R M

0 126 286 1 0
1 230 265 0 1
2 140 270 0 0
3 110 285 1 1

4. Find the page replaced by the following replacement policies:

1. FIFO
2. LRU
3. Second chance

(6+6+6)
6.
1. Write the steps involved in a remote procedure call. Compare RPC and
message passing.
2. Explain the operations that are performed by the file system when
processing a READ request.
3. Consider a system with a total of 150 units of memory allocated to three
processors as shown.

Process Max Hold

1 70 45
2 60 40
3 60 15

4. Apply the Banker's algorithm to determine whether it would be safe to

grant the following request. A fourth process arrives, with a maximum
need of 60 and an initial need of 25 units.
7. (7+6+5)
8.
1. What are computer worms and viruses? What are the safeguards used
against worms and viruses?
2. What are the functions of a disk controller? Describe the various interface
signals that are exchanged between a disk drive and the disk controller.
3. Write a monitor program for a bounded buffer producer consumer
problem.

(5+7+6)