OVERVIEW OF UNIX SYSTEM

Developed by
KEN THOMSON at BELL LABORATORIES in 1969. Evolved from time sharing OS known as MULTICS. Originally written in Assembly programming language. Latter UNIX was recorded in C in 1973.

Feature of UNIX OS
Multi user time sharing operating system-allows several users to work in computer system at the same time. Multi tasking operating system-number of tasks can be executed at the same time. Portability-ability to work on any machine Modularity-its a unique feature which allows various parts of the Unix system added or removed, by reducing cost of the system and useful where disk space is limited.

System securityrestricts access to sensitive information. prevent copying of software restrict unauthorized access password security file security

File Security System- read, write and execute permissions are given at three levels 1.User level 2.Group level 3.Others

 I/O redirection and piping- Unix is hardware independent which provides the redirection facility where input and output can be done to or from files. PIPING - output of one command acts as input to another command. I/O Independency- Unix system consider all devices connected to it as files, which allows input and output independent of hardware devices accessed.

 Communication- it has two level communication 1.Communication between the terminals connected to the same computer. 2.Communication between the two computers at the same site which may not use either same hardware or software through LAN.

STRUCTURE OF UNIX OPERATING SYSTEM

Kernel Shell Utility/Tools applications Kernel-the kernel has direct control over hardware. It controls functions like file management, memory management, process management, interrupt and error handling. Shell-the shell acts as command interpreter. There are several shell scripting language like Bourne shell(sh),C shell(csh).

 Utility/Tools and applications- Utilities are programs that perform different task but do not form a part of operating system. There more than 400 tools available in Unix system they are electronic mailing system, screen formatting tools,editors,also provides networking and communication utilities

FUNCTIONS OF KERNEL AND SHELL

KERNEL FUNCTIONS 1 managing the system resources 2 allowing time for different users and processors 3 controls functions like file management, memory management 4 Interrupt and error handling 5 date and time services 6 deciding the process and executing them

 SHELL FUNCTIONS 1 Interactive processing 2 Batch processing 3 I/O redirection 4 Wild card pattern 5 Pipes 6 Shell scripts 7 Shell variable 8 Execution of programs on user request 9 Automating repetitive tasks

ARCHITECTURE OF KERNEL
Tree levels of Unix operating system 1 User level 2 Kernel level 3 Hardware level

SYSTEM CALL INTERFACE

BUFFER CACHE

INTER PROCESS COMMUNICATION PROCESS CONTROL SUB SYSTEM

SCHEDULER

DEVICE DRIVERS

MEMORY MANAGEMENT

HARDWARE CONTROL HARDWARE LEVEL

 The system call and library interface represents the border between the user program and kernel We can include libraries for sophisticated form of system calls The system call can be partitioned as those that interact with file system and those that interact with process control sub system.

 The file system manages files, allocates space, administer free space, control access to files and retrieving data for users and devices. The buffer mechanism interacts with block I/O devices to initiate data transfer to and of peripherals Block I/O devices are random access storage devices.

 The process control subsystem is responsible for process scheduling , inter process communication, memory management and process scheduling. The file system and process subsystem interacts at the time of loading a file in to memory for execution. The memory management module controls the allocation of memory

 The scheduler module allocates the CPU to the processes. It schedules them to run in until a specific time slot. Finally the hardware control is responsible for handling interrupts and for communicating with the mechanism.