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1. The operating system serves as an intermediary between the user and the computer hardware. (True / False)
ANSWER: True
2. The operating system serves as an intermediary between a process and the computer hardware. (True / False)
ANSWER: False
3. This is the brain of a computer.
a. smart card
b. artificial intelligence
c. logical address
d. read-only memory
e. central processing unit
ANSWER: E
3. A process is a running program. (True / False)
ANSWER: True
4. When a single user runs two copies of the same program concurrently (for example, two instances of NotePad), two processes are
created. (True / False)
ANSWER: True
5. The following operating systems were developed by Microsoft:
a. Mac OS
b. Linux
c. Solaris
d. all of the above
e. b and c only
f. none of the above
ANSWER: F
6. A _______________ operating system supports a system that has rigid time requirements on the CPU and data flows.
ANSWER: Real-Time
7. Time-sharing requires the following.
a. process scheduling
b. process protection
c. deadlock detection/avoidance/handling
d. all of the above
ANSWER: D
8. A _______________ is a named collection of bytes recorded on secondary storage.
ANSWER: File
9. Multitasking requires multiple processors. (True / False)
ANSWER: False
10. Multiprocessing requires multiple processors. (True / False)
ANSWER: True
11. Inside a computer, data is stored in binary form. (True / False)
ANSWER: True
12. An interrupt is a mechanism to signal the processor that normal processing should be temporarily suspended. (True / False)
ANSWER: True
13. It is impossible to run a program if its total memory requirements exceed available RAM. (True / False)
ANSWER: False
14. These are examples of operating systems.
a. Linux
b. MS-DOS
c. Microsoft Windows
d. Microsoft Word
e. all of the above
f. just (a), (
, ©ANSWER: F
15. A disk drive is a direct access storage device. (True / False)
ANSWER: True
16. A disk drive is an example of a secondary storage device. (True / False)
ANSWER: True
17. The _____(a)______ address space is the set of all addresses generated by a program.
The _____(
______ address space is the set of addresses of real memory locationsANSWER:
(a) = Physical
(
= Logical18. From smallest to largest, which sequence is correct?
a. byte, bit, kilobyte
b. bit, byte, kilobyte
c. megabyte, kilobyte, gigabyte
d. kilobyte, gigabyte, megabyte
e. none of the above
ANSWER: B
19. This is the part of the operating system that remains in main memory during system operation.
a. central processing unit
b. kernel
c. seed
d. TRON
ANSWER: B
20. Cache memory helps to prevent bottlenecks between a CPU and random access memory. (True / False)
ANSWER: True
21. An operating system's user interface is often referred to as a shell because it separates the user from OS details. (True / False)
ANSWER: True
22. The short-term queue in the operating system's scheduling system consists of processes that are in main memory. (True / False)
ANSWER: False
23. Client/server computing is one example of distributed computing. (True / False)
ANSWER: True
24. An operating system that includes virtually all of OS functionality in a single large block of code that runs in a single process with a single address space is said to be ______________.
a. humongous
b. monotonic
c. monolithic
d. uniprocessing
ANSWER: C
25. When one process spawns another, the spawning process is referred to as the child process and the spawned process is referred to as the parent process. (True / False)
ANSWER: False
26. One solution to the problem of limited main memory space is swapping, which involves moving all or part of a process from main memory to secondary memory. (True / False)
ANSWER: True
27. A sequential access file has fixed-size 100-byte records. Assuming the first record is record 1, the first byte of record 5 will be at what logical location?
ANSWER: 28
28. On a system using 80-byte records and 500-byte blocks, how much space is wasted in each block?
ANSWER:
29. Contrast random access memory and disk storage in three different ways.
ANSWER: RAM is temporary memory, a temporary storage place for instructions, or data that needs to be processed by the CPU, while hard disk space is memory that is more permanent, a permanent storage place for data and often called secondary memory. When a file is saved, it is saved to the hard disk, but when you call up the internet, it uses temporary memory (RAM). The more windows you have open on your PC, the more RAM you will use up. Processes that the computer performs take up RAM, while saved files and programs take up hard disk space. Random Access Memory is the primary memory of a personal computer (PC) and is very fast, but RAM loses its information when the computer shuts down. However, disk storage is slower than RAM but does not lose its data when the computer is shut down.
30. What is the following diagram called?
ANSWER: The Memory Hierarchy
31. Explain what the diagram in question #30 is telling us.
ANSWER: The memory hierarchy is a ranking of computer memory devices. Devices at the top of the hierarchy have the fastest access time, and devices at the lower levels have slower access times with larger capacity and lower cost (generally, the memory hierarchy follows the access time with the fast CPU registers at the top and the slow hard drive at the bottom). Simply put, a memory hierarchy in computer storage distinguishes each level in the “hierarchy” by response time.
32. A 16-bit address bus can address _______ more addresses than an 8-bit address bus.
ANSWER: 65280
33. How many memory addresses can be addressed by a 24-bit wide address bus?
ANSWER: 13,423,956
34. Discuss the advantages of a multiprogramming operating system as opposed to a serial-processing (2.2) operating system. What trade-offs are involved, if any?
ANSWER:
35. Discuss 5 differences between operating systems for a mainframe and a personal computer.
ANSWER: In a mainframe computer, several users at separate terminals share system resources. Mainframe operating systems are primarily designed for resource utilization, to make sure that all resources are used efficiently. Operating systems designed for personal computers work with dedicated resources, but also share resources such as networking and servers, thus personal computers are designed to compromise between individual usability and resource utilization.
36. If you were a programmer writing an operating system for a real-time environment, what would be your main challenge?
ANSWER: My main challenge would be efficient handling of real-time because data is not always as simple as it looks. An embedded network must find and disseminate information quickly to many nodes. The application needs to find the right data, know where to send it, and ensure delivery to the right place at the right time. The system must respond to inputs and commands within a fixed amount of time to ensure correct performance. Input is typically read from sensors.
37. What is a real-world example of a system that requires a real-time operating system? Explain your answer.
ANSWER: VxWorks. VxWorks has been used in more than 500 million deployed devices, from small consumer products to commercial airliners. VxWorks is used in the Rover robots conceived for geological purposes at NASA, as in the case of the Pathfinder mission to Mars. A Rover robot was used successfully with VxWorks in 1997 too.
38. Briefly describe the stages in the life cycle of a process. Which of these stages can occur only once in a process' life cycle, and which stages can occur multiple times?
ANSWER: The process is submitted to the dispatcher input queues via an initial process list, the process is “ready to run” when it has “arrived,” any pending Real-Time jobs are submitted for execution on a first-come-first-serve process. If enough resources and memory are available for a lower priority User process, the process is transferred to the appropriate priority queue, when a job is started, the dispatcher will display the job parameters. A Real-Time process is allowed to run until its time has expired. A low priority User job is allowed to run for one dispatcher tick (one second) before it is suspended or terminated if its time has expired. The highest priority pending process in the feedback queues are started or restarted if there are no higher-priority Real-Time jobs. When a process is terminated, the resources it used are returned to the dispatcher for reallocation. When there are no more processes in the dispatch list, the input queues and the feedback queues, the dispatcher exits.
39. Explain how an operating system can help a company ensure that its customer contact representatives have higher-priority access than the company's executives to the processing power of the company's mainframe computer.
ANSWER:
40. A cloud computing service provider needs to charge customers for computing resources that they use (for example, CPU, memory, disk space) Discuss how an operating system can help the cloud computing service provider charge back these costs.
ANSWER:
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