CS 321 Spring 2013
Quiz Topics Before the Midterm

Below are all of the possible quiz topics that were posted on the class webpage prior to the Midterm Exam.

• Briefly explain each of the following concepts: process table, shell, file descriptor, text segment, block special file.
• Give an example of a system call (other than fork): its name and what it does.
• What exactly does the *ix fork system call do?
• In the *ix operating systems, what happens to a child process whose parent terminates before it does?
• In the *ix operating systems, what happens to a child process that terminates before its parent? Why?
• What is the difference between a monolithic kernel and a microkernel?
• Give an advantage of a microkernel over a monolithic kernel.
• A module managed by a microkernal can function as either a “client” or a “server”. Explain.
• List and briefly explain each of the three basic states that a process can be in.
• What is the “process table”?
• List three pieces of data that would reasonably be included in a process-table entry.
• What is a “race condition”? What is a “data race”? Which of these is easier to deal with? Describe one effective way of dealing with the easier of the two.
• What is a “mutex”? What are mutexes for? How is a mutex used?
• When we use locks, we need to write our code so as to minimize the amount of time that a thread holds a lock. Why is this important?
• Some locks are “advisory”; some are “mandatory”. Explain.
• What is “busy waiting”? Why are we generally not happy with it? What would we prefer to do, to achieve the same goal?
• Briefly explain what a “semaphore” is.
• Briefly explain the producer-consumer problem.
• Explain “synchronous” vs. “asynchronous”.
• What is a “pipe”?
• What information does the *ix pipe system call give us?
• An unnamed pipe cannot be used for communication directly between arbitrary processes. Why not?
• What is scheduling?
• Explain “compute-bound” and “I/O-bound” processes.
• What is the difference between interactive and real-time scheduling?
• Why are systems that use real-time scheduling relatively rare?
• What is a “memory hierarchy”, and what benefits does it provide?
• Give a disadvantage of not using a memory abstraction.
• A simple address space is traditionally described by two values. What are these called, and what does each represent?
• In the context of memory management, what is “swapping”?
• When does an OS need to swap?
• Give an advantage of managing free memory using a linked list, rather than a bitmap.