OPERATING SYSTEM

1.1) INTRODUCTION
Operating system is a system software that is extremely important to activate and coordinate the activities of various hardware resources like the processor, input output devices etc. It also controls the movement of information in the computer system. It i s t he fi rst pro gr am who l oaded i nt o t he com put er m em or y when we boot ou r computer system. It provides a standard to its application software so that application software can talk to operating system or each other easily. In other words, Operating Systems (OS) are the layer of software that sits between hardware and higher level pieces of function like applications and middleware. They help applications and middleware make use of the underlying hardware by doing things like managing memory, providing device driver support for hardware components and file systems to store and organize information on disk. While not technically part of the operating system layer, many modern operating systems are package some higher level function such as shells (also know as graphical user interfaces (GUI)), storage compression, firewalls, internet access, and even web browsers. This paper is a brief overview of the key operating systems in the market, their ancestry, their design points and their differentiating features..

Examples of popular modern operating systems include Android, BSD, iOS, GNU/Linux, OS X, QNX, Microsoft Windows, Windows Phone, and IBM z/OS

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1.2) EVOLUTION
Operating systems have evolved through a number of distinct phases or generations which corresponds roughly to the decades. 1. First Generations The earliest electronic digital computers had no operating systems. Machines of the time were so primitive that programs were often entered one bit at time on rows of mechanical switches (plug boards). Programming languages were unknown (not even assembly languages). Operating systems were unheard of .

2. Second Generation By the early 1950's, the routine had improved somewhat with the introduction of punch cards. The General Motors Research Laboratories implemented the first operating systems in early 1950's for their IBM 701. The system of the 50's generally ran one job at a time. These were called single-stream batch processing systems because programs and data were submitted in groups or batches.

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3. Third Generation The systems of the 1960's were also batch processing systems, but they were able to take better advantage of the computer's resources by running several jobs at once. So operating systems designers developed the concept of multiprogramming in which several jobs are in main memory at once; a processor is switched from job to job as needed to keep several jobs advancing while keeping the peripheral devices in use.

For example, on the system with no multiprogramming, when the current job paused to wait for other I/O operation to complete, the CPU simply sat idle until the I/O finished. The solution for this problem that evolved was to partition memory into several pieces, with a different job in each partition. 4. Fourth Generation With the development of LSI (Large Scale Integration) circuits, chips, operating system entered in the system entered in the personal computer and the workstation age. Microprocessor technology evolved to the point that it become possible to build desktop computers as powerful as the mainframes of the 1970s. Two operating systems have dominated the personal computer scene: MS-DOS, written by Microsoft, Inc. for the IBM PC and other machines using the Intel 8088 CPU and its successors, and UNIX, which is dominant on the large personal computers using the Motorola 6899 CPU family.

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1.3) FUNCTIONS
The main functions provided by most operating systems of today are as follows: 1. Process Management A process is a program in execution. During execution, a process needs certain resources such as CPU time, memory space, files, and I/O devices. At particular instance of time, a computer "system normally consists of a collection of processes. The process management module of an operating system takes care of the creation and deletion of processes, scheduling of various system resources to the different processes requesting them, and providing mechanisms for synchronization and communication among processes. 2. Memory Management To execute a program, it must be loaded, together with the data it accesses, in the main memory (at least partially). To improve CPU utilization and to provide better responses time to its users, a computer system normally keeps several programs in main memory. The memory management module of an operating system takes care of the allocation and deal location of memory space to the various programs indeed of this resource. 3. File Management All computer systems are used for storage, retrieval and sharing of information. A computer normally stores such information in units called files. Processes can read information from files and can create new files for storing newly generated information. Information stored ii files is made persistent by storing them on a secondary storage media such as a magnetic disk. Files provide a natural and easy means of information sharing. That is, a file can be created by on application-and then shared with different applications at a later time. The file management module of an operating system takes care of file related activities such as organization, storing, retrieval, naming, sharing, and protection of files. It allows programs to use a set of operations that characterize the file abstraction and free the programmers from concerns about the details of space allocation and layout of the secondary storage device. 4. Device Management A computer system normally consists of several I/O devices such as terminal, printer, disk, and tape. The device management module of an operating system takes care of controlling all the computer's I/O devices. It keeps track of I/Requests from processes, issue commands to the I/O devices, and ensures correct data transmission to/from an I/O device. It also provides an interface between the devices and the rest of the system that is

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simple and easy to use. Often, this interface is device independent, that is, the interface is same for all types of I/O devices. 5. Security Computer systems often store large amounts of information, some of which is highly sensitive and valuable to their users. Users can trust the system and rely on it only if the various resources and information of a computer system are protected against destruction and unauthorized access. The security module of an operating system ensures this. This module also ensures that when several disjoint processes are being executed simultaneously, one process does not interfere with the others, or with the operating system itself. 6. Command Interpretation A user communicates with the operating system, for using the various system resources, via a set of commands provided by the operating system. The operating system also provides a simple language, known as command language (CL)or job control language (JCL using which a user can put several commands together from the command set to describe the resource requirements of the job. The command interpretation module of an operating system takes care of interpreting user commands, supplied individually or in the form of command language, and directing the system resources to handle the requests. With this mode of interaction with the system, the users usually not too concerned with the hardware details of the system, or with how the operating system will direct the hardware to handle certain requests.

1.4) TYPES:
The various types of the operating system are as follows:1. Single-user Operating System Operating system, which allows only one user to work on a computer at a time, is known as single user operating system. Example included MS-DOS, Windows 9x etc. 2. Multiuser Operating System A Multiuser operating system allows a number of users to work together on a single computer. UNIX is a multiuser operation system. It is not that all users will bump on a computer at t he sam e t i m e. Ea ch user wi l l be p ro vi ded wi t h a t erm i nal and al l such t erm i nal s wi l l be connected to the single computer. Multiuser operating system running on a computer will manage the work of all users, without letting them know that they all are actually working on a single computer.

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3. Single - tasking Operating System Operating system which can execute a single job at a time is known as Single tasking operating system. For example, MS-DOS is a single tasking operating system because you can open and run only one application in DOS, at one time. 4. Multitasking Operating System Multitasking operating system allows the user to perform more than one job at the somet i m e on a comput er. Most of t oda y's ope rat i n g s yst em s such as W i ndows 9x , OS / 2, UN IX, LINUX etc. support multitasking. For example, when you open MS-Word and Internet Explorer at the same time, the Windows Operati9ng system is doing multitasking. The operating system is able to keep track of where you are in each of these applications and switch from one to another without losing track. 5. Real- time Operating System Real - time Operating Systems work towards providing immediate processing and also responding to user's commands in a very short time. Such an operating system is more commonly used in chemical industry for process control and scientific processing like airplane control and space vehicle control operations. Success of a real time system does not depend only on the correctness of the result, but also on the timeliness of the result. A correct answer obtained after the expiration of time limit is as bad as a wrong answer. Some examples of real time operating systems are HP-RT and VTworks. 6. Network Operating System (NOS) Network Operating System (NOS) is an operating system specifically designed to support interconnection of several computers. NOS provide support for multiuser operations as well as administrative, security and network management functions. Some examples of NOSs are Novell's Netware, Microsoft's Windows NT, Artisoft's LAN tactic etc. A network operating system has to acknowledge and respond to requests from many workstations, managing network access, resource allocation and sharing, data protection as wells error control. It provides for printer, file system, database and application sharing. 7. Distributed Operating system A Distributed Operating System hides the existence of multiple computers (interconnected by a network) from the user. That is, the user remains unaware of the fact that many computers and being used to process the data. These computers may be located at many places around the globe. Distributed Operating System provides single- system image to its users. Each computer in a distributed computing system processes a part of
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the global distributed operating system. All these computers work in close coordination with each other. Processes and system resources are managed globally, and controlled from specific locations. User views the complete system as a "virtual uni-processor" and not as a collection of machines. The distributed operation system works towards generating this illusion. Degree of autonomy of individual computers in an environment that uses network operation system is very high whereas the degree of autonomy of individual computers in an environment that uses distributed operation system is considerably low.

SOFTWARE
2.1) INTRODUCTION
Software refers to the programs that we run on our computer systems. Software allows the hardware to do something useful; without software, the hardware wouldnt know what it was supposed to do. Software is made up of a series of instructions or computer code. The term 'software' was first used by John Tukey in 1958. At the very basic level, computer software consists of a machine language that comprises groups of binary values, which specify processor instructions. The processor instructions change the state of computer hardware in a predefined sequence. Briefly, computer software is the language in which a computer speaks. So, software is any set of machine-readable instructions (most often in the form of a computer program) that directs a computer's processor to perform specific operations. The term is used to contrast with computer hardware, the physical objects (processor and related devices) that carry out the instructions. Hardware and software require each other; neither has any value without the other. Software refers to one or more computer programs and data held in the storage of the computer. In other words, software is a set of programs, procedures, algorithms and its documentation concerned with the operation of a data processing system.

2.2) EXECUTION
Computer software has to be "loaded" into the computer's storage (such as the hard drive or memory). Once the software has loaded, the computer is able to execute the software. This involves passing instructions from the application software, through the system software, to the hardware which ultimately receives the instruction as machine code. Each instruction causes the computer to carry out an operation moving data, carrying out a computation, or altering the control flow of instructions. Data movement is typically from one place in memory to another. Sometimes it involves moving data between memory and registers which enable high-speed data access in the CPU. Moving data, especially large amounts of it, can be costly. So, this is sometimes avoided by using "pointers" to data instead. Computations include simple operations such as incrementing the
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value of a variable data element. More complex computations may involve many operations and data elements together.

2.3) TYPES:
The various types of the computer software are as follows:1. System Software System software or operating system is the software used by the computer to translate inputs from various sources into a language which a machine can understand. Basically, the OS coordinates the different hardware components of a computer. There are many OS in the market. The most popular Os are from the stable of Microsoft. We have all heard, used and wondered at the Windows software, which is an OS. Starting with Windows, Microsoft has migrated to Vista, its latest offering in the market.

It may come as a surprise to some that there are other operating systems used by others. Among these UNIX is used for large office setups with extensive networking. XENIX is software which has now become redundant. HP -UX and AIX are some operating systems used by HP computers. Apache OS is quite popular with web servers. IBM still uses proprietary operating systems for its main frames. Proprietary systems are generally built with the help of a variant of UNIX operating system. 2. Application software A normal user rarely gets to see the operating system or to work with it. But all of us are familiar with application software which we must use to interact with a computer.Popular examples of application software are the Microsoft office suite which includes Word, Excel and PowerPoint. We have used these applications extensively. Internet explorer, Mozilla Firefox is two applications used to access the internet. E-mail software like Outlook express is used to manage Emails. It is obvious that all software utilized for
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working on a computer is classified as application software. In fact all user interfaces are an application. The anti-virus is an application and so is the Media player.

3. Programming languages Now this is a kind of computer software which is used exclusively by computer programmers. Unless we are also programmers, we are unlikely to come across programming languages. A simple way to understand programming languages is to think of them as bricks which can be used to create applications and operating system. C++, Java and Simlab are some popular programming languages. Generally Java is used for internet applications. C++ is a language of professional developers and used extensively in developing operating systems. PHP is another language used for internet applications. There is a new class of languages which are being utilized for the mobiles. These are light weight, modular languages which are used to design mobile applications.

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