CS2005 Networks and Operating Systems - Operating Systems Structures and Processes

Flashcards for key vocabulary and concepts related to operating systems and processes.

Operating System (OS)

Software that manages hardware resources and provides common services for computer programs.

Process

A program in execution, which requires resources such as CPU time, memory, and I/O devices.

Process Control Block (PCB)

Data structure in the operating system that contains information about a process such as its state, program counter, and CPU registers.

User Interface (UI)

The means by which a user interacts with a computer, which can be command-line (CLI) or graphical (GUI).

System Call

A request to the operating system to provide a service executed by the kernel.

Resource Allocation

The process of distributing system resources to multiple users or processes.

Concurrency

The executing of multiple processes at the same time which can share resources.

I/O Operations

Input/Output operations that involve managing the execution of programs needing data input or output.

Thread

The smallest sequence of programmed instructions that can be managed independently by a scheduler.

Process State

Represents the current status of a process, indicating if it's new, running, waiting, ready or terminated.