Contents
What is an Operating System?
So, lets start with the definition of an Operating system.
The hardware functions handled by the operating system are input and output and memory allocation.
The main role of the operating system is functioning as an intermediary between the software and the hardware.
So, an Operating System makes everything in the computer to work together smoothly and efficiently.
The most common and used operating system isMicrosoft Windowswhich is used by 82.74% market share.
The rest of the market is occupied by macOS, Linux, and Android.
Types of Operating Systems
There are four general types of operating systems.
The architecture of Operating systems
The operating systems control the hardware resources of a computer.
The kernel and shell are the parts of the operating system that perform essential operations.
The kernel is also known as the heart of the operating system as every operation is performed by it.
The shell thus acts as an interpreter to convert the commands from the user to the machine code.
Shells present in different types of operating systems are of two types: command-line shells and graphical shells.
The command-line shells provide a command line interface while graphical line shells provide a graphical user interface.
Though both shells perform operations, the graphical user interface shells perform slower than the command line interface shells.
Types of shells
Kernel
The kernel is a part of the software.
It is like a bridge between the shell and the hardware.
It is responsible for running programs and providing secure access to the machines hardware.
The kernel is used for scheduling, i.e., it maintains a timetable for all processes.
The operating system manages all the connected devices and tells them how to operate and interact with the system.
Thats because presenting the result of instructions and interactions are the basic performance of the computer.
The program needs to be designed to function with the particular operating system.
In the absence of the operating system, programs cant perform their designated task.
It is also the responsibility of the operating system to manage the data stored temporarily in the computers RAM.
Resource management like which task should be first processed by the CPU?
Which program needs to be aligned to process the power and memory of the computer system?
How to allocate the program to control the functioning of the computer?
And, so many other resources related decisions are taken up by the operating systems.
