473 Quiz

1. 473 Quiz

2. Assuming 4kB to save information about one function call, what is the largest integer whose factorial can be calculated by a recursive program whose address space is 4MB in size? Ignore space occupied by code segment. • factorial(n) = n ∗ factorial(n − 1), n > 1 • factorial(1) = 1 • ANSWER: • The stack would only be able to hold 1,000 function frames. So the largest integer would be 1,000.

3. Which of the following is synchronous? Interrupt arrival, Trap occurrence • Answer: • Synchronous: Generated at the end of an instruction execution. Eg. Trap (Divide by zero, system call using ‘int’ instruction) • Interrupts are asynchronous – can arrive at anytime (middle of a clock cycle – edge triggered or level-triggered) • Always handled at the end of the interrupted instruction

4. Assume a program with 1M instructions. Of these 40% refer to a data item or an instruction in memory (load/store). Assuming one cycle per instruction fetched to the CPU from memory and ignoring hardware caches, how many cycles does the program need to finishif there is no TLB? • Answer: • Load/store specify only virtual address and requires virtual-physical address mapping to fetch from memory (Hardware page table WALK) • 1Million * 0.4 * 2 + 1Million* 0.6 = 1.4 Million

5. Think of two ways a kernel could detect a malfunctioning timer interrupt mechanism? • Answer: • Kernel uses timer interrupt as a means of time-keeping – faulty timer interrupt can make the kernel think it is running faster/slower • First way: Run a piece of code with a predictable relationship with the number of instructions it would execute within a given amount of time. Then compare this count with that expected based on the time reported by the timer. • Second way: Send messages to an external entity with access to a functional timer and compare the time elapsed between these with that reported by our timer.

6. We discussed the need to flush the TLB upon context switch on certain processors. What would you change about the TLB for it not to have to be flushed upon a context switch? • Answer: • We would use what are called tagged TLBs, where each translation entry within the TLB also has bits to indicate which process (i.e., address space) that entry corresponds to.

7. What do you think happens when a data item needed by a process is not found in main memory? • ANSWER: • A trap is generated which causes the OS to run and fetch these missing memory contents needed by the process from a secondary storage device (typically a disk) into main memory. This kind of trap is called a page fault

8. Recall user-level threads. Why is it safe to let a user-level thread switch the CPU? • Answer: • It is safe to do so because of the notions of context switching and virtual memory. A user-level piece of code may fill up the registers with any value (e.g., using something like setjmp), but the OS guarantees that this will not affect the register contents seen by any other process. A good example is the program counter register. A process may fill any address into this register, but it would be a virtual address within its own address space and would be safely translated into a physical memory address assigned to this process.

9. Process scheduling is usually described as selection from a queue of processes. For each of these scheduling methods, describe the selection method, the insertion method (if required), further properties of the queue (if required), and whether a simple queue should be replaced by a more sophisticated data structure. • Answer: • Round robin: Circular queue • SJF: Heap or binary tree • Multi-level feedback queue: queue of queues

10. So far we have said that all registers including the PC need to be saved when context switching out a process. However, one can typically get away without saving the PC (meaning it gets saved in some other way). Where do you think it gets saved? Who (what entity) saves it? • Answer: • Who saves PC register –hardwaresaves PC + stack pointer in the kernel stack

11. Which of process/K-level thread/U-level thread would you pick to design an application whose constituent activities: Are mostly CPU-bound; Are mostly CPU-bound and need to meet timeliness guarantees; Do a lot of blocking I/O? • Answer: • IO bound: kernel-level threads since user-level threads doing IO blocks the entire process • CPU bound: User-level threads, context switching overhead is small

12. A process on an average runs for time T before blocking for I/O. A context switch takes time S. For round robin scheduling with quantum Q, give a formula for CPU efficiency. • Answer: • CPU efficiency = time doing useful work/total time • If Q=inf, efficiency = T/T+S • If T=nQ, efficiency = nQ/(nQ+nS+S) • If Q=nT, …

13. True or False • (a) A process can send a signal to any other process. (Answer: false) • (b) The TLB must be flushed when context switching across user-level threads belonging to the same process (i.e., address space). (Answer: false) • (c) First-Come-First-Served (FCFS) is an appropriate scheduler for a system with inter-active processes (such as editors). (Answer: false) • (d) Round robin is a non-work-conserving scheduler. (Answer: false) • (e) Traps are always synchronous. (Answer: true) • (f) Condition variables and semaphores completely get rid of busy waiting when used to construct entry sections. (Answer: false)

14. (g) Where does a global variable reside: (a) heap, (b) stack, (c) code segment, (d) data segment? (Answer: data segment) • (h) Which of these properties of a mutual exclusion solution, if satisfied, automatically implies that the others are also satisfied: (a) no starvation, (b) bounded wait, (c) no deadlock? (Answer: bounded wait) • (i) Upon a division by zero by a process, which kernel routine of the following will get executed after switching to the kernel mode: (a) an interrupt service routine, (b) a signal handler, (c) a trap handler, (d) flushing of certain kernel buffers? (Answer: interrupt service routine) • (j) Pick the CPU scheduling algorithm that provides the least average waiting time among these: (a) First-Come-First-Served (FCFS), (b) Shortest Job First (SJF), and (c) Round Robin (RR). (Answer: shortest job first)

15. Why is it safe in a multi-tasking system to let user-level code write any address into the Program Counter (PC) register? • Answer: • PC points to a virtual address – hence safe

16. Can a piece of code remain atomic despite being interrupted by the CPU scheduler? Why or why not? • Answer: • yes, mutex locks can be used.

17. Assume a Lottery scheduler and two processes P1 and P2 with shares 1 and 2, respectively. What is the probability that process P2 will be chosen by the scheduler successively 10 times? • Answer: • (2/3)10

18. An OS uses round robin scheduling. A context switch takes 0.002 msec while interrupt handling takes 0.001 msec per interrupt. If the quantum length is 10 msec and interrupts arrive every 10 msec(at the middle of every quantum), what is the CPU efficiency. CPU efficiency is defined as the ratio of useful CPU time (used to run processes) to the total time. • Answer: • 10/(10+.003) • (10 - .001)/(10+.002)

19. In our discussion of signal handling, we saw that after executing the signal handler implemented by a process, there is a need to go back to the kernel mode before resuming the normal execution of the process. • Answer: • Where to return in user code?

20. Thread A: • statement a1 • statement a2 • Thread B: • statement b1 • statement b2 • (i) a1 must happen before b2 and (ii) b1 must happen before a2. Both the semaphores (bArrived and aArrived) are initialized to 0. • Thread A: • statement a1 • wait (bArrived); • signal (aArrived); • statement a2 • Thread B: • statement b1 • wait (aArrived); • signal (bArrived); • statement b2 Can we use conditional wait and signal ?