Question Bank for Operating System

1 Define Operating System and also explain objectives of OS?

2 What is OS? What is the need of an OS? Discuss

major functions of OS with examples?

3 Describe three general methods for passing parameters to

the OS?

4 List functions of OS and explain one of them in detail

5 Write a short note on the evolution of OS?

6 With the help of a neat diagram explaining OS services?

7 Define System calls with the help of an example?

8 List types of OS structure and explain the advantages

of microkernel approach.

9 Explain in detail Linux shell with its types?

10 What is the process? Explain multiple parts of process

in memory.

11 What is context switch? Describe the action taken by a kernel

to context switch between processes.

12 Describe the differences among short-term, medium term

and long-term scheduling.

13 Why is it important for the scheduler to distinguish I/O

bound programs from CPU bound programs?

14 Draw and Explain Process state transition diagram.

15 Explain the use of the Process control Block (PCB). Discuss

the content of PCB.

16 What is meant by pre-emptive scheduling? How does it

affect the system performance vis-à-vis non-primitive
scheduling?

17 Discuss round robin scheduling policy with its merits and

demerits. What is the impact of the quantum of time slice on
the system performance?

18 Briefly describe the three types of processor scheduling

19 What is usually the critical performance requirement in

an interactive operating system?

20 For process scheduling, does a low-priority value Understanding

represent a low priority or a high priority?
21 What is the difference between premeptive and non-pre- Understanding
emptive scheduling?

22 List types of scheduling algorithms and briefly define anyone. Remembering

23 What are the merits and demerits of SJF policy? Understanding

24 Which of the following scheduling algorithms could Understanding

result in starvation?
First Come first served
Shortest Job First
Round robin
Priority

25 Explain the differences in how much the following Understanding

scheduling algorithms discriminate in favour of
short processes. a) FCFS b) RR c) Multilevel
Feedback
Queues

26 Numerical on scheduling algorithm. Apply

27 Explain in detail the operation on process as process Understanding

creation and termination.

28 Explain thread with help of suitable examples. Understanding

29 Explain multithreading and its models. Understanding

30 Which of the following components of program state Understanding

are shared across threads in a multithreaded process?
Register value
Heap memory
Global variables
Stack Memory

31 Show that, if the wait() and signal() semaphore operations Analysing

are not executed automatically, then mutual exclusion may
be violated.

32 Show how to implement the wait() and signal() Analysing

semaphore operations in a multiprocessor environment
using the TestAndSet() instruction.

33 Explain Dining Philosophers Problem. Understanding

34 What is the critical-section problem? List software and Understanding

hardware solutions of the critical-section problem and
describe any of it.
35 Explain critical section problems in detail. Give the three Understanding
requirements that should be satisfied by a solution to the
critical section problem.

36 What is semaphore? Show how to avoid race conditions Understanding

in producer and consumer problems.

37 What is the bounded buffer problem? Understanding

38 What is the dining philosopher problem? Explain Understanding

Dining philosophers’ solution using any one method.

39 Explain Process creation using fork() system call. Understanding

40 What is interprocess communication? Explain two models Understanding

of interprocess communication

41 Give examples of reusable and consumable resources. Understanding

42 What are the three conditions that must be present for a deadlock Understanding
to be possible.

43 What are the four conditions that create deadlock? Understanding

44 How can the hold-and-wait condition be prevented? Understanding

45 List two ways in which the no pre-emption condition can Understanding

be prevented.

46 How can the circular wait condition be prevented? Understanding

47 What is the difference among deadlock avoidance, detection Understanding

and prevention?

48 Numerical on Resource allocation graph Apply

49 Numerical on banker’s algorithm Apply

50 What is thrashing? How is it handled? Understanding

51 What is demand paging? What are the advantages? Understanding

52 Explain the concept of virtual memory. Understanding

53 Consider a system consisting of m resources of the same type , Apply

being shared by n processes. Resources can be requested and
released by processes only one at a time. Show that the system
is deadlock free if the following two conditions are hold:
 a. The maximum need of each process is between 1 and
m resources.
b. The sum of all maximum needs is less than the m+n.

54 A variable partition memory system has at some point in time Apply

the following holes sizes in the given order: -
20K,15K,40K,60K,10K,25K. A new process is to be loaded.
Which hole size would be filled using best-fit, first-fit and worst
fit respectively?

55 What is the need of page replacement? Consider following Apply

reference string
7, 0 , 1 ,2 ,0,3,0,4,2,3,0,3,0,3,2,1,2,0,1,7,0,1
Find the number of Page Faults with FIFO, optimal page
replacement and LRU with four frames which are empty
initially. Which algorithm gives the minimum number of page
faults.

56 What is paging? How is it different from segmentation? Understanding

Explain hardware support for paging?

57 Compare the following main memory organization schemes: Analysing

contiguous memory allocation, pure segmentation and pure
paging with respect to the following issues:
1) External fragmentation
2) Internal fragmentation

58 With the help of a neat diagram explaining the hardware Understanding

support with TLB paging.

59 Justify the statement: Demand paging can significantly Apply

affect performance of computer systems.
Consider the following page reference string:
1,2,3,4,2,1,5,6,2,1,2,3,7,6,3,2,1,2,3,6. How many page faults would

occur for the following replacement algorithms, assuming one,

two, three, four, five, six and seven frames?
LRU replacement
FIFO replacement
Optimal replacement

60 Compare and contrast given allocation methods: Analysing

contiguous allocation, Linked allocation, Indexed
allocation.

61 Write short notes on: Memory segmentation Understanding

62 Given memory partitions of 100KB,500KB,200KB,300KB and Apply

 600KB (in order), how would each of the first fit and worst fit
algorithms place processes of 212KB,417KB,112KB and 426KB
(in order)? Which algorithm makes the most efficient use of
memory?

63 Explain demand paging with suitable examples. Understanding

64 What is address translation? Consider a logical address space of Apply

32 pages with 1,024 words per page, mapped onto a physical
memory of 16 frames.
a. How many bits are required in the logical address?
b. How many bits are required in the physical
address?

65 Write short notes on a) Translation Lookaside buffer Understanding

b) Page replacement algorithms

66 Consider a logical address space of 256 pages with a 4 KB Apply

page size, mapped onto a physical memory of 64 frames.
a. How many bits are required for a logical address? b.
How many bits are required for the physical address?

67 What is the difference between simple paging and virtual Analysing

memory paging?

68 What is paging and explain address translation in a paging Understanding

system with suitable diagrams.

69 What is the difference between internal and external fragmentation? Analysing

70 Numerical on Effective Memory access time (TLB) Apply

71 What is Page table and Inverted page table? Understanding

72 What are the distinctions among logical, relative and Understanding

physical addresses?

73 What is the difference between a page and a frame? Understanding

74 What is the difference between a page and a segment? Understanding

75 What is the difference between a field and a record? Understanding

76 What is the difference between a file and a database? Understanding

77 What is a file management system? Understanding

78 What criteria are important in choosing a file organization? Understanding

79 List and briefly define five file organizations? Remembering

80 Why is the average search time to find a record in a file less for Analysing
 an indexed sequential file than for a sequential file.

81 What are typical operations that may be performed on a directory? Understanding

82 What is the relationship between a pathname and a Understanding

working directory?

83 What are typical access rights that may be granted or denied to Understanding
a particular user for a particular file?

84 List and briefly define three techniques for performing I/O Remembering

85 What is the difference between logical I/O and device I/O? Understanding

86 Write short note on DMA

87 What is the difference between block-oriented devices and Understanding

stream oriented devices? Give a few examples of each.

88 Why would you expect improved performance using a double Understanding

buffer rather than a single buffer for I/O?

89 What delay elements are involved in a disk read or write? Understanding

90 Perform the analysis FCFS, SSTF, SCAN, CSCAN, LOOK, C- Apply

LOOK for the following sequence of disk track requests:
27,129,110,186,147,41,10,64,120. Assume that the disk head is
initially positioned over track 100 and is moving in the direction
of decreasing track number.