Introduction to the Linux Kernel

 

● System call interface (SCI)

1. ○ A thin layer that provides a method to interact from user space to kernel space

● Process Management (PM)

1. ○ Create, destroy processes
2. ○ Communication between different processes (kernel threads)
3. ○ CPU scheduling

● Memory Management (MM)

1. ○ Physical to virtual memory management
2. ○ Memory allocation
3. ○ Swapping, from memory to hard disk

● Virtual File System (VFS)

1. ○ Eports the common file interface
2. ○ Abstract file system functionality from implementation

● File Systems

1. ○ Implementation of FS functionality

● Buffer Cache

1. ○ A set of functions to manipulate main memory designed for FS

● Device Driver

● Physical Device

1. ○ Where data live

● Network Stack

1. ○ Implement the network protocols
2. ○ Deliver packets across programs and network interfaces

● Device Drivers (DD)

1. ○ Interact with the hardware
2. ○ Extract an abstraction of the device functionalities

● Arch

1. ○ Architecture dependent code

Praktikum Kernel Programming
University of Hamburg
Scientific Computing
Winter semester 2014/2015