CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #1 CSC 660: Advanced OS Processes

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #2 Topics 1.What is a Process? 2.Task Descriptor 3.Process Lifecycle 4.Process Address Space 5.Context Switch 6.Linked lists 7.Creation 8.fork() and clone() 9.Process Relationships 10.Termination 11.Zombies

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #3 What is a process? A process is a program in execution. Program code + dynamic execution context. Virtualization Processes provide virtual CPU + virtual memory. Kernel refers to processes as tasks.

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #4 What is in a process? A process consists of. Program code. Address space. Data. Resources: open files, signals. At least one thread of execution. Threads contain: Program counter. Stack. Register set.

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #5 Process Control Block: task_struct

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #6 Process Identity Kernel: Address of task_struct –current macro User space: PID –current->pid –32768 possible PIDs –pidhash

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #7 Process Lifecycle

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #8 Process State TASK_RUNNING Process is ready or running. TASK_INTERRUPTIBLE Waiting, able to receive interrupts. TASK_UNINTERRUPTIBLE Waiting, unable to receive interrupts. TASK_STOPPED Execution stopped, can resume with SIGCONT. TASK_TRACED Execution stopped by the ptrace() debugging mechanism. EXIT_ZOMBIE Execution terminated, but parent hasn’t wait() ed. EXIT_DEAD Being removed from system as parent has wait() ed.

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #9 Process Address Space Process appears to have flat memory space. Discontinguous areas of physical memory mapped via page table to produce virtual memory. Described by mm_struct Virtual memory space 3GB virtual memory on 32-bit architectures. High 1GB reserved for mapping kernel memory.

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #10 32-bit Process Address Space 0x xBFFFFFFF text data heap stack EIP ESP bss

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #11 Context Switch When does scheduler switch out process? Blocked on I/O. Time slice expires. Where is switching done? In schedule() function. How does it switch? Switch to new page table. Save hardware context to stack. Switch stack pointers. Load hardware context of next process from stack.

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #12 Context Switch Example

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #13 Your own task_struct How to find your task_struct ? 1. stack pointer points to top of kernel stack 2. thread_info stored at bottom of kernel stack 3. mask 13 lsb’s of stack pointer to get address 4. thread_info has pointer to task_struct Use current macro to do this normally.

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #14 Your own task_struct

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #15 Kernel linked lists Circular doubly-linked list. No special first or last node. Defined in struct list_head { struct list_head *next, *prev; } Use by embedding in structures: struct my_struct { struct list_head list; void *data; }

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #16 Kernel linked lists

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #17 Kernel Linked Lists struct my_struct *p; struct list_head *new, *x, *my; INIT_LIST_HEAD(&p->list) Create a new linked list of my_struct’s. list_add(new, p) Add new list_head to list after p. list_del(struct list_head *x) Remove structure containing list_head pointer x. list_for_each(p, &my->list) Iterate over list starting with my, with p as pointer to current element. list_entry(p, struct my_struct, list) Return pointer to my_struct whose list_head is p.

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #18 Process Lists #define next_task(p) list_entry((p)->tasks.next, struct task_struct, tasks) #define prev_task(p) list_entry((p)->tasks.prev, struct task_struct, tasks) #define for_each_process(p) \ for (p = &init_task ; (p = next_task(p)) != &init_task ; )

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #19 Where do processes come from? Kernel creates some processes. Kernel threads. init Processes create all other processes. Process copies itself with fork(). Original is parent, new process is child. Child can load its own program with exec().

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #20 Process Creation and Termination

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #21 fork() System call creates a new process Creates a new task_struct. Initializes with copy of parent resources. Creates a new address space. Page table is copy-on-write pointer to parent. Places child process on ready queue. Returns in both parent and child. Parent return value is PID of child process. Error return value of -1 indicates no child. Child return value is 0.

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #22 clone() Threads are just a type of process. Share address space, files, signal handlers. All processes/threads created by clone() Process: clone(SIGCHLD, 0) Thread: clone(CLONE_VM | CLONE_FS | CLONE_FILES | CLONE_SIGHAND, 0);

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #23 Process Relationships real_parent Process that created p or process 1 ( init ). parent Process to be signaled on termination. If ptrace(), is debugging process, else real_parent. children List of all children created by p. sibling Pointers to next and previous elements of sibling list.

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #24 Process Relationships

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #25 Process Tree (Solaris)

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #26 Process Termination Voluntary exit() system call. C compiler automatically adds to binaries. Involuntary signal exception

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #27 Signals Software interrupts used for asynchronous communiction between processes. –SIGALRM: alarm() timer has gone off. –SIGINT: interrupt signal generated by Ctrl-c. –SIGSEGV: segmentation violation sent by kernel when process accesses invalid address. –SIGKILL: terminates a process. Process can either –Ignore the signal: SIGKILL/STOP cannot be ignored. –Catch the signal: Create a signal handler function and register it with the kernel to be called on signal.

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #28 do_exit() 1.Sets PF_EXITING flag. 2.Releases resources: 1.Address space. 2.File handles. 3.Signal handlers and timers. 3.Sets exit_code member of task_struct. 4.Notifies parent of termination ( SIGCHLD ) 5.Reparents any children of process. 6.Set process state to EXIT_ZOMBIE. 7.Calls schedule() to switch to new process.

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #29 The Undead Why do we need zombies? Must keep task_struct so parents can get exit_code member. Parent issues wait() system call to get exit. If parent predeceases child, init will be parent. Calls release_task() to free resources. Removes process from lists, hashes, caches. Frees kernel stack and thread_info struct. Frees task_struct.

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #30 Kernel Threads System processes that run only in kernel mode –Use kernel page tables (mem > PAGE_OFFSET ) –Created by kernel_thread() function which calls do_fork(flags|CLONE_VM|CLONE_UNTRACED,…) Process 0: swapper –The idle process, runs cpu_idle() when no other processes in TASK_RUNNING state. –Created statically when kernel boots. Process 1: init –Created by process 0 via kernel_thread(). –Uses execve() system call to load init program.

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #31 Logging In login program 1.Checks password. 2.chdir to homedir. 3.chown terminal to user. 4.sets group IDs 5.initializes env variables 6.changes UID to user 7.execs login shell

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #32 Key Points Process = program + execution context Execution context stored in PCB ( task_struct.) –Tasks organized in a doubly linked list. –Referenced by PID from user space. –Process states: RUNNING, (UN)INTERRUPTIBLE Process provides virtual CPU + memory. Scheduler manages context switches. Processes and threads created by clone(). –Parent/child and sibling relationships. –Kernel reclaims resources on exit().

CSC 660: Advanced Operating SystemsSlide #33 References 1.Daniel P. Bovet and Marco Cesati, Understanding the Linux Kernel, 3 rd edition, O’Reilly, Robert Love, Linux Kernel Development, 2 nd edition, Prentice-Hall, Claudia Rodriguez et al, The Linux Kernel Primer, Prentice-Hall, Peter Salzman et. al., Linux Kernel Module Programming Guide, version 2.6.1, Avi Silberchatz et. al., Operating System Concepts, 7 th edition, W. Richard Stevens and Stephen Rago, Advanced Programming in the UNIX Environment, 2 nd edition, Andrew S. Tanenbaum, Modern Operating Systems, 3 nd edition, Prentice-Hall, 2005.