KENYATTA UNIVERSITY
COURSE OUTLINE :
DEPARTMENT: CIS
UNIT TITLE: COMPUTERS OPERATING SYSTEMS
UNIT CODE: SIT304/SCO107/SCO217/SCO231
PRE-REQUISITE: NONE
LECTURER: DR JOHN M. KANDIRI
CONTACT HOURS: 3 HOURS OF LECTURES PER WEEK
Course Methodology:
Lectures, Tutorials, Demonstrations .
Written assignments will explore the issues and their logical consequences.
Aims: The module aims to provide an introduction to the facilities offered by and the
under-lying theoretical background to an operating system.
Objectives:
(Indicative Learning Outcomes)
The student would be able to:
Understand the basic principles of operating systems
Appreciate the role of the operating systems as resources manager
Understand the process, memory file and I/O management tasks of the Operating system
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Course Contents
INTRODUCTION
What is an operating system?
Definition
History of OS
Overview of OS
What are input and output devices?
Where are operating systems found?
What is a general purpose operating system?
A simple operating system for a security system
What are input output devices
What is a single-user operating system?
What is a multi-user operating system?
Operating system utilities
Operating system interfaces
Advantages and problems of multi-user operating systems
What is a multi-tasking operating system?
OS COMPONENTS AND TERMS
What are the various parts of an operating system?
What is a real-time executive?
What is a computer program?
How does an operating system run more than one program at once?
What is cooperative and preemptive scheduling?
What is dispatching?
What is system overhead?
What is required to switch from one program to another?
What is context switching?
What is scheduling?
Other methods of scheduling
MEMORY MANAGEMENT
What is memory?
How is memory used?
What is memory partitioning?
What is memory fragmentation?
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What is Virtual Memory?
What are overlays?
PROCESS MANAGEMENT
What is a process?
What about process states?
What is a process control block?
How do processes intercommunicate? What is interprocess communiation?
How do processes synchronize their activity?
How do processes protect critical data?
What is a thread?
What is a background and foreground task?
How does an operating system load?
What is the bootstrap process?
What are the different types of operating systems?
What is a shell?
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FILE MANAGEMENT
What is a file?
What typical operations are performed on files?
What are file control blocks?
What about how we name files?
What are file types?
How does an operating system keep track of files?
What is a root file system?
What does a root file system entry look like?
What is a cluster?
How is free space managed?
What file systems are supported by Windows operating systems?
What are access control lists and file permissions?
What is a symbolic link or shortcut?
What is file-system integrity?
What is fragmentation and what does defragging a drive do?
I/O MANAGEMENT
What are the functions of I/O manager?
What are I/O devices?
What are I/O drivers and controllers?
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BASIC FEATURES OF GRAPHICAL INTERFACES
The mouse, The mouse cursor, Selecting items with a mouse, Window fundamentals
Window properties
Windows Objects and Components
Text Boxes, Radio Buttons, Check Boxes, Dialog Boxes, List Boxes, Drop Down List Boxes
Tab Controls, Toolbars, Hardware requirements, General Features of Windows
Easy Installation ,Graphical Interface, Plug and Play, Add/Remove Programs, Networking
Grading
Scores for this course will be determined by assignment , projects and test points
weighted as follows:
Continuous Assessment Tests 30%
Class test I - 15%
Class test II - 15%
Group Projects I - 10%
End of semester Examination 70%
An overview of course contents
Reference Books and URL
Main text
TANENBAUM, A.S (2001) Operating Systems : Design and implementation . 2 nd
ed.
Other Texts and URLs
TANENBAUM, A.S (2001) Modern Operating Systems
SILBERSCHATZ A. and GALVIN, P.B (1997) Operating Systems Concepts 5 th ed.
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