What Are Parallel Operating Systems?

Parallel operating system is a computer operating system that taps the potential of modern high-performance computers and modern operating systems, and can maximize the computing power of parallel computing systems. ^[1]

Parallel operating systems have evolved with the development of parallel computers. Early parallel computers simply used vector boards or array machines to improve the performance of serial computers. At this time, the operating system only needs to do some simple operations such as loading, and it is not a parallel operating system. The earliest parallel operating system is American

traditional

I. Classification by control methods can be divided into the following four categories:

1.Master-Slave

Master-slave is a simpler and older type of parallel operating system. It is more suitable for parallel computers with a master-slave architecture, and it can also be used in a symmetric environment. The main feature of the master-slave operating system is that it arranges all system services and interrupt processing to run on one processor (the processor is called the master processor); the other processes (called the slave processors) are all managed processes. It is sent to the main processor for processing.

2.Separate Supervisor

A stand-alone operating system refers to an operating system kernel on each processor. It has a completely different structure from the master-slave type and has similarities to operating systems on the network. Operating system resource sharing in this way is a higher-level resource sharing method, such as file sharing.

3.Floating Supervisor

The main feature of the floating structure is that the kernel of the operating system is not fixed on a certain processor (like the master-slave type), but floats on several processors that can execute the kernel as needed.

4.Multithread

Threads are entities that can be executed individually, and are lightweight processes with the necessary minimum state; the so-called minimum state includes the process state and the contents of related registers. The so-called multi-threaded parallel operating system is actually a redesign of the kernel or a further improvement of the floating type. Even if the kernel's partition is small enough to allow multiple processors to run in the kernel at the same time, a multi-thread is formed. Kernel.

2. According to the kernel structure, it can be divided into the following categories:

1.The overall kernel system

If the kernel of a parallel operating system is a whole, it is separated from the user program by a simple hardware boundary, and the kernel structure without any boundary protection between the modules in the operating system is called the whole kernel. In the overall kernel structure, inter-process communication as an advanced operating system function is implemented through shared memory or visible message-based communication mechanisms supported by the system.

Capability-based systems

In this system, each accessible entity in the kernel module or hardware resource has its own protection domain, and all entities are located in a single named space.

3.Message passing system

In this operating system kernel, each process always exists in its own address space, and at the same time, the communication of the process is achieved through message passing on the communication channel. ^[3]