Read The UNIX Time-Sharing System.

Don’t be dismayed by unfamiliar technical jargon; make a guess about what it means and move on. The authors may explain it later, or perhaps never get around to it. There is a good chance that you will discover that it didn’t actually matter. But if it does, you have something to do during lecture.

Questions

Alice keeps her notes in the file /home/alice/notes.txt. Suppose you’re writing a program to help her.

  • She wants to append a note at the end of the file. Describe the sequence of system calls your program would invoke.
  • What if she wants to insert a few words at the beginning of the file? Would the same sequence of system calls work? If not, describe a new plan.

Turn in your answers as part of Exercise 4. You’re also recommended to try MIT 6.033’s Unix hands-on.

If you want to learn more about operating systems, take CSE 451.

Further readings