Typical Single Semester Course

The following syllabus is designed for a typical undergraduate course where the goal is to introduce students to the concepts of operating systems. We encourage you to examine our notes on integrating Java within this suggested curriculum.

• Chapter 1: Introduction
• Chapter 2: Computer System Structures
  This chapter can be skipped if students are familiar with computer organization.
• Chapter 3: Operating System Structures
  Section 3.6 (Virtual Machines) may be omitted if desired.
• Chapter 4: Processes
  Section 4.5 (Interprocess Communication) can be explored in less detail.
• Chapter 5: Threads
• Chapter 6: CPU Scheduling
  Sections 6.4 (Multiple-Processor Scheduling) and 6.5 (Real-Time Scheduling) may be omitted if desired.
• Chapter 7: Process Synchronization
  Section 7.7 (Monitors) may be omitted.
• Chapter 8: Deadlocks
  You may only want to cover Sections 8.1 through 8.3.
• Chapter 9: Memory Management
  Sections 9.5 and 9.6 may be omitted if you do not wish to cover segmented architectures.
• Chapter 10: Virtual Memory
• Chapter 11: File-System Interface
  Sections 11.3.1 and 11.3.2 may be omitted (Single-Level and Two-Level Directories).
• Chapter 12: File-System Implementation
• Chapter 13: I/O Systems
  Section 13.1 and 13.2 may be omitted if students have an understanding of I/O hardware.
• Chapter 14: Mass-Storage Structure
  Coverage of Section 14.8 (Tertiary-Storage Structure) may depend upon the amount of time remaining. Disk scheduling algorithms (Section 14.2) make nice Java exercises.