CS261 Fall 2016: Quiz #1

Please use whatever word processing software that you'd like to write your answers, but please send me either plain text (≤ 80 characters per line) or PDF. I will be grading the quiz blind (that is, I don't want to know whose quiz I am grading), so please do not put your name anywhere in your exam. Instead, name your exam lastname.{txt,pdf}. Please email your quiz to: margo@eecs.harvard.edu.

Here are the papers we've read:

1. Baumann: The Multikernel: A New OS Architecture for Scalable Multicore Systems
2. Bensoussan: The Multics Virtual Memory:Concepts and Design
3. Bugnion: Disco: running commodity operating systems on scalable multiprocessors
4. Corbató: An Experimental Time-Sharing System
5. Daley: Virtual Memory, Processes, and Sharing in MULTICS
6. Dijkstra: The Structure of the "THE" Multiprogramming System
7. Gamsa: Tornado: Maximizing Locality and Concurrency in a Shared Memory Multiprocessor Operating System
8. Hibler: Microkernels Meet Recursive Virtual Machines
9. Kilburn: One Level Storage System
10. Leidtke: On micro-kernel Construction
11. Meyer: A virtual machine time-sharing system
12. Rashid: From RIG to Accent to Mach: The Evolution of a Network Operating System
13. Yehuda: The Turtles Project: Design and Implementation of Nested Virtualization

Historical Context

Please divide the thirteen papers that we've read into three categories: the 1) 1960's and 70's, 2) the 1980's and 90's, 3) 2000 and more recent. After you've categorized the papers, assign each category a title that you think summarizes the set of papers.

To Microkernel or not to Microkernel

Please indicate whether Jochen Leidtke would consider each of the following systems a microkernel. Give 1-2 sentences for each justifying your answer.

• Barrelfish
• Fluke
• Multics
• THE
• Tornado

Virtual Machines

We have read about three rather different virtual machine systems: CP-67/CMS, Disco, and KVM. For each one, identify the main research contribution from the system/project. Then compare the three systems in terms of their contributions and impact (1-3 sentences per each pairwise comparison should be sufficient).

Paper Survey