Question

What is an operating system? What are its functions? What are the types of operating system?

Answer 1

Operating system is the interface and is also referred to as system software that is needed to run application softwares like calculator etc. Example of operating system Is macos, windows xp etc.

Functions of operating system :

1. Managing resources.

Operating system knows what kind of hardware is attached and uses those resources to run application or user commands. It tries to smooth user experience.

2. Providing basis for application

Application softwares need operating systems to run and OS provide various services to support such applications.

3. User interface

To make user interact with the machine properly, os is an interface that is friendly and understandable.

4. Monitor system health

OS tries its best to ensure that the experience is smooth and it keeps on monitoring in the background if there's anything that requires attention like a bad application or ram management etc. It keeps computer healthy.

5. Data management.

OS provides the environment that helps us manage the files we need and have stored on the computer. We can choose to use delete or move these files and OS is essential to do that.

Types of OS

1. Single and multi user OS: singer user os allows only one user at a time while a multi user OS allows multiple users.

2. Single and multi tasking os: single tasking OS allows one command or task a time while multi tasking OS allows multiple tasks to be processed.

3. Time sharing : this OS also allows multiple users and allow time sharing via resources sharing. Many people at different terminals can use the same computer at the same time.