Chapter 27 Windows 2000

Objectives

• To present the design of a widely used contemporary PC operating system.
• To present a case study of object structuring in an OS design.
• To contrast the provision of processes and threads with an old OS (classical UNIX).

Possible difficulties

Windows 2000/NT will evolve. Some students will know some versions intimately. Some local versions in use will have diverged from the original design presented here. The core OS structure however remains valid from Windows NT, through Windows 2000 and to Windows XP.

Teaching hints

• Note the choice of the privilege boundary, excluding the window manager, and the use of processes and threads.
• Here is a concrete example of a process descriptor and a thread descriptor.
• If the students use UML, or some other O-O method, for software design, some aspects of NT could be specified in this way.