UNIT2

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SystemLifecycle:Ups&Downs
Booting KernelInitialization init:ProcessNumberOne Shutdown PowerManagement

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Harddisk

Outside

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HardDisk

Inside

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ALookattheHardDisk
Ontheinside,therearesomeshinyplattersona spindle. Theharddiskintheabovepicturehasonlytwo platters,butmostmodernoneshavemorethanthat, atleastthree. Thearmsaboveandbeloweachplatterholdtiny read/writeheadsontheendofthemwhichfloatona thincushionofairjustabovethespinningdisk surface.
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Theycanpivotaroundtosweepthediskinsearchof thedatayouwant. Dataontheharddiskplattersiswritteninconcentric rings(likegrowthringsonatreestump),called 'tracks'. Tracksaredividedupinto'sectors'. Onesectoronaharddiskcanhold512bytesofdata. Actuallythereareagreaternumberofsectorsonthe outsidetracksandfewerontheinsidetracks.

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The'beginning'ofadiskmeanstheoutside edge,andthe'end'isreallythepartclosest tothecenter.

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Partitions
Inoldentimes,adiskcouldonlyhavefour partitions.Thepartitionnumbers1,2,3and4are reservedforthepartitions.

Thesearecalledprimarypartitions

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Thenitbecamepossibletosubpartitiononeofthese fourprimarypartitions.Onlyoneofthefourprimary partitionsisallowedtobedividedupinthisway.

Thesubpartitionedprimarypartitioniscalledan 'extended'partition.Itcanhavethenumberfrom5. Thepartitionsthatareinsideitarecalled'logical' partitions.

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Becausethenumbers1,2,3and4arereservedforthe fourprimarypartitions(orthreeprimaryandone extendedpartition),thepartitionnumberingfor logicalpartitionsalwaysbeginswithnumber5. Evenifthereisonlyanextendedpartitionandno otherprimarypartitions,thelogicalpartitionscan neverhaveanumberlowerthan5. Logicalpartitionnumberingbeginsatfiveandcounts upwardsfromthere.OnanIDEdisk,wecanmakeas manyas63logicalpartitions DMO LSA

TheLinuxBootprocess
BasicInput/Outputsystemstartsandchecksfor Hardwaredevices. BIOSisaprogramandisbuiltintothehardware memory. ThepurposeoftheBIOSistofindthehardware devicesthatwillbeneededbythebootprocess.

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TheBIOShandsovercontroltothefirststageboot loader,LILO. Itthenreadsinthepartitiontableandlooksforthe secondstagebootloaderonthepartitionlistedinthe /etc/lilo.conffile.

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LILOrunsthesecondstageboot loader,/boot/boot.b. Thesecondstagebootloaderfindsthekernelimage andrunsit.

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Thekernelimagecontainsasmalluncompressed programthatdecompressesthecompressedportion ofthekernelandrunsit. Thekernelscansforthesysteminformation includingtheCPUtimeandspeed. Itsdriversscanforotherhardwaresandconfigure whattheyfind. Thekernelthenmountstherootfilessysteminread onlymode.

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Thekernelstartstheinitprocess. Theinitprocessstartsthegettyprocessforvirtual consolesandserialterminalsandinitiatesother processes.

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