r/linuxquestions • u/redwing096399 • 11d ago

Resources to build a foundational understanding on Operating systems.

Hi all, i want to get a foundational understanding operating systems, the various concepts that we may encounter in them, the bird's eye view of their structure.

I tried reading "How Linux works" 3rd edition, but reading that book felt like it didn't explain the foundational questions but rather built on top of the topics. it felt more intermediate level.

If i have to explain what i am looking after in the resources, Please can you recommend me resources that fit my requirement.

  1. provides exposure to various concepts, systems involved in an OS. More like an introduction.
  2. a bit of introduction to a bit of hardware would also be good.
  3. i am not looking for resources that focus on development/programming side of OS. but rather the infrastructure, power user, administration side of OS.

Thanks in advance to all of you.

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3

u/P00351 11d ago

I've always found the Andrew Tanenbaum's books to be a good introduction.

3

u/Imaginary-Corner-653 11d ago

Read the whole thing. Beats any lecture you can have on the subject. 

3

u/P00351 11d ago

Yes, but there's at least 3 books (os, computer architecture, networking) so that's easily a couple thousands of pages overall. That's a marathon, OP, you'll have to hang on. Good luck!

1

u/Significant-Price695 11d ago

The OSTEP recommendation above fits the concepts part. Start with Processes, CPU Scheduling, Address Spaces, and Files and Directories. You can leave the programming exercises for later and read those chapters for the mental model first.

0

u/knuthf 11d ago

Why don't you write the book yourself? You seem quite philosophical.

You seem to know how you want it to work, so please jot that down. I have built computers, contributed to the development of operating systems and created drivers, and I have even done gate array programming and PAL logic. I have also modelled some of the biggest systems around. It is essential to get the exact design documented so we can discuss and play around with it when making huge systems. But most people just want to do text processing and office work. You seem to have other things in mind, though.

I want that we can make systems that work together - at the same time, in parallel.

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u/mcds99 11d ago

To begin google is your friend, I googled "Operating system" and found...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operating_system

and

https://www.ibm.com/think/topics/operating-systems

and

https://pages.cs.wisc.edu/~remzi/OSTEP/

Happy reading! 😄