cst 334: week 2

Write a 1 - 2 paragraph description of what you learned this second week in CST 334 Topic: Processes

This week in CST 334, I learned a lot about processes and how the OS handles them. A process is just a running program, but there’s a lot that happens behind the scenes to keep everything running smoothly. The OS loads the program from disk into memory, sets up a stack and heap, and keeps track of its state, whether it's running, waiting, or blocked. Since there are usually more processes than CPUs, the OS constantly switches between them to create the illusion that everything is running at once. This process is called time-sharing, and it’s what allows us to have multiple applications open without thinking about how the CPU is being shared. The OS also has different scheduling policies to decide which process gets CPU time at any given moment.

I also learned about process creation and termination, which happens every time we open or close a program. The OS uses a process API that lets it create, destroy, and control processes. Processes can be paused, resumed, or even forced to stop if they aren’t responding. The OS also keeps track of which processes are waiting on input or resources, making sure everything runs efficiently. One of the most interesting parts was looking at process scheduling and how different strategies affect performance. For example, some systems wait for a process to finish before switching, while others will immediately switch to another process if one is waiting on I/O.

The simulations helped a lot in understanding how process states change over time and how the OS balances resources. The biggest takeaway for me is that the OS is constantly making decisions to keep everything running without wasting CPU time. Every process is carefully managed so the computer feels smooth and responsive, even when running multiple programs at once.