What are some good reasons for designing your operating system as a layered OS? Why isn’t MS-DOS an example?
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It's very obvious that you're trying to easily find the answer to some kind of school question. Go home and read your books!
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you need some book or at least an article ;)\nso there is no one gonna help .\nok . watch this :\nhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OSI_model#Layer_7:_Application_Layer\nalso this :\nhttp://www.answers.com/topic/osi-model
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If you use something besides windows operating system, I do not think you can call it a Windows based system. Anyhow the Redhat and Lindows Linux distributions are both interesting.
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The big ones are Microsoft and Macintosh for the PC market, for the Unix market there are quite a few including Solaris, HP-UX, LynxOS, Various flavors of Linux such as "Red Hat" (which is open source), Concurrent and many others.\n\nTo know what you are looking for though we would need to know more about your needs.  When shopping for an OS there are a few questions you should answer first:\n\n- how much money do you want to spend?\n- what are you going to use it for?  Web Server, Application Prototyping, Real-Time systems, File Server?\n- what other systems will it have to interract with?\n- what type of user interface should it have?\n\nGood luck
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An operating system always has a few main functions...\n\n1) Allocate and control access to system resources (RAM, Hard drive, CD-Roms etc)\n\n2) Provide an interface for programs to control devices (this is where drivers come in for devices, the OS uses the driver to communicate with the device on behalf of the user without the user knowing the details)\n\n3) Detect user events and process those event messages to control programs.\n\nThose are some of the main functions of any operating system so I would imagine it is the same role for developing anything... including a learning resource.\n\nI have included a link which tells you more about an operating system and its functions.\n\nEnjoy!
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With no OS at all, your computer would do nothing, unless you write your own drivers. Even DOS was a crude OS. \n\nAn OS is the interface between the hardware and the software.
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Yes, there are other operating systems-DOS is one of them.
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I do not think an operating system can be fully written in high level laguages. It's kernel needs a lot of machine code withc is the lowest level you can go with a language. Now it depends on what languages you actualy mean by high level. C/C++ are high level languages and Linux's kernel for example is written in C++ (witch also supports machine code to be inserted). If we leave the kernel alone (witch is the most importent part in the OS), some other modules of the OS can be written in , let's say Basic or even Haskell. The disadvantages of these languages is that programs written with them will be slower, significantly in some cases, witch is not usualy bad because programmer time is more exensive than processor time. So if a programmer takes a week to write a program in C++ and only one day in Haskell, it will not matter if the Haskel program will run 20% if it's a program used just to give a result for example. However in operating system there are a lot of time-critical modules (memory management, disk management etc) .. so basicly al the time the computer will run slower.
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the operating system is the program or code that allows the hardware know and understand how to execute programs, read and write data, and how to do the functions that make a computer work; disk management, memory management, video, sound, networking, processor optimization.  over the past 50 years, we started with OS that worked on mainframes, then minicomputers and then pc.  up till this point, the seller of the hardware usally sold the OS to work with their special equipment.  Whe the PC came out, it was a small enough machine in both price and pieces of hardware, that more programmers could write the OS to meet special needs that they felt were lacking in other offerings.  Microsoft came out with dos, ibm had a dos, DR DOS had a dos offering, and there was antoher commerical offering called cpm that was very dos like. But Microsoft was able to work with the different PC makers to have their dos preinstalled so they became dominant.  Then Macs came out and the windows gui became a hot topic, and Microsoft came out with Windows,  there were some other PC system houses that tried to comeout with a Windows varient, but by this time, the fact that most people were wanting systems that were compatible(moving files, buying application) again Microsoft came to dominate the PC world.\n\nThose individuals that wanted more control of their systems and wanted to be able to tweak the options helped bring UNIX and then LINUX to the pc world.  All of the various versions of these programs( and there are hundereds) have a basic kennel part of the code that is the same for all versions (this is the basic code on how to read disk and memory), but then individuals can modify the various drivers other parts of the user interface etc.  Those that use the UNIX varients feel that they are keeping computing "pure" and not beholding to the big corps "microsoft" but it does add confusion to the marketplace.
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i think you be asking about the new operating system ubuntu. I install and use this OS on my PC and i find it to be a user friendly and a good combination of many embedded software.i still dont use it for networks i find it to be a good OS for a home user.
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It is much easier to fine tune kde.\nYou can have multiple virtual screens. Handy when you are doing seperate things at the same time, and for controlling the clutter.\n\nKde's file browser is a lot smarter the windows explorer and far more flexible.\n\nOtherwise they are similiar enough that of you know one you can learnr the other with no real effort. They both have start things, task bars, and so on that you would easily recognize.
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I think if you looked at the percentage of Mac users who are enthusiastic about their machines, as opposed to the percentage of Windows users who are enthusiastic about their machines, you'd see a big difference in 'popularity!'  (Can ya tell I'm a Mac addict?!)  :D\n\nAnyway, the real issue goes back much farther than the other answerers suggest:  Right from the start, Apple kept tighter control over its OS and hardware technology, which was not the case for the PC world.  As a result, anybody & their dog was out there putting together hardware & software for Windows, with the freedom to do things their own way inside.  Back then more so than now, that meant much more competition (& lower prices,) but also meant that there were lots of compatibility issues with 'tricked out' PC systems.  Different peripheral vendors would do their own thing, & when you put the wrong two parts in the same machine, they would freak out the whole system.  Mac users simply didn't have that problem.  (Every now & then something would crop up, but not NEARLY to the extent that it did for the PC world.)  Still, enough users were looking primarily at the up-front savings, and lots of people did a minimum of customization, anyway.  All that allowed MS-DOS (which evolved to Windows) to build up a larger base of customers, and that momentum built on itself.\n\nIn most ways, Windows has finally (mostly) caught up with Macs in stability & usability.  And, Macs aren't as much more expensive than PCs as they used to be, either.  But, you won't see me giving up my Macs!  :)\n\nYou are not making a poor decision!  Go for it!
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Stable operating systems tend to have a high degree of configuration management.  That means, changes to the operating system are highly managed.  In the mainframe world, IBM's z/OS operating system uses a product called SMP/E to perform system changes.  This tool is often used in conjunction with strict change control procedures, such as change ticket approvals, peer review meetings, and scheduled implementation.\n\nThe opposite is a system where anyone can just install anything they want whenever they want.  These systems usually tend not to be very stable.
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Reason #1 is because I need to run some software that are not available for Linux (yet :).\nThe other nine reasons, such as being easy to use, are really for novice users, not power users.
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Better stability. When a new version of an OS comes out, there are so many bugs that a large company can't afford to have take down their server, so they stick with what works.
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Interoperability is more important in getting the value out of computers than being the 'best' at writing the software or operating system.  So it is more valuable for everyone to use the same thing than it is for each person to use what they think is best. \n\nMicrosoft realized this early on and positioned themselves in the market as being the 'de facto' operating system for personal computers.  It was written in such a way that would allow it to run on any "IBM-compatable" (as they used to be called).\n\nThat meant that a document or a spreadsheet created on my personal computer could be used on any and all of the personal computers of my coworkers, family, and friends.\n\nIts the same reason that McDonalds does such good business.  It isn't the best tasing food, nor the most healthy.  However they are everywhere.
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Using Bootcamp or Virtual PC, you CAN work on multiple applications at once.\n\nBeauty of multi-tasking.