Assignment workshop: research, planning and referencing

This week’s topics

Assignment workshop: research, planning and referencing

1. Unpacking the assignment brief and criteria
2. Finding and evaluating sources
3. Planning and referencing

What you will be able to do

• 1.1 Outline a range of common operating systems for computers and mobile devices.
• 1.2 Describe the historical development and need for operating systems.
• 1.3 Explain the key components of an operating system.
• 1.4 Explain how operating systems manage hardware and software resources.
• 1.5 Analyse the different kinds of operating system that exist.
• 1.6 Evaluate common trade-offs in resource management for operating systems.
• 2.1 Compare different file system types.
• 2.2 Describe different approaches to memory management.
• 2.3 Describe the role of device drivers in facilitating communication with hardware devices.
• 2.4 Explain the role of virtual (swap) memory.
• 2.5 Explain the role of paging in allowing for non-contiguous memory allocation.
• 2.6 Analyse the difference between fixed and dynamic loading and linking strategies.
• 3.1 Describe what is meant by a process.
• 3.2 Explain the contents of the process control block and its importance.
• 3.3 Explain the way that processes are represented for management by operating systems.
• 3.4 Analyse the range of responsibilities an operating system has for managing the execution of processes.
• 4.1 Outline the difference between independent and cooperating processes.
• 4.2 Describe what is meant by concurrency.
• 4.3 Explain the memory sharing and message passing approaches to inter process communication.
• 4.4 Analyse deadlock and race conditions as potential problems in concurrent processing settings and propose strategies to mitigate them.
• 4.5 Evaluate the importance of low-level and high-level inter process communication.
• 5.1 Develop kernel modules that interact with hardware devices and system resources.
• 5.2 Implement system calls to extend kernel functionality and interact with user-level applications.
• 5.3 Implement kernel-level programs to perform different tasks.
• 5.4 Use debugging to test kernel-level code to ensure stability and performance.

Activity

Plan the unit assignment against every criterion; source and reference the evidence.

Study materials

Further resources

• Writing Guide, 12.1: Introducing Research and Research Evidence · PDF · OpenStax Writing Guide with Handbook (2021), 12.1: the research process and types of research evidence, pp. 390–391 · for registered students
• How to perform a literature review with free and open source software · Open-access article · Pearce (2018), Practical Assessment, Research & Evaluation. Step-by-step secondary research (literature review) with free tools. · for registered students
• Ten simple rules for reading a scientific paper · Open-access article · Carey et al. (2020), PLOS Computational Biology. Practical guide to the parts of a research article and how to read them in the right order. · for registered students