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A page table is a data structure used by a virtual memory system in a computer to store mappings between virtual addresses and physical addresses. Virtual addresses are used by the program executed by the accessing process, while physical addresses are used by the hardware, or more specifically, by the random-access memory (RAM) subsystem.
File descriptors for a single process, file table and inode table. Note that multiple file descriptors can refer to the same file table entry (e.g., as a result of the dup system call [3]: 104 ) and that multiple file table entries can in turn refer to the same inode (if it has been opened multiple times; the table is still simplified because it represents inodes by file names, even though an ...
Zombie process. On Unix and Unix-like computer operating systems, a zombie process or defunct process is a process that has completed execution (via the exit system call) but still has an entry in the process table: it is a process in the "terminated state". This occurs for the child processes, where the entry is still needed to allow the ...
System call. A high-level overview of the Linux kernel's system call interface, which handles communication between its various components and the userspace. In computing, a system call (commonly abbreviated to syscall) is the programmatic way in which a computer program requests a service from the operating system [ a] on which it is executed.
When a child process terminates, it becomes a zombie process, and continues to exist as an entry in the system process table even though it is no longer an actively executing program. Under normal operation it will typically be immediately waited on by its parent, and then reaped by the system, reclaiming the resource (the process table entry).
Exit status. In computing, the exit status, or exit code, of a terminated process is an integer number that is made available to its parent process (or caller). In DOS, this may be referred to as an errorlevel . When computer programs are executed, the operating system creates an abstract entity called a process in which the book-keeping for ...
fork() is the name of the system call that the parent process uses to "divide" itself ("fork") into two identical processes. After calling fork(), the created child process is an exact copy of the parent except for the return value of the fork () call. This includes open files, register state, and all memory allocations, which includes the ...
fork (system call) In computing, particularly in the context of the Unix operating system and its workalikes, fork is an operation whereby a process creates a copy of itself. It is an interface which is required for compliance with the POSIX and Single UNIX Specification standards. It is usually implemented as a C standard library wrapper to ...