Memory management
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Memory management handles primary memory and moves processes between main memory and disk during execution. It tracks allocated and free memory locations and decides which processes get memory and when. Address binding maps a program's logical addresses to physical memory addresses using the memory management unit (MMU). At different stages - compile time, load time, or execution time - the binding of instructions and data to memory addresses can occur. The process address space refers to the set of logical addresses a process references, while physical addresses correspond to logical addresses in memory. The MMU converts virtual addresses generated by processes to physical addresses using a base register value as an offset.
Memory management
- 1. Memory management Memory management is the functionality of an operating system which handles or manages primary memory and moves processes back and forth between main memory and disk during execution. Memory management keeps track of each and every memory location, regardless of either it is allocated to some process or it is free. It checks how much memory is to be allocated to processes. It decides which process will get memory at what time. It tracks whenever some memory gets freed or unallocated and correspondingly it updates the status. Address binding Address binding is the process of mapping the program's logical or virtual addresses to corresponding physical or main memory addresses. In other words, a given logical address is mapped by the MMU (Memory Management Unit) to a physical address. Multistep Processing of a User Program
- 2. Classically, the binding of instructions and data to memory addresses can be done at any step along the way: Compile time. If you know at compile time where the process will reside in memory, then absolute code can be generated. Load time. If it is not known at compile time where the process will reside in memory, then the compiler must generate relocatable code. Execution time. If the process can be moved during its execution from one memory segment to another, then binding must be delayed until run time. ProcessAddressSpace The process address space is the set of logical addresses that a process references in its code. For example, when 32-bit addressing is in use, addresses can range from 0 to 0x7fffffff; that is, 2^31 possible numbers, for a total theoretical size of 2 gigabytes. There are three types of addresses used in a program before and after memory is allocated − S.N. Memory Addresses & Description 1 Symbolic addresses The addresses used in a source code. The variable names, constants, and instruction labels are the basic elements of the symbolic address space. 2 Relative addresses At the time of compilation, a compiler converts symbolic addresses into relative addresses. 3 Physical addresses The loader generates these addresses at the time when a program is loaded into main memory. Logical Versus Physical Address An address generated by the CPU is commonly refereed as Logical Address, whereas the address seen by the memory unit that is one loaded into the memory address register of the memory is commonly refereed as the Physical Address.
- 3. Logical Versus Physical Address Space Virtual and physical addresses are the same in compile-time and load-time address-binding schemes. Virtual and physical addresses differ in execution-time address-binding scheme. The set of all logical addresses generated by a program is referred to as a logical address space. The set of all physical addresses corresponding to these logical addresses is referred to as a physical address space. Memory Management Unit The runtime mapping from virtual to physical address is done by the memory management unit (MMU) which is a hardware device. MMU uses following mechanism to convert virtual address to physical address. The value in the base register is added to every address generated by a user process, which is treated as offset at the time it is sent to memory. For example, if the base register value is 10000, then an attempt by the user to use address location 100 will be dynamically reallocated to location 10100. The user program deals with virtual addresses; it never sees the real physical addresses.