Interprocess Communication

Readings: Chapter 7, Comer; Sections 2.6.4, 2.6.5, 4.6, 4.7 Singhal.

An operating system provides interprocess communication to allow processes to exchange information. Interprocess communication is useful for creating cooperating processes. For instance an `ls' process and a `more' process can cooperate to produce a paged listing of a directory.

There are several mechanisms for interprocess communication. We discuss some of these below.

• Shared Memory
• Software Interrupt
• Message Passing
  • Reliability of Messages
  • Order
  • Access
  • Remote Assignment vs Procedure Call
  • Synchronous vs Asynchronous
  • Buffering of Messages
  • Pipes
  • Selectivity of Receipt
• Xinu Low-Level Message Passing
  • Semantics
  • Implementation