Open System for Teaching Operating Systems by Using a Simulator

The study and understanding of the algorithms of computational resources management by operating systems, is essential for proper assimilation of the importance of operating systems, such as resource managers. This has motivated the realization of a simulator based on the web, downloadable and executable locally without Internet connection; the simulator allows studying the behaviour and understanding these algorithms, is based on Java applets and has proved useful for students, given its simplicity and entertaining presentation, highly valued aspects by the students. Each algorithm implemented is accompanied by a short description of the theoretical foundations underpinning it and indications for use, which is also very intuitive. The algorithms implemented in the Simulator are as follows: planning of the processor, strategies of replacement of pages in main memory, the performance analysis of a disk subsystem, concurrent execution of threads and synchronization and synchronization of processes in distributed operating systems.