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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.
A virtual file system (VFS) or virtual filesystem switch is an abstract layer on top of a more concrete file system. The purpose of a VFS is to allow client applications to access different types of concrete file systems in a uniform way. A VFS can, for example, be used to access local and network storage devices transparently without the ...
Loader (computing) In computer systems a loader is the part of an operating system that is responsible for loading programs and libraries. It is one of the essential stages in the process of starting a program, as it places programs into memory and prepares them for execution. Loading a program involves either memory-mapping or copying the ...
Copy-on-write. Copy-on-write (COW), sometimes referred to as implicit sharing[1] or shadowing, [2] is a resource-management technique used in computer programming to efficiently implement a "duplicate" or "copy" operation on modifiable resources [3] (most commonly memory pages, storage sectors, files, and data structures).
Unix architecture. A Unix architecture is a computer operating system system architecture that embodies the Unix philosophy. It may adhere to standards such as the Single UNIX Specification (SUS) or similar POSIX IEEE standard. No single published standard describes all Unix architecture computer operating systems — this is in part a legacy ...
exec (system call) In computing, exec is a functionality of an operating system that runs an executable file in the context of an already existing process, replacing the previous executable. This act is also referred to as an overlay. It is especially important in Unix-like systems, although it also exists elsewhere.
read (system call) In modern POSIX compliant operating systems, a program that needs to access data from a file stored in a file system uses the read system call. The file is identified by a file descriptor that is normally obtained from a previous call to open. This system call reads in data in bytes, the number of which is specified by the ...
write (system call) The write is one of the most basic routines provided by a Unix-like operating system kernel. It writes data from a buffer declared by the user to a given device, such as a file. This is the primary way to output data from a program by directly using a system call. The destination is identified by a numeric code.