The Sombrero Single Address Space Operating System Prototype A Testbed for Evaluating Distributed Persistent System Concepts and Implementation

摘要

The Sombrero distributed single address space operating system prototype is currently being implemented. The prototype includes an emulation of CPU-resident protection hardware necessary to fully utilize the properties of a single address space. The primary objective of the Sombrero project is to demonstrate that software development costs are sharply reduced in a single address space environment with no reduction in performance. This paper presents Sombrero design decisions and implementation mechanisms developed in order to support protection, communication, resource access and control transfer across a very large persistent distributed address space. Included are changes to operating system architecture, evolution of programming types and a new approach to distributed consistency management in a single address space based-DSM system that is being integrated into the prototype.