does the driver directly operate the device?

Matthias Lange mlange at sec.t-labs.tu-berlin.de
Sat Apr 27 19:41:41 CEST 2013


Hi,

On 27.04.2013, at 16:36, gaober wrote:

> drivers in linux are in kernel mode.but in a microkernel-based system,drivers are like apps,do they operate the device directly?or the microkernel will do something to operate device.

Yes, in a microkernel system the device drivers operate the device. The microkernel only provides isolation (=address space), communication (=IPC) and scheduling. Device interrupts are transformed into IPC by the microkernel and forwarded to a registered thread.

Matthias.


-- 
Dipl.-Inf. Matthias Lange <mlange at sec.t-labs.tu-berlin.de>
Security in Telecommunications
TU Berlin / Deutsche Telekom Laboratories
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