Data Structures

  1. Bitmap: This is an array of 0s and 1s (also called a bit vector.) Each array slot is associated with an entity, like a resource, device, or storage block, and indicates whether the entity is available (1) or unavailable (0) for use.

    Bitmaps will be mentioned in various topics in our course, such as "Memory Management" and "File Management".

A bitmap of resources: an array of cells containing 0s and 1s: there are plently of such cells in this array, but only 10 of them show up on the image: cell number 22 down to cell number 31. These cells contain the digits: zero one one zero one one one zero zero one. Notice that, for example, cell number 25 contains a zero, which, in the case of this example, represents an unavailable (busy) device, which cell number 16 contains a one, which represents another, this time available device.

A bitmap of resources. Miriam Briskman, CC BY-NC 4.0

These notes by Miriam Briskman are licensed under CC BY-NC 4.0 and based on sources.