Subject: Operating System

Topic: DISTRIBUTED SYSTEMS

Difficulty: Medium

A network operating system (NOS) is a computer operating system system that is designed primarily to support workstation, personal computer, and, in some instances, older terminal that are connected on a local area network (LAN). A network operating system is an operating system designed for the sole purpose of supporting workstations, database sharing, application sharing and file and printer access sharing among multiple computers in a network. Certain standalone operating systems, such as Microsoft Windows NT and Digital’s OpenVMS, come with multipurpose capabilities and can also act as network operating systems. Some of the most well-known network operating systems include Microsoft Windows Server 2003, Microsoft Windows Server 2008, Linux and Mac OS X

A network operating system provides printer sharing, common file system and database sharing, application sharing, and the ability to manage a network name directory, security, and other housekeeping aspects of a network.

The salient features of network operating systems are:

Basic operating system features support like protocol support, processor support, hardware detection and multiprocessing support for applications

Security features like authentication, restrictions, authorizations and access control

Features for file, Web service, printing and replication

Directory and name services management

User management features along with provisions for remote access and system management

Internetworking features like routing and WAN ports

Clustering capabilities

Common tasks associated with network operating systems include:

User administration

System maintenance activities like backup

Tasks associated with file management

Security monitoring on all resources in the network

Setting priority to print jobs in the network