The University of the West Indies, St.

Augustine
Department of Computing and Information Technology
COMP 2604 - Semester II, 2022/2023
Assignment 1 – 5%
Due Date: February 17th 2023 @ 5 pm

Max. Marks: 20

1. Instructions related to accessing I/O devices are typically privileged instructions, that
is, they can be executed in kernel mode but not in user mode. Give a reason why these
instructions are privileged.
[2 marks]

2. Describe the complexity involved in Cache memory with various computing

environment.
[4 marks]

3. In Fig. 2-2, three process states are shown. In theory, with three states, there could be
six transitions, two out of each state. However, only four transitions are shown. Are
there any circumstances in which either or both of the missing transitions might occur?
[4 marks]

4. On all current computers, at least part of the interrupt handlers are written in assembly
language. Why?
[2 marks]
5. What is the output of the following programs?
[3 marks]

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 6. How many child processes are created if the following program is run? What is the
output that is printed?
[2 marks]

7. Consider the following program:

How many different copies of the variable x are there? What are their values when
their process finishes?
[3 marks]

Submission: Submit one single text file containing the answers to all SEVEN questions. Name
the text file “ID#Number_A1_COMP2604.docx”, e.g. “808000326_A1_COMP2604.docx”.
Please upload the text file to the Turnitin submission link on myeLearning. Only 1 submission
is allowed, so be careful that your file submitted is the final version.

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