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Operating Systems: Virtualization, Concurrency & Persistence

VAX/VMS Virtual Memory: Memory Management Hardware

Explore the VAX/VMS virtual memory system focusing on its hardware features, such as 32-bit virtual addresses, hybrid paging and segmentation, and kernel-level page table management. Understand how the OS handles memory challenges like small page sizes and generality to ensure effective system performance across diverse hardware.

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History

The VAX-11 minicomputer architecture was introduced in the late 1970s by Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC). DEC was a massive player in the computer industry during the era of the mini-computer; unfortunately, a series of bad decisions and the advent of the PC slowly (but surely) led to their demise“The Innovator’s Dilemma” by Clayton M. Christenson. Harper Paperbacks, January 2003. A fantastic book about the disk-drive industry and how new innovations disrupt existing ones. A good read for business majors and computer scientists alike. Provides insight on how large and successful companies completely fail.. The architecture was realized in a number of implementations, including the VAX-11/780 and the less powerful VAX-11/750.

The OS for the system was known as VAX/VMS (or just plain VMS), one of whose primary architects was Dave Cutler, who later led the effort to develop ...