The Kernel Kit is a collection of C functions that let you define and control the contexts in
which your application operates. There are five main topics in the Kit:
- Threads. A thread is a synchronous computer process. By creating multiple threads, you can make your application perform different tasks at
(virtually) the same time. A team is the collection of threads that your application
creates.
- Ports. A port can be thought of as a mailbox for threads: A thread can write a
message to a port, and some other thread (or, less usefully, the same thread) can then
retrieve the message.
- Semaphores. A semaphore is a system-wide counting variable that can be used as a
lock that protects a piece of code. Before a thread is allowed to execute the code, it
must acquire the semaphore that guards it. Semaphores can also be used to synchronize the execution of two or more threads.
- Areas. The area functions let you allocate large chunks of virtual memory. The two
primary features of areas are: They can be locked into the CPU's on-chip memory,
and the data they hold can be shared between applications.
- Threads. An image is compiled code that can be dynamically linked into a running
application. By loading and unloading images you can make run-time decisions about the resources that your application has access to. Images are of particular
interest to driver designers.
The rest of this chapter describes these topics in detail. The final section,
"Miscellaneous Functions, Constants, and Defined Types", describes the associated API that support the Kit functions.
The Be Book, HTML Edition, for Developer Release 8 of the Be Operating System.
Copyright © 1996 Be, Inc. All rights reserved.
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Last modified September 6, 1996.