Smart Phone Operating System(SPOS)

Introduction of Smart Phone OS(operating System)

Background
Technology
Android

OS
Apple OS
Windows OS
Blackberry OS
Symbian OS
Comparison and conclusion

Architecture
Concurrency
Memory Use
Networking
Security

Introduction of Smart Phone OS

OS is the most critical software element that manages hardware and software.

It performs the basic tasks such as, input from the device keyboard and
generation of output to the devices screen.

It is responsible for the management of memory and for communication within

the device.

In the mobile world, the more complex OSs will contain User Interface

cont...

OS is hidden from the user, no direct interaction to the user

Required application program is loaded to interact to the user.

The OS, provides a software platform that communicate with API(Application

Programing Interface)

Background of SPOS

Smart phone was first described by the company Ericsson in 1997.

The first phone to feature cellular + Personal Digital Assistance (PDA) was developed by IBM
in 1992 naming SIMON person communicator which could be referred as smart phone.

Later in 1996, Nokia released Nokia 9000 which has also PDA device .

Mobile phone operating systems were introduced(now a days Smart phones) are classified.

More than 80% of the world mobile market consist of smart phones .

Smart Phones Technology

The technology and features of the smart phones are varies to one operating system to another.

Five major SP(Smart Phone) operating systems such as Android, iOS, Blackberry, Symbian and
Windows OS.

cont..

Totally there are five steps involved in smart phones application development.

Strategy

Design
Development
Marketing
Maintenance

The most common mobile phones operating systems in the market of mobile phones are :-

Linux, Android, and Symbian, iPhone OS, RIM BlackBerry and Windows Mobile.

Android OS

Android is Linux based OS designed for mobile devices.

Its first public version was released on 12th Nov, 2007 .

It is an open source OS which is based on Linux kernel.

Enables the developers to write and modify applications initially in Java.

It is also support C/C++.

The role on its popularity is absolutely free OS for mobile devices.

Android OS Architecture

Android OS can be divided into four layers such as Linux Kernel, libraries, application
framework, and applications.

Fig2. Android OS software architecture

Android OS Architecture
Linux Kernel Layer

It is the bottom layer of the software stack that whole Android OS is built
on this layer.

it provides the following functionalities: Process management, Memory

Management, device management.

It also responsible for managing virtual memory, networking, drivers,

and power management.

With this layer Android OS interacts with the hardware of the device.
Native Libraries Layer

It is the top of Kernel layer that enables the device to handle different
types of data.

Data is specific to hardware and Libraries written in C or C++.

Android OS Architecture
Android Runtime Layer

Android Runtime consists of Dalvik Virtual machine and Core Java

libraries.

It is located on the same level as the library layer .

Dalvik Virtual Machine run .dex files which are created from .class file by
dx tool. dx tool is included in Android SDK.
Application Framework Layer

It provides many higher-level services .

Important blocks of Application framework are: Activity Manager, Content Providers, Telephony Manager, Location Manager and
Resource Manager.

Android OS Architecture
Application Layer

It is the top layer in the Android architecture .

Some applications come pre-installed with every device such as:SMS client app, Dialer, Web browser and Contact manager.

Concurrency Model of Android

Android offers almost the same features regarding concurrency

model.

The third party developers are able to run background services.

but it is not guaranteed that the services will run.

Virtual Memory of Android

Android run inside the Dalvik Virtual Machine(DVM).

DVM is registered based virtual machine which optimizes for low

memory requirements.

Networking of Android

Use standard networking packages like Java.net.org, apache.htt

networking functionality.

It uses Wi- Fi or cellular network to connect the internet.

Security of Android

DVM is play a significant role in the security of the OS.

Android applications cannot access the data or code from other

programs and all data sharing is done explicitly.

By default, Android applications does not allow giving permissions

to do anything that may affect the data on mobile phone and the
user experience.

Apple iOS

This strong but expensive operating system.

It has improved Siri, Airdrop (programming concepts) to transfer files.

Apple iPhone 5S contains worlds first and fastest A7 chip with 64 bit
architecture and M7 motion coprocessor chip.

Apple iPhone 5S also contain Fingerprint sensor.

Apple is now preparing to launch the update of its new software iOS 7.

Architecture of iOS

Fig2. Architecture of iOS

Cocoa touch layer

It contains the key frameworks for building iOS applications.

The layer defines the basic application and support for key technologies such
as multitasking, touch based input, push notifications and many high level
system services.

Media Layer

The Media Layer contains the graphics, audio, and video technologies.

Graphics technologies includes Core Graphics, Core Animation and OpenGL

technologies which handles 2D vector and animating views and 2D and 3D
figures.

Core Services

It contains the high level features that all applications use such as
iCloud Storage, Core services framework.

Its framework includes Accounts framework, Address book framework

and Core Data framework for user accounts, contacts and for managing
model view controller application.

Core OS

It contains the low-level features such as Accelerate framework, Core

Bluetooth framework and External accessory framework.

Accelerate frame work contains interfaces .

The Core Bluetooth framework allows developers to interact specifically

Bluetooth Low energy accessories.

External accessory framework provides support for communicating with

hardware accessories attached to an iOS based device.

Concurrency Model

Apple give permission to only one third party application to run at a same time.

when the mobile phone user goes back to the home screen the application is
terminated.

state information is archived and when the active user goes back then
application is reinstated.

Memory Use
The

1st generation iPhone offer 128 MB memory while 3rd

generation iPhone offers 256MB .

iPhone

OS does not contain swap file for virtual memory, this

indicates that when RAM is full then there is not any available
memory any more.

Networking

Inside the iPhone OS the core of network functionality is based on Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD) sockets.

The CF Network layer allows the developers to develop streams and sockets.

Without user interaction applications are not allowed to connect a Wi-Fi connection.

Security

iPhone OS offers various APIs to implement security features for

developers.

Like as desktop counterpart, iPhone OS uses BSD and Common Data

Security Architecture (CDSA) to implement the security features.

File access permissions a low level features are implemented by the

BSD kernel.

Higher level functionality is given by CDSA.

Windows OS(WOS)

WOS is one which is the most widely used operating system developed
by Microsoft Corporation.

Windows phones has the worlds best UI (User Interface) allowing us to

hover over the apps with just a slide.

It allows Multi-tasking, installing third party apps.

Windows has launched its Surface to Computer which acts like a smart
phone and as well as a computer.

Architecture of Windows OS

Fig3. Architecture of Windows OS

Core OS Services

Core OS services enable low level tasks, such as process, thread, and
memory management.

Basic device drivers are also part of the Core OS services.

WinRT APIs

WinRT APIs provide various features for enable the system services such as
data communication, graphics and media and etc.

This API is written in C++ on top of Win32 and the COM interface.

Metro Style Applications

A Metro style app is an app built using HTML5 or XAML+(C#,VB or C++), on

Microsoft's new APIs -in short.

Concurrency Control

Windows CE came into existence by Microsoft for embedded devices and

provides Windows mobile an interesting attribute.

Users have guaranteed upper bound on the running time of higher priority
threads.

Memory Use

Windows Mobile OS is of 32-bit with maximum of 32MB of virtual memory.

A large chunk of memory is used by the operating system in order to keep

the applications running when the users close the applications.

When
The

memory is going low then these applications can be closed by the operating system.

developers can access the Win32 directly by Windows Mobile.

Networking
Windows

Mobile offers number of APIs in order to create a network connection for mobile
phone users.

To

create standard sockets is not difficult and complete management over the Bluetooth
and Wi-Fi connection is accessible by default in the managed .NET Compact framework .

Security
The

reverse of invent is that the implementation in security measures of the operating

system are not unlimited.

The

applications are not sandboxed and secured from one another.

The applications cannot access the process space of another process directly .

The process space protection is designed to secure the applications from programming errors in
other applications .

but it is not enough to protect applications from malevolent applications

BlackBerry OS

The operating system of BlackBerry is a modest operating system .

In the beginning Black-Berry mobile phone were developed with business

experts in mind.

provide wireless synchronization with Microsoft exchange in terms of

functionality.

Concurrency Control

Number of applications and processes can run at the same time on

BlackBerry OS because of multithreaded nature of BlackBerry OS.

When an application turned inactive then background threads are allowed

to remain active.

This functionality is available is not a shock, because BlackBerry OS has

been developed with running background network processes.

Memory Use

For many third party application JVM handles memory management on

the BlackBerry mobile device.

The JVM also handles data swapping between flash memory and SRAM,
garbage collection and memory allocation.

A particular low memory manager is running in order to deal with the

limited memory capacity of mobile phones.

Third party applications and standard application must work with this
interface in order to delete the low priority data .

Networking

In mind BlackBerry OS is developed with background network processes.

Making a TCP socket or HTTP socket to create a connection over wireless

network is not difficult.

The API does not have the ability to dynamically discover and connect to
the wireless network .

Security

the security has been a central point of BlackBerry OS .

the BlackBerry Enterprise server then all communication among the

mobile phone and external world is encrypted.

The network administrator can add or remove the applications at all as

well as change policies that manage what the user and application can
do.

Encrypt the all user data on the device is a possible policy.

Symbian OS

In the first half of 2009 most popular operating system for mobile devices was
Symbian with a market share of 51 percent.

But in last few years its market share decease rapidly more than 20 percent
due to the major developments such as the release of iPhone OS and Android
OS.

Symbian OS has various variants also, because operating system does not
contain a user interface itself.

The UI Framework layer is used by applications implementation and Graphical

User Interface (GUI) implementation of the operating system itself .

Symbian OS architecture

Fig4. Symbian OS architecture

Concurrency Control

Symbian operating system is multithreaded like other operating system

for mobile devices.

Symbian OS kernel has the facility of hard real time operating system
tasks .

Memory Use

Symbian OS was designed for mobile device with limited resources.

Symbian OS has not the ability to handle exceptions like standard C++.

Since the out of memory errors may happen any time at the time of
memory allocation.

To remove these errors and make the program able to go back to a

stable and acceptable stat when error occur.

Networking

Symbian OS offers limited set of services in order to connect the

wireless network.

It can detect for Wi-Fi networks retrieve information or data about the cellular
network that is being connected.

Symbian OS has also offers limited functionality of Bluetooth.

It is possible in only one condition the devices that securely connected to each
other for Bluetooth I/O.

Symbian OS sockets are similar to the BSD sockets and it is possible to specify the
interface that must be used.

Security

Symbian OS has various features like other mobile device operating systems for the
purpose of protection and privacy.

The harmful threat is managed by the Symbian OS security architecture is the

distribution of malicious applications.

Symbian offers developers with numerous APIs in order to implement the security
features.

By default in Symbian OS Cryptographic, hashing and random number generating

algorithm are available.

comparison and Conclusion

Quality comparison of operating systems based on emergent features

THE END !!