It must then determine whether the program or programs currently in core must be dumped (to disk or drum), in part or entirely, to leave room in core for the next user. The next user must then be retrieved from secondary storage together with the proper machine conditions.
In addition to maintaining input and output buffers for each user console, the supervisor keeps a record of the status of each user. The status of a user may be: "working," where a program is ready to continue running whenever it is next brought in; "waiting command," where the user has just completed a command line at his console; "input-wait" or "output-wait," where the program is temporarily held up waiting to get a console line in or out; "dormant," where the program has stopped running and returned control to the supervisor, but machine conditions and the status of memory are preserved for inspection, modification, or re-entry; and "dead," where the program has terminated, control has been returned to the supervisor, and machine conditions and the status of memory have been scrapped.
It should be noted that command programs are handled in exactly the same manner as the user's own programs, with respect to status and scheduling. The background system is also considered another user; at present it has a different place in the scheduling algorithm, with permanently lowest priority. In addition there will be another type of background, consisting of batch jobs initiated from consoles but left to run without console interaction; these jobs will be run with exactly the same type of scheduling as normal foreground programs.
Command Format
The commands are typed by the user to the time-sharing supervisor (not to his own program) and thus can be initiated at any time regardless of the particular program in memory. (For similar reasons of coordination, the supervisor handles all input-output of the foreground system typewriters.) Commands are composed of segments separated by blanks; the first segment is the command name, and the remaining segments are parameters pertinent to the command. Each segment consists of the last 6 characters typed (initially an implicit 6 blanks). A carriage return is the signal which initiates action on the command. Whenever a command
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