The operating system microsoft windows nt is focused on. WNT: The True Story of Windows NT

Roots

It all started in 1975 when Digital Equipment Corporation initiated the development of its 32-bit VAX platform.

The project was led by Cutler, who had already built a reputation for being a tough systems engineer by building the RSX-11M for the famous PDP-11 minicomputers. In 1977, the VAX-11/780 machine and its operating system, VMS 1.0, were announced. Four years later, Cutler was insanely tired of "attributing" numbers after the same three-letter prefix, and he decided to leave Digital. However, the functionaries of the corporation turned out to be more cunning: since a talented developer cannot be kept in the bosom of the organization, they decided to imitate the atmosphere of a startup and free creativity. An autonomous division in Seattle was created, and Cutler was allowed to recruit the required number of personnel (about 200 people) directly from Digital employees. The new structure took up the design of the processor architecture and operating system, codenamed Prism.

The "happy moment" did not last long, the big bosses failed to bring the work they had begun to its logical conclusion, and in 1988 Cutler, along with his 200 engineers and programmers, found himself on free bread. But the well-known developer was not left out of work: at that time, a decision was ripe in the head of Bill Gates about the need to create a server OS that competes with Unix clones. Only to get David Cutler, the future Microsoft CEO agreed to hire 20 ex-Digital engineers of his choice. In November 1988, a team of five Digital people and one Microsoft programmer set to work.

The task was to write an OS for the new Intel i860 RISC processor, codenamed N-Ten. From here, by the way, the abbreviation NT arose, later interpreted by Microsoft marketers as New Technology. Already in December 1988, the first fragments of the system were ready. The catch was that the i860 only existed on paper, so the code had to be tested on a software emulator. Development was carried out on "toy", by today's standards, Intel 386 25 MHz machines with 13 MB of RAM and 110 MB hard drives.

The microkernel architecture that underpinned NT from the very beginning became crucial when it was discovered in 1989 that the hardware i860 was not capable of efficiently executing written code. I had to switch to MIPS R3000, and then to the standard Intel processor 386, which was completed in less than a year by a team that grew to 28 engineers.

In 1990, the most important event that became a key event in the fate of NT took place - the release and dizzying success of Windows 3.0. In fact, it was Microsoft's first multi-tasking OS with a decent graphical interface that allowed real work to be done. It is borrowing this interface and the API determined the future of NT. Initially, the server OS was supposed to be a remake of the joint OS / 2 project with IBM and, accordingly, function with existing OS / 2 applications. However, the third version of Windows appeared just in time: Redmond abandoned his allies and refocused the NT development team on the design of the Win32 API, made in the "image and likeness" of the Win16 interface. This provided much-needed continuity that made it easier to port applications from the desktop to the server platform.

The NT development team, which had by then become Windows NT, began to grow rapidly, and soon had about 300 people working in it. The abandonment of OS/2 orientation led to serious problems in the relationship between Microsoft and IBM. There were no official statements, just at one of the inter-corporate presentations, IBM employees found in confusion that the OS created had nothing to do with the brainchild of their company. Nevertheless, Windows NT 3.1 (numbering was "adjusted" to the current version of 16-bit Windows that existed at that time) included support for DOS, Win16, POSIX and OS / 2 APIs, including. In July 1993, a new server system from Microsoft came out and started its journey.

Then things went smoothly: in September 1994, Windows NT 3.5 was released. The previous version was prepared in a feverish rush, everything had to be coded from scratch, and a lot of features remained unimplemented. Now it's time to think about efficiency, speed and ... organizing some kind of interaction with networks built on NetWare - the absolute leader of that time, dominating the market local networks. If in those years they were so attentive to the issues of regulation of monopolies, as is done today, perhaps it would be enough to write the appropriate slander to the appropriate authority. Alas, Microsoft had to deal with the situation on its own. Novell hesitated whether or not to provide client Windows support NT. Redmond couldn't wait any longer - they wrote their own NetWare client, and it turned out to be so good that they continued to use it after the release of the original software from Novell. In May 1995, thanks to the architecture based on the microkernel, a special "PowerPC edition" of the OS appeared - Windows NT 3.51. According to some reports, its release was delayed due to IBM's inability to stick to the plan to bring this processor to the market. Therefore, the evolution of the PowerPC version went a little further than Windows NT 3.5, which allowed it to become the basis for the next version of the OS.

If until now it was still possible to talk about some similarity between the architectures of Windows NT and even Unix (in some ways infinitely distant, but in some ways very similar to the VMS OS), then with the release of NT 4.0, which introduced the graphics subsystem into core, the last reason for such reasoning has disappeared. In theory, such a decision was an absolutely logical conclusion from the sad experience of trying to integrate the popular window into NT. Windows environments 95. It is likely that the idea of ​​repeating the architectural model of the X Window - Unix - arose precisely because of the original "server orientation" of NT. However, if there were no problems with the “transplantation” of the graphical shell, then its performance in user mode (i.e., in the form of a regular application) left much to be desired, which is absolutely natural - supporting an abstract output device (be it a bitmap display, a printer, or in general whatever) the Windows graphics subsystem is incommensurably more complex and, accordingly, more demanding on resources than the X Window, which "understands" only raster displays. So, as part of the Windows NT 4.0 kernel, released in July 1996, another module appeared. The revision was called the Shell Update Release (SUR).

The next step was Windows NT 5.0, released on the market in 2000 under the name Windows 2000. right decision, which allowed this operating system to be repositioned. The work continues to this day, as evidenced by the release of Windows Server 2003.

How VMS Became WNT

Some wits once joked that if you increment (increase by one) each letter of the name of the Cutler VMS operating system, you get WNT or Windows NT. According to professionals, this is true. Not a preconceived notion based on the fact that the main architects of NT were once the developers of the VMS, but an objective reality.

In fact, NT is the embodiment of radically redesigned, implemented in the C language to achieve better mobility, the architectural ideas of the VMS assembler core, supplemented by the appropriate front-end APIs and new file and graphics subsystems. The commonality of the architectural solutions of the two systems is very high. So, they have the same concepts of processes, priorities (32 levels), management of changing priorities and control over the distribution of processor time between them. But despite the significant similarities, no doubt due to the previous experience of the team of the chief architect - Cutler, NT was originally created as a multi-threaded operating system - this "small" difference alone makes it possible to understand the degree of separation of NT from the "basic" VMS architecture.

Drivers in both operating systems work within the framework of a stack model, each layer of which is isolated from the others, which allows organizing a multi-stage device control scheme. Systems allow swapping of both user processes and system processes, including drivers. The way resources are represented is also similar, both systems treat them as objects and manage them using the Object Manager. NT security, like its underlying Discretionary Access Control Lists or DACLs, traces its lineage back to VMS 4.0.

In 1993, Digital engineers reviewed the specifications for Windows NT and found that it bore a striking resemblance to the experimental Mica operating system that had been created as part of the Prism project. Why such attention to Redmond products? Not from a good life, Digital employees began to study the insides of someone else's system. In 1992, the corporation fell into a protracted peak, money was slipping through its fingers, and sales of the new Alpha processor were slipping. Now in search of salvation, the company's bosses tried to seek help from their worst rival Intel, to which its president, Andrew Grove, refused. In the end, I had to bow to "Gates the Third" and ask for a port of Windows NT under Alpha in exchange for a promise to make NT, to the detriment of VMS, my main operating system. However, having received a pre-release version of NT, Digital's engineers slowly realized that the OS required significantly more RAM than their typical "$5,000 Alpha PC" would hold. NT was clearly not suitable for the mass market of RISC stations, an attempt to stand under the Microsoft flag for Digital (as, indeed, for most other companies) turned out to be a waste of time and money.

The game of "spot 10 differences" between WNT and VMS has paid Digital big dividends. According to one version published at the time in Business Week, instead of openly suing, the president of Digital, with irrefutable evidence of intellectual property infringement in his hands, decided to get more for less. He turned to Microsoft for clarification, which resulted in the signing of a large-scale contract under which Digital became the main network integrator for NT. In addition, in October of the same year, Redmond refused support in Windows NT for both processors competing with Alpha: PowerPC and MIPS. Unfortunately for the Digital management, the alliance was soon destroyed, and the status of "NT network installation services for Microsoft" passed to Hewlett-Packard, which, however, a few years later got another heavy burden of the corporation - the VMS OS.

Despite the fact that the paths of NT and VMS diverged, these operating systems continued a series of peculiar borrowings. In particular, Windows NT received support for clusters only in 1997, while VMS has had it since 1984, and a 64-bit version of Windows appeared even later (VMS migrated to a higher bit depth back in 1996). On the other hand, in VMS 7.0 in 1995, threads were announced at the kernel level, and a Registry-like database and a global event log, similar to the corresponding NT tools, became part of VMS 7.2. Windows Server 2003 is out, let's see what happens next...

Windows NT is not a further development of pre-existing products. Its architecture was created from scratch, taking into account the requirements for a modern operating system. The features of the new system developed on the basis of these requirements are listed below.

In an effort to ensure compatibility (compatible) of the new operating system, the developers of Windows NT retained the familiar Windows interface and implemented support for existing file systems(such as FAT) and various applications (written for MS - Dos, OS / 2 1.x, Windows 3.x and POSIX). Developers also included tools for working with various networking tools in Windows NT.

System portability has been achieved, which can now run on both CISC and RISC processors. CISC includes Intel-compatible 80386 and higher processors; RISCs are represented by systems with MIPS R4000, Digital Alpha AXP and Pentium P54 series and higher processors .

Scalability means that Windows NT is not tied to a single-processor computer architecture, but is able to take full advantage of the possibilities provided by symmetrical multiprocessor systems. Currently, Windows NT can run on computers with between 1 and 32 processors. computer environment requirements, Windows NT makes it easy

add more powerful and productive servers and workstations to the corporate network. Additional Benefits gives the use of a single development environment for both servers and workstations.

Windows NT has a uniform security system (security) that meets the specifications of the US government and complies with the B2 security standard. In a corporate environment, critical applications are provided with a completely isolated environment.

Distributed processing means that Windows NT has networking capabilities built into the system. Windows NT also allows communication with various types of host computers through support for a variety of transport protocols and the use of high-level client-server facilities, including named pipes, remote procedure calls (RPCs) and Windows sockets.

Reliability and robustness provide architectural features that protect application programs from being damaged by each other and by the operating system. Windows NT uses fault-tolerant structured exception handling at all architectural levels, which includes a recoverable NTFS file system and provides protection through built-in security and advanced memory management techniques.

Localization capabilities (allocation) provide the means to work in many countries of the world in national languages, which is achieved by using the ISO Unicod standard (developed by the international organization for standardization).

Windows NT concepts

The Windows NT operating system is implemented in two flavors: Windows NT Server and Windows NT Workstation. Windows NT Server 4.0 is a network operating system with Internet applications, file and print services, remote access service, built-in router, file indexing, and network management. Second Windows variant NT - Windows NT Workstation 4.0 resembles NT Server in many ways, but is optimized as an operating system for workstation. In terms of architecture and features, Windows NT Server is a superset of Windows NT Workstation and includes all the features of the latter. Further, in cases where it is not indicated which OS is meant, the comments refer to both.

Origins of Windows NT

Start of work on creating Windows NT falls at the end of the 88th year. Microsoft has appointed David Cutler to lead a new software project: OS development new technology(New Technology - NT). David Cutler was DEC's principal consultant and worked for the firm for 17 years developing OS and compilers: VAX/VMS, OS for MicroVAX I, OS RSX-11M, VAX PL/1 compilers, VAX C.

Windows NT was first developed as a lightweight version of OS/2 (OS/2 Lite) that could run on less powerful machines by truncating some features. However, over time, seeing how successful Windows 3.0 was received by consumers, Microsoft refocused and began to develop an improved version of Windows 3.1. Microsoft's new strategy was to create a single family of Windows-based operating systems that would cover many types of computers, from the smallest laptops to the largest multiprocessor workstations.

Windows NT, as the next generation of Windows systems has been called, is the highest level in the hierarchy of the Windows family. This operating system, which originally supported the familiar graphical user interface (GUI) of the Windows user, was Microsoft's first fully 32-bit operating system. The Win32 API - a programming interface for developing new applications - made available to applications improved OS features, such as multithreaded processes, synchronization, security, I / O, object management.

The conceptual advantages of Windows NT over the MS-DOS/Windows 3.1 pairing were clear. Its 32-bit basis, together with true multitasking and multithreading, greatly increased the potential of the system.

The first operating systems of the NT family, Windows NT 3.1 and Windows NT Advanced Server 3.1, appeared in July 1993. The code name for the next version of Windows NT 3.5, Daytona, which is the same as the name of the Florida highway, may have indicated that its main advantage is speed. Indeed, the performance of version 3.5 increased by 1.5 times compared to version 3.1, and after its introduction, many corporate users who rejected version 3.1 for one reason or another, reconsidered their attitude towards the NT line: in 1995, the share of Windows NT in their sector of the market increased by 2 times and amounted to 15%.

Features of Windows NT 4.0 version

Released in August 1996 next version Windows NT 4.0. This next version of Windows NT was originally supposed to be numbered 3.52, but it was given the number 4.0, which was previously mentioned in the computer press in connection with another upcoming version of Windows NT codenamed Cairo. Perhaps this indicates that this latest version (Windows NT 4.0) has so many important new features that require more significant encoding changes. The innovations made in Windows NT Server 4.0 are mainly related to the improvement of the user interface, the expansion of Internet support, the introduction of new and modernization of existing administrative tools, and the improvement of system performance.

Many significant changes were made in Windows NT 4.0, among which the following are the most significant:

interface implementation in the style of Windows 95;

orientation towards the Internet and intranet;

architectural changes that allowed to dramatically increase the performance of graphic operations;

modification of means of interaction with NetWare - Gateway and NCP client now support NDS;

support for multiprotocol routing;

the appearance in Windows NT 4.0 of an emulator of Intel's processors for RISC platforms.

There are other improvements in version 4.0. For example, Windows NT Server 4.0 greatly improves scalability over Windows NT Server 3.51, allowing for significantly faster performance on machines with 4 processors, as well as linear performance gains on machines with eight or more processors.

The performance of Windows NT Server 4.0 as a file server also improved significantly and exceeded Windows performance NT Server 3.51 according to some reports more than 2 times.

New administrative Windows tools NT can work remotely on Windows clients 95. In addition, Windows NT Server provides a remote boot service for Windows 95 clients. (This is useful for diskless workstations.)

Windows NT 4.0 features a new Windows 95-style graphical user interface. While some users may not like this change, Microsoft is restoring the "one-stop-shop" principle that was originally considered one of Windows NT's strengths. On a network with client stations running Windows 95 or Windows NT (or on a mixed network that includes such stations), Windows NT Server administrators can perform their functions using the same interface as workstation users.

Aside from external changes, the GUI upgrade hasn't had much of an impact on network management methods. The basic Windows NT Server administrator tools remain the same. The User Manager for Domains, Server Manager, Disk Administrator, Event Viewer, Performance Monitor, DHCP Manager, WINS Manager, Network Client Administrator, License Manager, and Migration Tool for NetWare have not changed significantly. Remote Access Administrator hasn't changed either, but it's now moved from separate folder in the Administrative Tools menu. The new System Policy Editor, which is compatible with both Windows NT and Windows 95, has replaced the User Profile Editor you've seen since Windows NT Server 3.x. Version 4.0 includes four additions: Administrative Wizards, the already mentioned System Policy Editor, as well as an advanced Windows NT Diagnostics tool and Network Monitor (a network monitoring program previously only included with the Microsoft Systems Management Server product).

Administrative Wizards allow you to easily perform step-by-step actions such as creating user accounts, managing user groups, controlling access to files and directories, installing a new printer, installing and uninstalling programs, connecting a modem, preparing installation diskette packages for new customers and monitoring compliance with license agreements for installed programs. All this will be useful for those administrators who find that, despite the presence of a graphical interface, Windows NT management tools are still complicated.

Windows NT 4.0 has several useful system monitoring components borrowed from Microsoft's Systems Management Server. The main application is the Performance Monitor tool that graphically monitors selected system events. In particular, the Performance Monitor can be used to obtain graphs of CPU utilization, general I / O network cards and the number of bytes transferred over HTTP.

Another application, the Monitor Tool, is also capable of capturing and monitoring network traffic coming and going from a computer under NT. A monitoring scenario (for example, a description of what protocol frames you want to monitor, what traffic characteristics to measure, from which workstations or users) can be saved and reused if necessary.

The set of wizards is still far from functional completeness. For example, it does not have a program that would move the user's budget from one domain to another, that is, would perform procedures related to the need to delete one account and create another.

Other innovations in Windows NT Server 4.0 are related mainly to the Internet and the intranet. An important place among them is occupied by the following software components included in the delivery set:

Internet Information Server (IIS) version 2.0 is a Microsoft product that provides Web, ftp and gopher server services, the capabilities of Internet Information Server are comparable, and in a number of tests they surpass the similar popular product Server Netscape. Microsoft Internet Information Server 2.0 is the fastest Web server for Windows NT Server - it outperforms its 1.0 predecessor by 40 percent;

Object model of distributed components - Distributed Component Object Model (DCOM), which provides secure communication between components over the Internet;

DNS / WINS Server, which makes it easy to find the necessary Web sites on the Internet or intranets;

PPTP technology (point-to-point tunneling protocol), which extends the functionality of the remote server Windows Access NT Server (RAS) and provides the ability to create private networks on the Internet;

FrontPage, which lets you create Web pages from a variety of templates, validate links, and generally manage the Web sites you create;

index server Microsoft Search Server, which makes it easy to find information on distributed intranet servers within any documents, including those created in Microsoft Office.

Two Internet-facing features of the new system are of particular interest to administrators. The first is the DNS name service. It allows the use of DNS names, but only supports static addressing. To remove this limitation, Microsoft offers integration DNS services and WINS, calling this combination "true dynamic DNS". Now, when a WINS client needs to determine the IP address that corresponds to the symbolic NetBIOS name, it first consults the WINS database and then the DNS itself. Thus, both dynamically recognized WINS names and static DNS names can be used equally in the system.

In addition, Windows NT 4.0 includes a Web-based administration utility that provides access to Windows NT administration tools from any Web browser. For security reasons, remote administration should use Web browsers that can log the user directly to the Windows NT server (ie, such as Internet Explorer) or support SSL.

One of the improvements is due to the fact that the increasing role of the Internet "and client-server systems is leading to an increase in the number of mobile users. Microsoft has improved RAS in this regard (improved ISDN support) and provided tools for securely working with RAS over the Internet. RAS implements protocols PPTP (creates encrypted traffic over the Internet) and Multilink PPP (allows you to combine several channels into one) Clients can be Windows NT 4.0 Workstation or Windows 95.

The Distributed Component Object Model is another key addition to Windows NT Server 4.0. The Object Linking Model (COM) allows software developers to create applications that are made up of individual components. The Distributed Model (DCOM) in Windows NT Server 4.0 extends COM in a way that allows individual components to communicate over the Internet. DCOM is a growing Internet standard published according to the format defined in the RFC 1543 specifications.

In the development of Windows NT 4.0, Microsoft decided to sacrifice stability for performance. To this end, architectural changes have been made: the window manager and GDI libraries, as well as graphics adapter drivers, have been moved from user mode to kernel mode. This change marks a departure from the concept of a microkernel adopted in previous versions of Windows NT 3.x.

Moving the graphics library and drivers to the kernel improves the performance of graphics I/O. These changes especially affected the speed of Win32 applications, while Windows-16 applications and DOS graphical applications work in much the same way as in version 3.5.

At the same time, the described changes make the operating system, in principle, less reliable. Indeed, since graphics adapter software is usually developed by the hardware manufacturers, and this software often changes (along with the hardware), it is difficult to expect from it the reliability that is required for operating system modules.

New Windows properties NT5.0

Late 1997 is expected to see Windows NT 5.0, an improved version of Windows NT. It will not only be a fully 32-bit system, but also a fully object-oriented system. Windows Foundation NT 5.0 is an object-oriented file system based on the OLE 2.0 standard that allows you to store objects rather than files. The object-oriented approach makes it possible to ensure the correctness of multiple copies of data, such as documents, spreadsheets, applications, and other types of information, stored on different network machines at the lowest cost.

Windows NT 5.0 promises a lot, and innovations will primarily affect the following subsystems:

Active Directory - global help desk, which develops a 2-layer approach to DNS name resolution. Active Directory contains information not only about files, but also about objects of other types, for example:

Computer name, IP address, Username, password, email address, application name, computer, version, permissions.

Distributed File System (Dfs) - distributed file system (freely available at www.microsoft.com). The directories of this file system, located on different servers, are mounted in a common tree starting on the root server with the root share name. Different subtrees of a single share can consist of not only Microsoft file systems, but also Novell NCP and Sun NFS file systems. Some branches of the distributed file system can be transparently replicated at the discretion of the administrator.

Distributed Component Object Model (DCOM) - program objects (ActiveX or others) can be distributed across network servers and called by applications from any computer. Information about the location of objects is registered in Active Directory.

Security features: Document permissions on Windows NT 5.0 will be checked using the Kerberos method or electronic signature, and the transfer of documents over the network will be implemented using encryption.

Hardware Requirements

There are differing opinions about whether the hardware requirements of Windows NT are high. Some feel that they are too high, and some consider these requirements quite acceptable. It all depends on what tools or what fleet of computer equipment is available to a potential consumer of Windows NT, and what tasks he faces.

To run Windows NT Workstation 4.0, the computer must have at least an i486 processor (in this version of the system, Microsoft has refused any support for i386 processors), at least 12 MB of RAM and 108 MB of disk space. And although this OS is quite functional on computers that have RAM less than 16 MB, but it is recommended to install it if you have 24 MB of RAM and at least 216 MB of free disk space. You can run Windows NT Workstation 4.0 on a system with fewer resources, but then the user is unlikely to be satisfied with its performance.

For Windows NT Server 4.0, Microsoft specifies the following hardware requirements: i486 or faster processor, 16 MB of RAM, and at least 148 MB of contiguous free disk space. To get acquainted with the functionality of the system, this may be enough, but for the "industrial" use of these minimum requirements clearly not enough. For a server with low or medium load (defined by the number of users served), you need 32 MB of RAM and hard drive with a capacity of at least 1 GB.

A complete list of hardware that has been tested for compatibility with Windows NT is contained in the documentation for the system and on the server. www.microsoft.com.

Areas Windows usage NT

With high performance, stability, advanced security features, and having a wide range of basic system functions in its arsenal, Windows NT Server can be used in various areas, and, above all, it can be used as a server in a corporate network. Here, its ability to act as a domain controller is very useful, which allows you to structure the network and thereby simplify administration and management tasks. It is also used as a file server, print server, application server, remote access server and communication server (software router).

Clients on a Windows NT Server network can be computers with different operating systems installed on them. Supported as standard: Windows NT Workstation, MS-DOS, OS/2, Windows for Workgroups, Windows 95, UNIX clones, Macintosh. Core clients are included as standard with Windows NT Server.

Windows NT Server is a powerful platform for complex network applications, especially those built using client-server technology. Combined with BackOffice servers, it can satisfy a very wide range of needs. corporate users. For example, a database server can run under Windows NT Server. SQL data Server by Microsoft, as well as database servers from other well-known companies, such as Oracle and Sybase, Adabas and InterBase database servers.

The powerful Microsoft administration system can be installed on the Windows NT Server platform System Management Server, whose functions are to inventory the hardware and software configuration of network computers, automatic installation software products for workstations, remote control of any computer and network monitoring.

Windows NT Server can be used as a communication server with IBM mainframes and IBM AS400 systems. For this, a special Microsoft SNA Server product has been created, which makes it easy to combine IBM PC-compatible workstations and powerful mainframes in one network. SNA Sever is a gateway that allows workstation access to both LAN and mainframe servers without the need for two network cards or multiple network protocol stacks. This results in a reduction in hardware cost and a reduction in the amount of RAM required. Providing transparent access to mainframes, SNA Server, integrated with NT Server security, provides host access authorization. SNA Server can work with any of the protocols supported by NT Server: IPX/SPX, TCP/IP, or NetBEUI.

Windows NT Server is the platform for Microsoft Exchange, a new high-performance collaboration suite built on top of a mail server.

Finally, latest version Windows NT 4.0 is a solid platform for Internet-oriented applications: Web servers, Web browsers, information retrieval systems, Internet e-commerce systems.

The Windows NT Workstation operating system is positioned primarily as a client in Windows NT Server networks, as well as in NetWare, Unix, Vines networks. On NetWare networks, Windows NT workstations fill a well-known gap - the lack of a good application server. A computer with Windows NT installed on it can also be a workstation in peer-to-peer networks, performing the functions of both a client and a server at the same time. Windows NT Workstation can be used as a standalone operating system when performance or privacy is required, or when implementing complex graphic applications, for example, in computer-aided design systems.

Based on the NT (New Technology) kernel, developed by Microsoft Corporation. The system was aimed at corporate users. Windows NT had a graphical user interface and provided the Win32 API, a 32-bit application programming interface for developing new applications that could take full advantage of high-level operating systems, such as multi-threaded (or multi-tasking) processes, synchronization, and anti-tampering. access, I/O and object management. Windows NT could communicate with other Microsoft operating systems, with the Apple Macintosh, with UNIX-like systems over networks. various types. Interaction could take place both with single-processor and multi-processor computers built using CISC or RISC technologies. Initially, Windows NT developed separately from the Windows 9x family of operating systems and was positioned on the market as a solution for workstations (Windows NT Workstation) and servers (Windows NT Server). Windows NT gave rise to a family of operating systems that includes Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Server 2003.

In November 1988, a joint project between IBM and Microsoft was launched to create a new generation operating system - OS / 2 NT, which could run programs written for both Windows and OS / 2, and was supposed to be a replacement for both systems. But in May 1990, Windows 3.0 was released, which brought Microsoft commercial success, and the company decided to make the Windows API the main one in OS/2 NT. This caused resentment from IBM, which promoted the OS/2 API. As a result, the contract was terminated, and the companies began to develop the existing common code on their own. IBM developed OS/2 3.0, while Microsoft developed Windows NT, which appeared in August 1993. Subsequently, she was given the number 3.1 to match the Windows 3.1 released a little earlier. The new system was distinguished from Windows 3.1 by the following features:

• 32-bit. New system could use all the features of 32-bit processors, including running 32-bit programs and addressing large amounts of memory (up to 4 gigabytes);
• preemptive multitasking. The operating system did not wait for the process itself to want to release the processor, but forcibly removed it from execution after it had used up the time allotted to it;
• lack of MS-DOS. Windows NT 3.1 was an independent operating system, had its own bootloader. When shutting down, the system did not exit to MS-DOS, but offered to turn off or restart the computer;
• UNICODE support. It was the first operating system to support UNICODE internally;
• multiplatform. Windows NT ran not only on 32-bit x86 processors, but also on 64-bit MIPS R4000 and DEC Alpha 21064;
• support for 16-bit OS/2 programs. Part of the rights to the OS/2 code remained with Microsoft, so this and all subsequent versions of Windows NT could run such programs;
• compatibility with POSIX 1.0 applications at the source code level;
• support for symmetric multiprocessing (up to 16 processors);
• support for file systems: native NTFS and HPFS inherited from OS/2. Both systems, unlike FAT, could use long filenames, up to 255 characters;
• improved networking capabilities. In addition to the supported NetBEUI and IPX protocols, SMB, TCP/IP, and SNMP have been added;
• a tree registry editor that stored all system settings.

Windows NT 3.1 had the same user interface as Windows 3.1 and came in two editions, Windows NT and Windows NT Advanced Server. Subsequently, three service packs (Service Pack) were released for this system, and in September 1994 appeared a new version- 3.5. Compatibility with NetWare networks, support for long filenames in FAT, support for the OpenGL API, improved work of 16-bit programs for Windows and MS-DOS (each now worked in its own address space) were added. Like its predecessor, it came in two editions - Windows NT Workstation and Windows NT Server. In May 1995, Windows NT 3.51 appeared. Differences from previous version were minor: the installer with a new graphical interface, new reference system with content and support for PowerPC processors. Three Service Packs were released for NT 3.5 and five for 3.51.

Simultaneously with the release of NT 3.51, the Shell Technology Preview package appeared, providing new interface with the start menu. This interface was implemented by default in Windows 95 two months later, and in August 1996 in Windows NT 4.0. In addition to the new interface, the fourth version of the system was distinguished by improved networking capabilities (included in the standard delivery of Internet Explorer 2.0, IIS and DNS server, support for multiprotocol routing), new DCOM technology and a large number of editions. In addition to Workstation and Server, in 1997 the Server Enterprise Edition was released with improved scalability and limited support for clusters, and in 1998 - Terminal Server with the ability to remotely connect users. In addition, a special version for embedded systems, Windows NT 4.0 Embedded, was developed. Service Pack 7 was released for NT 4.0, the latest version being called 6.0a.

In September 1997 and August 1998, two beta versions of the Windows NT 5.0 operating system were released, and in October 1998 it was renamed Windows 2000. The release of this system took place in February 2000. New features included: Active Directory directory service, Plug&Play and FAT32 file system support, new versions network programs(IE 5.0 and IIS 5.0), enhanced encryption capabilities (including support for Encrypted File System), built-in remote administration tools. Unlike NT 4.0, Windows 2000 ran only on the IA-32 architecture and came in four editions: Professional, Server, Advanced Server, and Datacenter Server. For Windows 2000, Service Pack 4 was released, and in August 2001, a 64-bit version of Advanced Server for Itanium processors appeared.

A new version of NT 5.1 appeared in October 2001 under the name Windows XP and was a development of Windows 2000 Professional. The main changes were an improved user interface, fast user switching, improved remote administration, system restore and rollback driver installation. The system received two service packs and was released in the following editions:

• Professional (basic version);
• Home (with truncated networking capabilities);
• Media Center Edition (with additional multimedia applications);
• Starter Edition (highly limited, no online features);
• 64-bit Edition (for Itanium processors);
• x64 Edition (for processors with AMD64 or EM64T extensions);
• N (without Windows Media player);
• Tablet PC Edition (for tablet computers);
• Embedded (for embedded systems).

In April 2003, a server variation of Windows XP was released, called Windows Server 2003 and having an internal version of 5.2. Differences from Windows XP: included in the installation of the .NET platform and the IIS 6.0 web server, improvements in Active Directory, built-in firewall, an extended set of utilities for system administration. The system was released in four editions: Web Edition, Standard Edition, Enterprise Edition and Datacenter Edition. The last three of them also came out in versions for 64-bit x86 processors, and Enterprise and Datacenter also came out for Itanium. Two updates appeared in 2005, Service Pack 1 and R2.

At the end of 1988, Microsoft appointed David Cutler to lead a new software project: creating a new Microsoft operating system for the 1990s. He assembled a team of engineers to develop a New Technology (NT) system.

The original plan was to develop NT with OS/2-style user and program interfaces (APIs), but OS/2 sold poorly, and Windows 3.0 was a great and ongoing success in the marketplace. Seeing the market challenge and the complexities involved in developing and maintaining two incompatible systems, Microsoft decided to change course and direct its engineers towards a strategy of a single holistic operating system. This strategy was to develop a family of Windows-based operating systems that would cover many types of computers, from the smallest laptops to the largest multiprocessor workstations. Thus, the next generation of Windows systems was called Windows NT.

Windows NT supports the graphical user interface (GUI) of Windows and is also the first Windows operating a Microsoft system that supports the Win32 API, a 32-bit programming interface for developing new applications. The Win32 API exposes advanced operating system features such as multithreading, synchronization, security, I/O, and object management to applications.

In July 1993, the first operating systems of the NT family appeared - Windows NT 3.1 and Windows NT Advanced Server 3.1.

Versions

• Windows NT 3.1 (July 27, 1993)
• Windows NT 3.5 (September 21, 1994)
• Windows NT 3.51 (May 30, 1995)
• Windows NT 4.0 (August 24, 1996)
• Windows 2000 (February 17, 2000)
• Windows XP (October 25, 2001)
• Windows XP 64-bit Edition (March 28, 2003)
• Windows Server 2003 (April 25, 2003)
• Windows XP Media Center Edition 2003 (December 18, 2003)
• Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 (October 12, 2004)
• Windows XP Professional x64 Edition (April 25, 2005)
• Windows Fundamentals for Legacy PCs (July 8, 2006)
• Windows Vista (November 30, 2006)
• Windows Home Server (November 7, 2007)
• Windows Server 2008 (February 27, 2008)

Structure of Windows NT

Structurally, Windows NT can be represented as two parts: the user mode part of the operating system and the kernel mode part of the operating system.

The part of Windows NT that runs in kernel mode is called the executive part. It includes a number of components that manage virtual memory, objects (resources), I/O, and the file system (including network drivers), the interaction of processes and partly the security system. These components interact with each other using inter-module communication. Each component invokes the others through a set of carefully specified internal procedures.

The second part of Windows NT, operating in user mode, are servers - the so-called protected subsystems. Since subsystems cannot automatically share memory, they communicate with each other by sending messages. Messages can be sent between a client and a server, or between two servers. All messages go through the Windows NT runtime. The Windows NT kernel schedules protected subsystem threads in the same way it schedules normal application process threads.

Support for protected subsystems is provided by the execution part. Its constituent parts are:

• Object manager. Creates, deletes, and manages runtime objects, abstract data types used to represent system resources.
• Security monitor. Sets security rules for local computer. Protects operating system resources, protects and registers executable objects.
• Process manager. Creates and terminates, suspends and resumes processes and threads, and stores information about them.

Virtual memory manager.

• I/O subsystem. Includes the following components:
  • an I/O manager that provides device-independent I/O;
  • file systems - NT drivers that execute file-oriented I / O requests and translate them into calls to conventional devices;
  • network redirector and network server - file system drivers that transmit remote I / O requests to network machines and receive requests from them;
  • executive device drivers - low-level drivers that directly control the device;
  • a cache manager that implements disk caching.

The execution part, in turn, is based on the lower-level services provided by the NT kernel. Kernel functions include:

• process planning,
• handling interrupts and exceptions,
• processor synchronization for multiprocessor systems,
• system recovery after failures.

The kernel runs in privileged mode and is never removed from memory. The only way to access the kernel is through an interrupt.

Windows NT protected subsystems run in user mode and are created by Windows NT at boot time. Immediately after creation, they begin an endless cycle of their execution, responding to messages coming to them from application processes and other subsystems. Among protected subsystems, one can single out a subclass called environment subsystems. Environment subsystems implement operating system application interfaces (APIs). Other types of subsystems, called integral subsystems, perform tasks required by the operating system. For example, most of the system Windows Security NT is implemented as an integral subsystem, network servers are also implemented as integral subsystems.

The most important environment subsystem is Win32, a subsystem that provides application access to the 32-bit Windows API. Additionally, this system provides a graphical interface and manages user input/output.

Each protected subsystem runs in user mode, calling a system runtime service to perform privileged actions in kernel mode. Network servers can run in both user mode and kernel mode, depending on how they are designed.

Subsystems communicate with each other by passing messages. When, for example, a user application calls an API procedure, the environment subsystem that provides the procedure receives the message and executes it either by calling the kernel or by sending the message to another subsystem. When the procedure completes, the environment subsystem sends a message to the application containing the return value. Sending messages and other activities of protected subsystems is invisible to the user.

The main tool that holds all the Windows NT subsystems together is the Local Procedure Call (LPC) mechanism. LPC is an optimized version of the more general remote procedure call (RPC) that is used to communicate between clients and servers located on different machines networks.

Hello everyone I will say right away that Windows NT is not really a program, it is a Windows family from Microsoft. Under the name Windows NT, the concept of operating systems from Microsoft is hidden, not a specific one, but all systems. Windows today is a very popular operating system and there is no more popular than it. My opinion is that popularity is primarily due to the fact that there is no worthy alternative and will not be any more - it's stupid now to compete with the giant Microsoft.

But nevertheless, everything is correct - you really can have something that will have the name Windows NT, because this name appears in many places. I won’t give exact examples, I don’t remember, but you can easily meet this inscription in your Windows.

If you are faced with the question of whether to remove Windows NT software or not, then I will answer this way - it is better not to remove it. Because there may be problems later. It is logical if you think about it, it becomes clear that everything where Windows NT is written, then you should uninstall it only when you are sure of it.

Windows NT was developed in the 1990s, after Microsoft stopped working with IBM (oh, they made cool laptops), together these companies developed OS / 2, it was also an operating system that I still don’t understand, but it doesn’t matter. In short, then they began to cut Windows and you yourself know what came of it - mega Krutetskaya Windows, there is only one monopoly, everyone doesn’t like it, but everyone uses it

Yes, there is also Linux, but alas, it is for a narrow circle of users - not at all for those who need it simply and beautifully and not difficult. I personally like Windows, although it didn’t please many people, especially Windows 10, but I don’t see anything crooked in it ..

Ancient Windows, once upon a time it was a masterpiece and the ultimate dream:

But compare, this is already a seven, well, that is, Windows 7, many are still sitting on it and are not going to get off:

I was a long fan of Windows XP, even very long, I sat while sitting - Windows 7 was already out, and I was hanging out on XP ... And so I bought new hardware, it was a 1150 socket, everything was new, but I managed to install Windows XP there and I still sat for two years. Then Windows 10 came out, and I eventually switched to it. The computer works for weeks and everything is fine, there are no glitches and blue screens, there are no errors. Everything works like clockwork. True, in XP this was also almost non-existent. So I somehow like everything about Windows ..

I wrote a list of where exactly you can notice such as Windows NT:

1. descriptions of some system files;
2. Windows settings, system settings, Windows NT can be found everywhere;
3. in reference materials for the program or even in the instructions for some equipment;
4. it is unlikely, but it is possible that some kind of virus will mow down under Windows NT;
5. V system folders, for example, in C:\Windows there is a bunch of junk, in the description of which there is Windows NT;

I completely forgot to write, I myself can’t say for sure, but it seems that there is an operating system itself called Windows NT, here is its boot screen.