Welcome to the Operating Systems Group

The Operating Systems Group at KIT is focusing on the design, implementation, and analysis of system software, which is low-level software running directly on top of the hardware interface. As a mediator between applications and the hardware, system software plays a central role in the software stack. It manages the computer's hardware resources such as memory and computation time and provides common abstractions and services for efficient and secure resource access.

An understanding of access patterns to byte-addressable memory is fundamental for the allocation and mapping of memory that is close to CPUs and accelerators or even far away (disaggregated memory) via network technologies such as Computer Express Link (CXL). more
In case of persistent memory technologies with hybrid access modes (byte- and block-addressable), the operating System can determine the optimal mode dynamically. more
 
Our approach to virtual memory management can allocate, map, and migrate memory areas to the optimal memory class (e.g., volatile or persistent memory and storage ) depending on run-time criteria like capacity, bandwidth, latency, and energy consumption. more

File systems for accelerators used in areas such as AI and HPC are an alternative approach to traditional CPU-based file access. If accelerators have full control over data path from the storage media to the accelerator's memory,  they can reduce latencies, discharge the CPU from management work, and don't waste the valuable 
main memory bandwidth for the I/O of accelerators. more 

The Operating Systems Group is also heavily involved in the Bachelor's and Master's program in computer science at KIT. We give an introductory lecture to operating systems for undergraduates, organize seminars, and offer advanced labs and lectures in the areas of virtualization and power management in the Master's program. We also regularly supervise theses, thereby giving students the chance to actively take part in the exciting field of systems research. more