Inside Mac OS X
Kernel Environment
Preliminary 4/11/00 Technical Publications ©2000 Apple Computer, Inc.
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About This Book
1 About This Book
The purpose of this book is to provide fundamental high-level information about the Mac OS X core operating system architecture. It also provides background for system programmers and developers of device drivers, file systems, and network extensions. The book concentrates on those areas where Mac OS X system architecture differs from other, similar operating systems.
Therefore, this book does not delve deeply into the specific APIs or programmatic use of the individual components of the Mac OS X core operating system, collectively known as the kernel. These components include Mach, BSD, the I/O Kit, networking, and the file system. To learn more about how to program for these components, you should see the specific documentation for each of them. The succeeding chapters of this book will provide pointers to more in-depth reference material.
Audience Profile
This book has a wide and diverse audience – specifically, the set of potential system software developers for Mac OS X. It is anticipated that the audience will consist primarily of the following sorts of developers: