This text, Applied Operating Systems Concepts, is based on the best selling text Operating System Concepts, 5/e (OSC), 1998 by Abraham Silberschatz and Peter Baer Galvin. Like OSC, Applied provides a clear description of the concepts that underlie operating systems. One of the key differences is that Java is used to present many of these ideas and included are numerous examples that pertain specifically to popular operating systems such as UNIX, Solaris 2, Windows NT, Mach, the Apple Macintosh OS, IBM's OS/2 and Linux.

The advent of Java technology has given the authors an excellent vehicle to illustrate many of the most important concepts in modern operating systems today. Topics like multitasking, CPU scheduling, process synchronization, deadlock, security, and distributed systems lend themselves very well to demonstrations using Java technology.