Introduction

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Introduction

The third edition of Inside Microsoft Windows 2000 is intended for advanced computer professionals (both developers and system administrators) who want to understand how the core components of the Microsoft Windows 2000 operating system work internally. With this knowledge, developers can better comprehend the rationale behind design choices when building applications specific to the Windows 2000 platform. Such knowledge can also help developers debug complex problems. System administrators can benefit from this information as well because understanding how the operating system works under the covers facilitates understanding the performance behavior of the system and makes it easier to troubleshoot system problems when things go wrong. After reading this book, you should have a better understanding of how Windows 2000 works and why it behaves as it does.

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Structure of the Book

The first two chapters (Concepts and Tools, and System Architecture) lay the foundation with terms and concepts used throughout the rest of the book. The next three chapters—System Mechanisms, Startup and Shutdown, and Management Mechanisms—describe key underlying mechanisms in the system. The remaining chapters—Processes, Threads, and Jobs; Memory Management; Security; I/O System; Storage Management; Cache Manager; File Systems; and Networking—explain the core components of the Windows 2000 operating system.

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Differences in the Third Edition

This new edition of Inside Microsoft Windows 2000 covers many topics that weren't in the second edition of Inside Windows NT, such as startup and shutdown, service internals, registry internals, file system drivers, and networking. It also covers the kernel- related changes and enhancements in Windows 2000, such as the Windows Driver Model (WDM), Plug and Play, power management, Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI), encryption, the job object, and Terminal Services.

For the first time, the book includes a companion CD with useful tools for exploring Windows 2000 system internals. Also included on the CD is a searchable electronic version of the book. Also, many new hands-on experiments have been added to the book that show how to use tools such as the kernel debugger to examine internal Windows 2000 system state.

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Hands-on Experiments

When a tool can be used to expose or demonstrate some aspect of Windows 2000 internal behavior, the steps necessary to try the tool yourself are listed in "Experiment" boxes. These appear throughout the book, and we encourage you to try these as you're reading—seeing visible proof of how Windows 2000 works internally will make much more of an impression on you than just reading about it. Many of the experiments use the kernel debugger. The live kernel debugger tool (LiveKd) included on the book's companion CD makes these experiments easy and safe to try.

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Topics Not Covered

Windows 2000 is a large and complex operating system. This book doesn't cover everything relevant to Windows 2000 internals but instead focuses on the base system components . For example, this book doesn't describe COM+, the foundation of the Windows distributed object-oriented programming infrastructure.

Because this is an internals book and not a user , programming, or system administration book, it doesn't describe how to use, program, or configure Windows 2000.