March 10, 2026 Journal Entry Week 1

March 9th, 2026

CST334

Journal Entry Week 1

Write a reflection on your learning in this week of class. 

Wow, it has been two and a half months since the last entry. Time flies and the last term didn't require any input. 

During my first week of CST334 I was exposed to a lot of topics in operating systems and how to manage computer resources. I'm not too interested in it but there is a desire to learn through reflection. 

I thought the memory hierarchy was interesting and the way memory in a computer runs at different speeds. Binary and hex was easy since I already teach that. How hex and binary is stored was interesting though, as well as how they are used to display data. File redirection was good practice and I learned some new topics/commands in Power Shell. 

Heap memory has been a challenge for me. I don't understand how the operating system manages it. I want to learn more about how memory is organized while running in a program, I think that would be a cool topic. 

My aha moment was understanding memory hierarchy. It connected the dots on a lot of the programming questions I had in previous courses and how data moves between cache, RAM and disk. It is interesting how some things are slower if they use the disk versus using RAM. Right now my Ubuntu is in a M.2 drive externally mounted on my wall using a Thunderbolt cable. This was a faster option than USB since I already have two M.2 drives installed in my laptop. Making that connection on exactly why, even though I knew my setup was the fastest possible right now, was cool to absorb as a subject. 

I would like to expose myself to Linux more and might change my operating system to my Ubuntu distro for some of the assignments so I can get more familiar with using the terminal for navigating and digging deeper into the concepts. I'm hoping we learn more about how the operating system interacts with programs and hardware. I had issues with Linux in the past and would like to know more about the low level concepts involved.