Aadressiruume

Aadressiruume, often translated as address space, refers to the set of all possible addresses that a system can use to identify and access memory locations or other resources. In computer science, this concept is fundamental to how processors and memory interact. Each unique address within the address space corresponds to a specific byte or word of memory.

The size of the address space is determined by the number of bits used for addressing. For instance, a system with a 32-bit address space can theoretically access 2^32 unique memory locations, which is approximately 4 gigabytes. A 64-bit system, conversely, has a much larger address space, capable of addressing 2^64 locations. This expansion in address space is crucial for supporting larger amounts of RAM and more complex computational tasks.

In operating systems, the concept of virtual address space is also significant. It allows each process to have its own private address space, which may not directly correspond to physical memory locations. This abstraction provides memory protection between processes and enables more efficient memory management through techniques like paging and swapping. The mapping between virtual and physical addresses is handled by the memory management unit (MMU) of the processor.