why certain apps can freeze the entire OS? If processes alternate each other by scheduler, then why computer freezes? Why it happens? How can a program/app have this “power” to do it? What are the most common reasons? Is there a way to unfreeze it? If I wait a lot, will it eventually unfreeze?

Question

You can answer in technical ways (even though the sub says the opposite) if you want. I should understand it.

In: 3

Answer 1

Either they’re bugging the OS or just causing too much load.

In the latter case, the app is just congesting the PC. Using all the CPU cycles, memory bandwidth, etc. The OS will ensure some resources are left for itself and other processes, but it also assumes that you want the app to do that. I.e. the app is doing something difficult and needs those resources.

In the former case, the app interacts in the OS someway, either directly (i.e. by calling the APIs the OS offers apps) or indirectly (moving stuff around, using resource, etc) that cause the OS to freeze up/slow down more than it should. This shouldn’t really happen, but I’d say the most common case is an app uses so many resources that the OS slows down too much and misses something critical/appears unresponsive. I’ve seen this happen even on otherwise well maintained Linux servers.

TL;DR The OS’ job is to give apps resources to run. Sometimes it gives a little too much and it ends poorly.