A modern computer operating system usually segregates virtual memory into kernel space and user space. Primarily, this separation serves to provide memory protection and hardware protection from malicious or errant software behaviour.

What is kernel space in OS?

Kernel space is where the kernel (i.e., the core of the operating system) executes (i.e., runs) and provides its services. ... User space is that set of memory locations in which user processes (i.e., everything other than the kernel) run. A process is an executing instance of a program.

What does kernel space contain?

When a process is created and its virtual memory is divided into user-space and a kernel-space , where user space region contains data, code, stack, heap of the process & kernel-space contains things such as the page table for the process, kernel data structures and kernel code etc.