The thing with operating systems, any operating system, is that they have logic errors. In other words they have bugs. Bugs are simply mis-calculations that a programmer has made in designing logic structures or the programmer fumble fingered when typing in a variable and missed an "i" or something (those are the hardest bugs to find ). For what ever the reason an operating system or its user based programs can, do and will crash. The most important thing is how does the operating system handle this crash.

Now lets simulate an operating system crash using analogy's. If you have children, or are a big child yourself (I am fat, grey and balding yet still a child then you most probably know about play-doh (tm). If you can grab a hold of some then take a handful and throw it at the floor as hard as you can. What happens? It goes splat, and flattens out but is still in one piece. That is what happens when Linux crashes.

Next find a piece of glass,