Editing Interrupt handler (section)

== Execution context ==
In a modern operating system, upon entry the execution context of a hardware interrupt handler is subtle.

For reasons of performance, the handler will typically be initiated in the memory and execution context of the running process, to which it has no special connection (the interrupt is essentially usurping the running context—process time accounting will often accrue time spent handling interrupts to the interrupted process). However, unlike the interrupted process, the interrupt is usually elevated by a hard-coded CPU mechanism to a privilege level high enough to access hardware resources directly.