Abstract: In one configuration, a method for operating a computer includes booting an operating system having a plurality of tunable kernel subsystems; storing a representation of at least one base tunable having a set of inheritable properties in a memory of the computer; and storing, in a memory of the computer, a plurality of representations of instances of at least one of the stored base tunables, each instance including at least one inheritable property of the stored base tunable, wherein representations of at least a first instance and a second instance are stored at different memory addresses. The first instance and the second instance include a plurality of values, and differ in at least one corresponding value.