CS146a: Fundamentals of Computer Systems
Fall 2007
Instructor: Liuba Shrira
Description //
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Textbook and readings //
Class meetings //
Staff //
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Hot News //
Current Assignment //
Projects //
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FAQ //
Different //
Acknowledgments
Description
Prereq.: CS31a and knowledge of C.
The focus of cs146a is engineering of computer software and hardware systems:
techniques for controlling complexity; networks and distributed systems;
atomicity and coordination of parallel activities; recovery and reliability;
privacy of information; impact of computer systems on society. Case studies
of working systems and outside reading in the current literature provide comparisons
and contrasts. The lab provides hands-on experience with building computer
systems.
Here is a detailed CS146a mission and sylabus.
Assignments and Grades
Grades in cs146a will be based on written reports, lab projects, quizzes
and your participation in class. There will not be a final examination.
Before each class, you will be asked to submit a short report pertaining
to the reading assignments. Your report will be made available to the class.
The lab will consist of several projects. All the programming will be done
in C so fluency in C (or C++) is a must. The lab will be run in Unix environment.
You will have to defend your projects.
Since an important part of cs146a is discussion of current literature,
your class participation will influence your grade significantly -- so significantly
that we hesitate to try to assign weights to the individual components such
as summaries and projects. Everything is important; We will assign your final
grade based on the personal assessment of what you got out of the course,
integrating all the methods of evaluation we can think of.
Collaboration is neither permitted on the reports nor on the projects
except collaboration with team members on a team project. You are responsible
for protecting your homework directories so that others cannot view them
or copy them. Failure to do so constitutes a violation of academic integrity.
To protect a unix directory called "homework", "chmod og-rwx homework".
Textbook and readings
There are three things you need to have in order to accomplish the reading
assignments in cs146a
- We will use a draft version of a new operating systems book by Kaashoek and Saltzer that will be distributed. Background material
appears in Modern Operating Systems , by Andrew Tannenbaum, 2nd Edition
(Prentice Hall Publishers, ISBN: 0130313580) (MOS). and in Brooks,
Frederick P. The Mythical Man-Month, Addison-Wesley, 1975. (ISBN 0-201-00650-2,
paperback)
- Readings for cs146a, a set of papers
that will be distributed during the semester.
Class meetings
Staff
| Lecturer |
| Liuba Shrira |
Volen-133 |
x62704 |
(liuba at cs.brandeis.edu) |
| |
|
|
|
| Teaching Assistant |
| Ross Shaull |
Volen-139 |
x63366 |
(rshaull at cs.brandeis.edu) |
|
Course mailing list: (cs146a-l at cs.brandeis.edu)
Use this mailing list to contact all the cs146a students and staff, or
to ask general questions.
Office hours
Hot News
Current Assignment
Projects
- Project 1: due 2007-09-28 before 11:59
PM (extended to 2007-10-02)
- Project 2: due 2007-10-26 before 11:59
PM
- Project 3: due 2007-12-07 before 11:59
PM (optional - see assignment 10 above)
Reading Responses
Reading responses from students are posted on the LATTE page for this course.
Tutorial
- Slides from the C and blocking sockets tutorial have been posted.
Students with Disabilities:
If you are a student with a documented disability on record at Brandeis
University and wish to have a reasonable accommodation made for you in this
class, please see me immediately.
And Now For Something Completely Different
Random collection of articles on hot and/or controversial issues related
to 146a topics by experts from all over the web. Beware: you may or may
not need more then one grain of salt for each grain of truth here.
Acknowledgments
Thanks
to Frans
Kaashoek and Jerry
Saltzer, for making available the class materials.
Last updated 8/13/07
Brandeis University,
Computer Science Department