ECS 251 (Winter 2018)
Advanced Operating Systems
General information
| Information | Details |
|---|---|
| Lecture time and location | Tuesday and Thursday from 4:40pm - 6pm in Cruess Hall 107 |
| Instructor | Sam King (kingst@ucdavis.edu) |
| Office Hours | Wednesdays 3:10pm - 4pm in 3061 Kemper |
| Final | No final exam! |
| Piazza | https://piazza.com/ucdavis/winter2018/ecs251/home |
| Canvas | https://canvas.ucdavis.edu/courses/192586 |
Overview
This class focuses on hot topics in Operating Systems. We will discuss classic papers in the area as well as cutting-edge research. We will discuss classic papers in the area as well as cutting-edge research. We will explore new ideas through projects and improve skills in presentations, critical thinking, systems and security programming, and creativity. The class format will consist of lectures, student presentations, guest lectures, and class project presentations.
The prerequisite for this class is undergraduate operating systems. Some of the topics we will explore are: kernels, security, reliability and finding bugs, and distributed systems.
Lectures
You are responsible for knowing about all announcements made in lecture. We will discuss expectations about the project, suggestions for how to succeed, and grading guidelines in class, and general class policy issues, so make sure you don't miss any lectures.
Readings, postings, and class participation
A major part of this course will be reading, analyzing, and discussing papers. We will cover one or two papers per lecture typically. Required readings for each class are posted on the class web site. For each required paper, your assignment is to read the paper carefully before the lecture and to post on the course newsgroup an insight or question about this paper. A good model is the comments and question that take place after someone presents a paper at a research conference. The postings can take many forms, for example, you could post any of the following:
- What you appreciated about the paper
- Where you felt the paper fell short
- Future work that the paper inspired you to think of
- Questions about the meaning of a section of the paper
- Comparisons between the paper and another paper or approach for the same problem
- Relationship between the problem being attacked in this paper and another problem
- How the paper relates to another paper or approach
- Speculation about how the author's idea would apply in a new situation
- Something you wished the author had addressed
- Assumptions in the paper that you disagree with and how you think different assumptions would affect the outcome
- Answering another student's question or following up on another student's comments
Your posting need not be long; the ideal is a few thought-provoking sentences. You should submit your posting to Piazza no later than 11:59pm on the day before we discuss the paper. These postings aren't graded, but I do expect students to participate.
Participating in the in-class discussions on each paper is an important part of the class. Lively participation by the entire class will help us all understand the material better and have more fun in the process.
Class discussions
In class we will discuss the papers in two different phases. First, we will break into small groups (3-4 students) to discuss the papers for 10-15 minutes before we break into larger groups. This small group discussion will be guided by a set of questions given to you at the beginning of each class.
Optional textbook
Some of the papers cover distributed systems, and if you're looking for a text book to help with some of the background material, please see this online book (CC-BY-SA license) by James Aspnes that gives good coverage of the background material, including Paxos.