CSE-624: Advanced Operating Systems, Spring 2005
This is the home page for CSE-624, the
Advanced Operating Systems class for the Spring 2005 semester, given
at the Computer Science Department of
Stony Brook University.
The 2/9 class will be held in room CS-2311 (seminar room across the hall
from my office).
Note: we are currently scheduled to meet every Wednesday
from 5:30–8:00pm in the Computer Science Building seminar room
CS-2313A.
Important notes about this class:
- The focus of the class in S'05 will be on operating systems projects,
especially file systems and security projects (but other topics such as
Networking are also possible).
- Project groups can vary from a single person to as many as 4–5, as
long as the project's scope matches the group's size.
- Each group of students will pick a suitable project at the beginning of
the class: either a new project, or an on-going one to be extended. If you
don't have a project in mind, don't worry; you can join one of the existing
teams in this class, or we'll suggest something to you. Group members will
present their project idea, design, progress reports, and final demo in
front of the whole class.
- In the beginning of the semester, before we get too deep into projects,
we will be reading select papers from the literature and discuss them in
class. We will pick a number of papers representing a range of papers from
classics (original Multics papers) to the latest cutting-edge ones (e.g.,
"The Google Filesystem"). Each student will be expected to lead the
discussion of 1–2 papers during the semester.
- I (with the help of my students) will be giving specific focused
lectures intended to discuss a specific issue such as: VFS internals, NFSv4,
kernel debugging techniques, file system benchmarking, etc.
- One of the main goals of the class is to train graduate students for
conducting research, writing and publishing, and presenting papers. I will
give lectures showing how to prepare a good set of slides for use with a
computer projector and PowerPoint/PDF; how to give a talk; how to practice
talks; how to write a short 200-word abstract for an idea; how to write a
one-page summary paper, a 4–5 page "extended abstract" paper, or a
full-length 14–16 page conference paper; I will give lectures covering
the common mistakes made by authors/speakers, and more. By the end of this
class, you should feel comfortable with all of the stages of research:
coming up with an idea, defending your idea, conducting the actual research,
writing it up, presenting it orally, and scientifically criticizing your own
and others' work.
- For this class to be successful, it is important that you attend it each
week and participate in the open discussions.
- Grading in the class will consist of several components. The most
important component will be your project: presentations and writings; in
particular, by the end of the semester you will be expected to have produced
a professional quality conference-style 12–14 page research paper.
What I will look for in particular is how much you have improved your
research and presenation skills over the semester (I will not grade on a
curve). (It is my hope that you could submit that paper to a future
conference after the semester is over.) Other grading components I will
take into account include your presentation and leading of the discussion of
the 1–2 research papers, and your overall participation and attendance
in class. There will be no exams.
- To take this class, you should (1) have taken an introductory course in
operating systems before so you know all the basics, and (2) have taken
before and passed a course such as CSE-506, CSE-508, or
CSE-509
(i.e., a course with a substantial "systems" programming project component).
Alternatively, you should have proven experience from elsewhere (perhaps
where you worked before) that you can conduct phd-level research. Note that
good English language skills are
not required to take this class: the whole point of this class is
that I want to help you to improve those skills, no matter what your
existing skills or native language happen to be!
More information about this class will be given in class. In the mean time,
if you think you'd be interested in this class, then please subscribe to
class mailing list. If you have any questions, feel free to contact the instructor.
Last Updated:
2/1/2005