CS240: Advanced Topics in Operating Systems

Spring 2008 -- Dawson Engler

Announcements

• Quiz 3 (posted: June 9)

  • Quiz 3 is now available here.

• More Quiz Info (posted: June 2)

  • Quiz 2 can be found here and the solutions are here.

  • Adam will be holding office hours in Gates 420 on 6/3 from 11 am - 12 pm.

• Quiz Dates (posted: May 7, updated: May 29)

  • Quiz 2 will be held in class on Wednesday, May 28. Open notes. Includes material since Quiz 1, up to and including 5/23.

  • Adam will be holding office hours in Gates 420 on 5/27 from 4-5 pm.

  • Quiz 3 will be held in class, Wednesday, June 4. It will be open notes and cumulative.

• Quiz 1 Solutions (posted: May 5)

  • Quiz 1 solutions are now available here.

• Quiz 1 (posted: April 30)

  • Quiz 1 is now available here.

• Quiz 1 Information (posted: April 27, updated: April 28)

  • Quiz 1 will be on Wednesday, April 30 (in class). It will cover the papers covered in class up to, and including, April 28.

  • There are examples of old quizes on the course websites from previous quarters

  • Adam will be holding extra office hours on Monday, April 28, from 4-6 pm in Gates 420.

  • SCPD students will receive the exam electronically via email at the moment we hand the exam out in class. SCPD students should either email their answers or return them via SCPD. Exams via SCPD must be returned before class on Monday, May 5th. Please do not fax them. Fax comes out garbled and hard to read too often.

Class Abstract

Students will study advanced operating system topics and be exposed to recent developments in operating systems research. This course involves readings and lectures on classic and new papers. Topics: virtual memory management, synchronization and communication, file systems, protection and security, operating system structure and extension techniques, fault tolerance, and history and experience of systems programming.

Class Times

MWF 2:15PM - 3:05PM in Skilling 193

Course Staff

Instructor

Dawson Engler

E-mail: engler at csl

Telephone: (650) 723-0762

Office: 314 Gates

Office hours: By appointment

Teaching Assistant

Adam Oliner

E-mail: oliner at cs

Office: 420 Gates

Office hours: Immediately after class or by appointment.

Extra office hours before exams

Course Secretary

Judy Polenta

E-mail: jpolenta at cs

Telephone: (650) 723-3380

Office: 279 Gates

Prerequisites

The prerequisite for this class is CS 140 or the equivalent. It is necessary to have this background before taking the class, as we'll read a lot papers quickly without much time for catching up on the basics. The course assumes an understanding of topics in operating systems such as synchronization, virtual memory management, scheduling, and file systems.

The other requirement is that students be able to send and receive email, access the class newsgroup, access the class web page, and download and print postscript from the class web page. There will be very few handouts in the course, since most of the notes and other materials will be available only on the class web page.

Course Organization and Workload

The course consists of lectures, readings, and three exams. The two most important things to know about the class: (1) the main goal is to have interesting in-class discussions and (2) we recommend you read each paper at least three times: twice very carefully, the last time focusing on the hard parts. For any artifact the paper describes you should draw a picture. This should all be done more than a day in advance so that it sinks in.

Most of the work in this course consists of reading journal and conference papers. We will cover one paper for each class meeting. This class will be primarily discussion based (rather than organized around lectures). Active discussion will (hopefully) give you a non-trivial understanding of the material. The only way this approach can work is if you read the papers carefully. To encourage this, 40% of your class grade will come from class participation: this includes talking in class, as well as how you do on pop quizzes and (possibly) pop presentations. (Given the realities of geography remote SITN students can get their entire grade from exams.) Class time will not be used to rehash the material in the papers. Instead, it will be used to highlight the important points and discuss some of the more interesting features. There will be as much as 10-15 hours of reading per week. Do not take this course unless you are willing and able to do a lot of reading.

Grading Policy

The class is graded on a rough curve. 40% of your grade will come from class participation, the other 60% will be based on scores on three in-class exams. SCPD students will be graded just on exams (and any homeworks).

Grading FAQ

• Q: Will SCPD and non-SCPD students be graded on the same exam curve?

  A: Yes.

• Q: Is class participation based solely on attendance?

  A: No. Attendance is a necessary but not sufficient condition for good class participation.

  As far as attendance is concerned, the general policy is that a student will automatically receive a deduction of one letter grade for missing more than 3 lectures. We will not take official roll during lecture, but because we make the effort to know everyone in the class we will notice if a student is frequently absent. If you are a non-SCPD student and have any concerns about not being able to regularly attend class (e.g., you will have to miss several classes during the quarter) please discuss this as soon as possible with the course staff.

  Beyond attendance, we evaluate class participation largely by observing how prepared students are to discuss the covered paper when they come to class. This is not a trivial requirement because we expect papers to have been read thoroughly prior to lecture.

Exams

There will be three exams. They will be open book (but not open laptop). The final exam is cumulative. Sample exams with solutions are available on sites from previous years.

Contacting the staff

For general questions please first post to the class newsgroup, su.class.cs240 --- if you have a question, other people probably have the same one (or should). All course announcements will be put on to the class web page. The news group is a good place to advertise for study groups, ask questions of other students, etc.

• ESS: Connecting to Stanford Newsgroups

Course Outline

This course makes no attempt to cover all the interesting topics in operating systems. Instead, we will cover a few topics in depth. The course is divided into the following general topic areas:

Virtual memory management

Discussions of virtual memory management implementations and recent work in virtual memory for multiprocessors, NUMA machines, large virtual address spaces, and other topics.

Synchronization and communication

Discussions of synchronization with an emphasis on monitors. Communication using remote procedure call.

File systems

Discussions of file system interfaces and disk storage management techniques.

Protection and security

Discussions of data security and authentication.

Extensions and fault tolerance

Discussions of mechanisms for implementing OS services at user level, OS structure and performance, reliability and availability of OS services.

History and experience

Historically important papers and experience reports by senior researchers in the field.

Tentative Reading List

There is no textbook for this course. The course is based on a collection of journal and conference papers that describe the history and state of the art in operating systems. Papers will be discussed in class in approximately the order that they appear on the reading list below. You must read the papers before class.

Class Websites from Previous Quarters

• Winter 2008
  
• Spring 2007
  
• Autumn 2006
  
• Spring 2006
  
• Autumn 2005
  
• Spring 2005
  
• Winter 2005
  

Webpage maintained by Adam Oliner