CS 454/654 Distributed Systems

Information

Instructor: Bernard Wong

Email: bernard@uwaterloo.ca

Outline: Grading scheme and class policies

Time: Every Tuesday and Thursday at 2:30-3:50

Midterm: Thursday February 16 2:30-3:50 MC 2017

Office hours:

Bernard: 4:00-5:00 Mondays and Thursdays DC 3514

(additional office hours from 2:00-4:00 on 3/11, and 5:00-6:00 on 3/7, 3/9, 3/13 and 3/14)

(additional office hours from 1:00-2:00 and 4:00-5:00 on 4/10)

Prima (pchairun at uwaterloo dot ca): 1:00-2:00 Tuesdays DC 3552

(not available on 4/10. Additional office hours from 11:00 to 12:00 on 4/11)

Rakibul: TBD

Location: MC 2017

URL : http://www.cs.uwaterloo.ca/~bernard/cs454

Description

This course provides an introduction to the fundamentals of distributed computer systems, assuming the availability of facilities for data transmission. The structure of distributed systems using multiple levels of software is emphasized.

Announcements

• Solution for assignment 3 is available
• Slides from the review session are now available PDF
• Review session is April 5 at 2:30 PM in MC 2017. Room assignment is still tentative; I will update once I get final confirmation from the school.
• Assignment 3 updated (I've changed Nr to 3 in question 5b to make the question less ambiguous regarding which neighbors to use)
• Assignment 3 is now available
• Assignment 2 has been updated to reflect the new due date (March 15th).
• Assignment 2 has been updated to include submission instructions.
• Assignment 2 has been updated to address an oversight in the IDL.
• Tutorial for setting up Apache Thrift is now available
• Sample code for assignment 2 is now available.
• Solutions for assignment 1 is available
• Assignment 2 is now available
• Sample midterm with solutions is available

Assignment

Assignment 1 and 3 are to be completed individually.

Due Date	Assignment
1/31	1: PDF (a copy of the textbook questions is available here)
3/12	2: PDF (updated 3/8) IDL Sample Framework Thrift Tutorial (updated 2/21)
3/29	3: PDF (updated 3/22)

Lecture Slides

Date	Slides	Topic	Reading
1/3	PDF	Introduction.	1-1.2.3, 1.3-1.3.1
1/5	PDF	Architectures and Models	2-2.2.3
1/10	PDF (Updated 1/18)	Computer Networks	4-4.1.1
1/12	PDF (Updated 1/18)	Distributed Objects & Remote Invocation	4.1.2-4.3.2, 10-10.1.1, 10.3.3-10.3.4
1/19	PDF	Distributed Naming	5-5.2.3, 5.3-5.3.4, 5.4
1/24	PDF	Distributed Filesystems	11-11.1.1, 11.2-11.4.1, 11.5-11.5.2, 11.6-11.6.2
1/31	PDF (Updated 3/1)	Synchronization	6.1, 6.1.3 (omit subsection on wireless networks), 6.2-6.2.2, 6.3 (omit 6.3.3), 6.5-6.5.1
	PDF (Updated 3/6/2012)	Replication	7-7.2, 7.2.2 (omit subsections on causal consistency, grouping operations, and consistency versus coherence), 7.3-7.4.3, 7.5.2-7.5.3, 7.5.5.
	PDF (Updated 3/22 4PM)	Fault Tolerance	8-8.2.4, 8.3-8.3.2 (this was actually covered in the Distributed Objects & Remote Invocation section), 8.5-8.5.2
	PDF (Updated 3/29)	Security	9-9.1.1 (omit Globus example), 9.1.2-9.2.2 (skim over the details of DES, RSA, and MD5), 9.3-9.3.2, 9.3.4, 9.4-9.4.1

Last modified: March 8, 2012