Class Notes

CSCI 490 - Distributed Computing.

• Description; This course is an introduction to the concepts and issues involved in designing parallel and distributed systems. The main emphasis is on network and Internet based distributed systems. Half of the course grade will be based on the class project; implementing a secure, redundent, distributed file system using FUSE under Linux (see handouts for more).
• When; 8:10 - 9:00am, MWF, Fall 2006.
• Where; McRey 317.
• Office Hours; by prior arrangement.
• Text; Distributed Systems: Concepts and Design, Edition 4, by George Coulouris, Jean Dollimore and Tim Kindberg.
• Course Syllabus.
• Homework Assignments;
  1. 9/1 - Project Plan Introduction
  2. 9/8 - Project Plan part 2: schedule & milestones
  3. 9/19 - Preliminary Design Document
  4. 10/2 - Mid-Term Exam.
  5. 10/12-10/15 - Fall Break
  6. 11/22-11/26 - Thanksgiving Break
  7. 12/4 - Final Design Document.
  8. 12/4-12/8 - Project Presentations.
• Lecture Slides;(note: slide chapter numbers are for 3rd edition text book)
  1. Distributed Architectures (Chpt. 2)
  2. Understanding RMI (Chpt. 5)
  3. Internet Protocols (Chpt. 3)
  4. Operating System Support (Chpt. 6)
  5. Security (Chpt. 7)
  6. Time and Clocks (Chpt. 10)
  7. Transactions and Concurrency Control (Chpt. 12)
  8. Distributed transactions (Chpt. 13)
  9. Distributed Multi-Media Systems (Chpt. 15)