COMP4430 Syllabus...

COMP4430 Operating Systems 2
Syllabus

Calendar Description

(Formerly 074.443) Design and implementation of modern operating systems. Detailed analysis of an open source modern operating system and hands-on experience with its kernel and major components. 3.000 Credit Hours.

Course Evaluation

There will be three to four assignments, a project, and a term test. Two assignments and the term test will be marked and returned before the voluntary withdrawal deadline (March 20, 2008). The mark breakdown is as follows:

    3-4 Assignments		50%
    Project			20%
    Term Test			30% 
    In-class Participation	 3%

The assignments will include programming and written work. All programming will be done in a UNIX environment. Assignments will be due at the dates and times specified on each. No late assignment will be accepted. The term test will be held in class on Monday, February 11th, 2008. Please be sure to be available for it.

Academic Dishonesty

Plagiarism on the assignments or any form of cheating during the examination is subject to serious academic penalty. If you are not sure what constitutes academic dishonesty consult section 7 of the general calendar academic regulations. We now have specific Faculty of Science regulations that you must follow. A signed honesty declaration must be included with an assignment for its mark to be counted towards your final grade. Note that this is a new Faculty of Science declaration-do not use the old Computer Science honesty declaration.

Course Outline

This is a senior level course that provides an in-depth examination of design and implementation of today's operating systems. An existing open source operating system, such as Linux or OpenBSD, as well as Windows Research Kernel, will be used throughout the term as case studies to discuss the implementation of major building blocks of today's operating systems. It is primarily targeted to students who are enthusiastic to learn about the design and implementation of operating systems as well as low level systems software. The "sand-box" lab (E2-438) will be used for dissecting the source code of the above mentioned operating systems and for assignments and projects. Topics to be covered include:

Overview of operating systems
Detailed examination of today's modern operating systems, (e.g., Linux, Windows, and Solaris)
Internals of a sample open source operating system
Kernel design and implementation: process management, scheduling, and synchronization
Advance topics:
- Device driver design and implementation
- File system implementation
- Design, implementation, and management of (dynamically) loadable OS components

Please note that the subjects listed above are intended to convey the general direction of the course. There will be some deviation from this outline in terms of the material to be covered, the order in which it is covered, and the time taken to cover it.