CS 3650 - Computer Systems

Introduces the basic design of computing systems, computer operating systems, and assembly language using a RISC architecture. Describes caches and virtual memory. Covers the interface between assembly language and high-level languages, including call frames and pointers. Covers the use of system calls and systems programming to show the interaction with the operating system. Covers the basic structures of an operating system, including application interfaces, processes, threads, synchronization, interprocess communication, deadlock, memory management, file systems, and input/output control.

Resources

• MARS 4.5 - The MIPS simulator we'll be using.
• MARS Syscalls - Also the rest of the MARS docs.
• Operating Systems, Three Easy Pieces - Online text.
• Xv6 Unix Source - Another online "text".
• Prof Cooperman's Course Page - Lots of links to great resources.
• Linux / Unix help - How to use standard *nix tools.
• Nat's Lecture Notes - Probably confusing, but includes most code shown in class.

Challenge Project

Office Hours

Nat Tuck

WVH 314

Thursday, 2-4pm

ntuck ⚓ ccs.neu.edu

Textbook

Computer Organization and Design: The Hardware/Software Interface
Patterson & Hennessy
Fifth Edition

We'll also be using Operating Systems, Three Easy Pieces and the Xv6 Unix Source code, available online.

Work For This Class

Homework Assignments

Homework assignments will be available in the course subdirectory (/course/cs3650f16), accessible from your CCIS Linux account. Homework will be submitted using the submission scripts available on the CCIS servers.

Late homework may or may not be graded. If it is graded, you will lose 25% off your grade for that assignment. If it's not graded, you get a zero.

In-Class Participation

Questions will occasionally be asked in class of a random student. Answering these questions in class will contribute to a virtual "class participation" homework assignment.

Exams

We'll have two exams, a midterm and a final. These account for the majority of the grade. Exam topics may include anything we cover before the exam. The final will be cumulative.

Grading

Homework	30%
Midterm Exam	30%
Final Exam	40%

Schedule

Here's how the semester is likely to play out. Details subject to change.

Dates	Topics	Work Due
Sep 9	Introduction	Read: Ch 1, Ch 2.1-2.8
Sep 13 Sep 16	Assembly Language	Read: Ch 2.1-2.8, Appendix A.6, A.9, A.10 Read: Green Card HW1 (ASM1) Due
Sep 20 Sep 23	Pointers in C
Sep 27 Sep 30	More Assembly Symbol Tables	HW2 (C Ptrs) Due
Oct 4 Oct 7	UNIX Shell UNIX Syscalls: fork, exec, waitpid	Read: ostep.org: Ch 5, 14 HW3 (ASM2) Due
Oct 11 Oct 14	CPU Caches: Direct, Set Assoc, Fully Assoc	Read: Ch 5.3 - 5.4
Oct 18 Oct 21	More on Caches Python	Read: Python Tutorial HW4 (Shell) Due
Oct 25 Oct 28	Mid-Term Exam Virtual Memory	HW5 (Python) Due
Nov 1 Nov 4	MMU / TLB Unix Process Table	Read: Ch 5.7; ostep.org: Ch 15, 18, 19
Nov 8 No class Friday	Page Tables	Read: xv6 proc.h, proc.c, vm.c HW6 (Cache) Due
Nov 15 Nov 18	POSIX Threads	Read: ostep.org: Ch 26, 27.1, 27.2 HW7 (xv6) Due
Nov 22 No class Friday	Mutexes, Semaphores	Read: ostep.org: Ch 27.3, 28, 31
Nov 29 Dec 2	Cond Vars Solutions for Parallelism	ostep.org: Ch 30 HW8 (Threads) Due
Dec 6 Dec 9	Bonus Topic / Overflow Review
Dec 12 - 16	Final Exam

Policies

Collaboration & Sharing Code

• You must personally write the code you submit for assignments.
• If you see someone else's assignment code, you're both cheating.
• Discussion is encouraged, including discussing small snippets of code written on, e.g., a whiteboard.
• To be safe, avoid having disscussions in front of active computers.
• Cases of code plagarism (sharing / submitting other people's assignment code) will result in a 0 on the assignment and a report to OSCCR. A second offense will mean a 0 grade for the course.