CSE 421/521 - Operating Systems

FAll’23

 

Instructor:

 

Prof. Tevfik Kosar

338J Davis Hall, 645-2323

        Email: tkosar@buffalo.edu

Office hours: Wed @ 10am - 12pm

 

Course Description:

 

CSE 421/521 is an introductory course on the design and implementation of operating systems. It will focus on different OS design techniques, process management, processor scheduling, concurrent programming, deadlocks and synchronization, memory management, file management and I/O systems, disk scheduling, protection and security, and distributed systems. The course will include hands-on programming projects on different OS components. (Prerequisites of this course: CSE 250, or an equivalent course, or permission of the instructor.)

 

Course Logistics:

 

Lecture time & location  : Tue, 5pm – 7:40pm (Knox 110)

Exam schedule                : Midterm 1: October 17th @5pm-6pm (Knox 110)

  Midterm 2: December 5th @5pm-6pm (Knox 110)

 

 Textbook: (Required)        

 

v Operating Systems Concepts (9th or 10th edition),

      by A. Silbershatz, P.B. Galvin, and G. Gayne. Wiley Publishers..

ISBN: 978-1-118-06333-0 

 

Recommended Supplementary Text: (Optional)

 

v The C Programming Language. By Kernighan and Ritchie. Prentice Hall, Second Edition, 1988, ISBN 0-13-110362-8.

 

v Advanced Programming in the UNIX Environment, by Richard Stevens. Addison Wesley Press, 1993, ISBN 0-201-56317-7.

 

Grading:

 

The end-of-semester grades for this course will be composed of:

 

v Pop Quizzes: 5%

v Homework: 5%

v Project-1: 20%  

v Project-2: 20%   

v Midterm-1: 25%

v Midterm-2: 25%

 

* There will be no formal attendance taken in the class. But, you are expected to attend the classes and actively contribute via asking and/or answering questions.

 

Pop Quizzes:

 

There may be pop quizzes at the beginning of some classes. The questions in the quizzes will come mostly from the material discussed in the previous lecture(s) or homework assignment(s). The quizzes will be very short (5-10 min) with one or  two questions aiming to test whether you have understood the most recently discussed material in the curse. There will be 5 pop quizzes throughout the semester. One with the lowest grade will be discarded, and the rest four will count towards your final degree.

 

Homework:

 

There will be four homework assignments throughout the semester. The format of the homework questions will be similar to the exercises at the end of each chapter in the Silberschatz book. The homework assignments aim to ensure that you read the textbook and study regularly for the material covered in the class.

 

Projects:

 

There will be two hands-on programming projects throughout the course. These projects will be based on “pintos” instructional OS developed at Stanford University and aim to teach implementation of some core Operating System components for better understanding of the concepts. These will be “team” projects and they will require strong programming background in C and UNIX programming experience.

 

Piazza Discussion Forum:

 

We will be using Piazza for class discussion. The system is highly catered to getting you help fast and efficiently from classmates, the TA, and myself. Rather than emailing questions to the teaching staff, I encourage you to post your questions on Piazza. Find our class page at: https://piazza.com/buffalo/fall2023/cse421521  

 

Course Schedule (Tentative):

 

This schedule is tentative and subject to change. Please check Piazza for lecture slides, and other course related documents.

 

Date

Lect.

Title

Notes

Aug 29

1

Introduction &

Operating System Structures

 

 

Sep 5

2

Processes & Threads

Project-1 out 

Sep 12

3

Project-1 Discussion &

CPU Scheduling - I

 

 

Sep 19

4

CPU Scheduling – II &

Process Synchronization - I

 

 

Sep 26

5

Process Synchronization – II & Deadlocks - I

 

 

Oct 3

6

Deadlocks – II

Midterm-I Review

 

Oct 10

 

FALL BREAK

 

Oct 17

7

MIDTERM-I EXAM           & Midterm-I Discussion 

@5pm, Knox 110

Oct 24

8

Main Memory – I &

Main Memory - II

Project-1 due

Oct 31

9

Project-2 Discussion &

Virtual Memory - I

Project-2 out

Nov 7

10

Virtual Memory – II &

File Systems - I

 

 

Nov 14

11

File Systems – II &

Mass Storage and I/O - I

 

 

Nov 21

12

Mass Storage and I/O – II &

Distributed Systems - I

 

 

Nov 28

13

Distributed Systems – II & Midterm-II Review

 

Dec 5

14

MIDTERM-II EXAM

@5pm, Knox 110

Dec 10

 

Project-2 due

 

Academic Integrity Policy:

 

UB’s definition of Academic Integrity in part is, “Students are responsible for the honest completion and representation of their work”. It is required as part of this course that you read and understand the departmental academic integrity policy located at the following URL: https://www.buffalo.edu/academic-integrity/policies.html

 

There is a very fine line separating conversation pertaining to concepts and academic dishonesty. You are allowed to converse about general concepts, but in no way are you allowed to share code or have one person do the work for others. If you are caught violating the academic integrity policy, you will minimally receive a ZERO in the course.

 

* PS: We are using professional software which can easily detect any cheating attempts in programming projects. The results generated by this software is considered as official evidence for cheating from another student, or from internet or any other resource.