CSCI 555L/655: Advanced Operating Systems
Units: 4.0
Spring 2024 MW 2:00-3:50pm
Location: VPD 112
Instructor: Harsha V. Madhyastha
Office: SAL 326
Office Hours: TBD
Contact Info: Post privately on Piazza to contact the instructor
Course Description
The process of developing a new software system – a cloud-hosted web service, a multi-threaded
smartphone application, a key-value store, etc. – rarely involves invention of new techniques. Instead, any
system design is typically based on a careful combination of well-known techniques, taking into account the
constraints and objectives of the system’s target workload and the environment in which the system will be
developed. In this course, first-year graduate students will learn the common techniques used to make a
system reliable and performant at scale. In every lecture, we will discuss 1-2 research papers, distill the
techniques used in those systems, understand the authors’ motivations in choosing to use those
techniques, and discuss the applicability of those techniques in other settings. In groups of 2, every student
will lead the discussion for one of these papers over the course of the semester. Students will also conduct
a semester-long project in which they will implement and evaluate a prototype system in groups of 2-3.
Learning Objectives
By the end of this course, students will have gained experience with
- techniques for dealing with failures caused by concurrency bugs, power outages, hardware
corruption, etc.
- techniques for optimizing latency and throughput in a variety of settings
- techniques for enabling a system to scale to a large number of users, data items, computers, etc.
- reading and distilling a research paper in the area of computer systems
- presenting the findings of a research paper in the area of computer systems
- implementing some of the techniques learned in an example prototype system
Recommended Preparation
Students are expected to have completed an undergraduate course on operating systems, and have a basic
understanding of concurrency using threads, virtual memory management using paging and segmentation,
and data storage using file systems.
Course Notes
Students enrolled in this course will receive a letter grade.
All lectures will be recorded to enable students to review the lectures, but not to use as a substitute for
attending lecture.
Lecture slides and recordings will be posted on a website dedicated for this course.
Piazza will be used for announcements and course discussions.
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Readings and Supplementary Materials
There is no textbook for this course.
For every lecture, 1 or 2 research papers will be posted on the course website, which students are required
to read before coming to class.
Project
Students will work in groups of two or three on a semester-long project of their choice. There will be four
milestones:
- Week 3: Form a group and pick a topic for your project
- Week 6: Submit two-page project proposal
- Week 10: Submit five-page intermediate project report
- Week 15: Present project outcomes in class and submit ten-page final project report
The project counts for 40% of your final grade.
To help students pick a project, at the start of the semester, the instructor will discuss strategies for
choosing a project topic. Examples include a measurement-based characterization of a deployed or open-
source system, the development of a new software system, or reproducing results from the evaluation
section of a published paper.
Project Groups
Declare the membership of your project group by the third week of the semester. After this date, we will
form groups from the remaining students. Choose your group members carefully. You should discuss topics
such as prior experience, course background, goals for this course, workload and schedule for this
semester, and preferred project management and work style. Make sure you can find several blocks of time
during the week to meet to discuss or carry out the project.
Students are expected to work diligently in their group for the benefit of the entire group. All group
members should be familiar with all aspects of each project, irrespective of their role on the project. We
expect all group members to contribute their fair share, and we expect to assign the same project grade to
all members of a group. Members who either contribute less than their share or prevent others from
contributing their share may receive a lower grade on the project; non-contributing members will receive
a zero. In case of disputes regarding contribution, the instructor may interview group members and inspect
commits to any code repository used by the group. Commits to the repository should reflect the proportion
of work performed by each group member. If you use pair programming, take turns at the keyboard so that
the commit log reflects the contributions of all members.
Students may be fired from a group by the remaining members. The procedure for this is as follows: (1)
documented "gentle warning" of risk of firing via both e-mail and private Piazza post (with instructor
included on both), with cause and specific work required to remain in group; (2) allow at least 72 hours for
compliance; (3) if the problems persist, e-mail statement of firing to the group and post privately to the
instructors via Piazza. Fired group members may join another group; students who cannot find a group
must complete a project by themselves.
Managing group dynamics and using each group member's time and talents effectively can be difficult. If
there are problems with your group, please see an instructor as soon as possible. Be open and candid with
your group about potential problems early on so your group can plan around those problems and not fall
behind. A sure way to make your group upset at you is not finishing your work at an agreed-upon deadline
and not informing them about the problems early enough for them to help. Similarly, it is not okay to try to
do all of your group's work on a project by yourself, rather than in collaboration with your group.
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Avoid doing all the work on the project in group programming sessions. Usually someone on a team is
faster than the others, and that student will figure out the solution to most problems. A better approach is
to end every group session with a set of problems that need to be solved. Every team member can then
outline the solutions to these problems individually on their own time. The group can collaboratively work
out the details at the next meeting.
Quizzes
There will be three in-class quizzes over the course of the semester. There will be no midterm or final exam.
The dates for all quizzes will be announced in the first lecture.
If you miss a quiz for reasons other than a documented medical or personal emergency, you will receive a
zero for that quiz. Quiz dates are given at the beginning of the semester so you can avoid scheduling job
interviews or other commitments on those days. Outside commitments are not considered a valid reason
for missing a quiz.
Grading Timeline
Scores for every quiz will be released roughly a week after the day the quiz is conducted.
Classroom Norms
Lectures will make heavy use of in-class discussions. Students are expected to come to class having read the
papers assigned for the class and actively participate in in-class discussions. We ask that all students treat
each other with respect.
Attendance and Participation
Students are expected to attend every lecture in-person. Class participation will count towards 20% of a
student’s grade.
In pairs of two, every student will be in charge of leading the in-class discussion of one paper over the
course of the semester. The instructor will work with students to help them prepare for their in-class
presentation. This will count for 10% of every student’s final grade.
Reading List
The following is a tentative list of the papers that we will discuss over the course of the semester.
How to read and evaluate papers?
• How to Read a Paper (pdf)
• An Evaluation of the Ninth SOSP Submissions or How (and How Not) to Write a Good Systems
Paper (pdf)
Reliability
• RAID: High-Performance, Reliable Secondary Storage (pdf)
• Disconnected operation in the Coda file system (pdf)
• An Analysis of Data Corruption in the Storage Stack (pdf)
• The Episode File System (pdf)
• Reimplementing the Cedar File System Using Logging and Group Commit (pdf)
• Cores that don't count (pdf)
• Eraser: A Dynamic Data Race Detector for Multithreaded Programs (pdf)
• Improving the Reliability of Commodity Operating Systems (pdf)
Performance
• Caching in the Sprite Network File System (pdf)
• Speculative Execution in a Distributed File System (pdf)
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• Outatime: Using Speculation to Enable Low-Latency Continuous Interaction for Mobile Cloud
Gaming (pdf)
• Rethink the sync (pdf)
• The design and implementation of a log-structured file system (pdf)
• Better I/O Through Byte-Addressable, Persistent Memory (pdf)
• Coz: Finding Code that Counts with Causal Profiling (pdf)
• Horcrux: Automatic JavaScript Parallelism for Resource-Efficient Web Computation (pdf)
Other considerations
• Difference engine: Harnessing memory redundancy in virtual machines (pdf)
• A study of practical deduplication (pdf)
• The multikernel: A new OS architecture for scalable multicore systems (pdf)
• Energy-aware adaptation for mobile applications (pdf)
• Shielding Applications from an Untrusted Cloud with Haven (pdf)
Distributed Systems
• Implementing fault-tolerant services using the state machine approach: A tutorial (pdf)
• Improving MapReduce performance in heterogeneous environments (pdf)
• Cluster-based scalable network services (pdf)
• Efficient Memory Disaggregation with Infiniswap (pdf)
• Chord: A scalable peer-to-peer lookup service for internet applications (pdf)
Lessons
• Hints for computer system design (pdf)
• On system design (pdf)
Grading Breakdown
Table 1 Grading Breakdown
Assessment Tool (assignments)
Points
% of Grade
Project
40%
Quizzes
30%
Paper presentation
10%
Class participation
20%
TOTAL
100%
Final letter grades will be determined using a "modified" curve. We will assign grades of C and BELOW to
individuals who do not perform satisfactorily (i.e., you should not assume that because this is a graduate
class you will get a B or even B- if you perform unsatisfactorily). We will not assign incompletes unless it is
for a documented medical reason (in accordance with USC policy).
PhD students enrolled in CSCI 655 will be required to do some additional work compared to those enrolled
in CSCI 555L. Specifically, they will be asked to submit a review of a research paper in the area of computer
systems that is not discussed in class. This review will be considered as equivalent to a fourth quiz and
account for a quarter of the 30% grade contribution assigned to quizzes.
Academic Integrity
The University of Southern California is foremost a learning community committed to fostering successful
scholars and researchers dedicated to the pursuit of knowledge and the transmission of ideas. Academic
misconduct is in contrast to the university’s mission to educate students through a broad array of first-rank
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academic, professional, and extracurricular programs and includes any act of dishonesty in the submission
of academic work (either in draft or final form).
This course will follow the expectations for academic integrity as stated in the USC Student Handbook. All
students are expected to submit assignments that are original work and prepared specifically for the
course/section in this academic term. You may not submit work written by others or “recycle” work
prepared for other courses without obtaining written permission from the instructor(s). Students suspected
of engaging in academic misconduct will be reported to the Office of Academic Integrity.
Other violations of academic misconduct include, but are not limited to, cheating, plagiarism, fabrication
(e.g., falsifying data), knowingly assisting others in acts of academic dishonesty, and any act that gains or is
intended to gain an unfair academic advantage.
The impact of academic dishonesty is far-reaching and is considered a serious offense against the university
and could result in outcomes such as failure on the assignment, failure in the course, suspension, or even
expulsion from the university.
For more information about academic integrity see the student handbook or the Office of Academic
Integrity’s website, and university policies on Research and Scholarship Misconduct.
We encourage students to help each other learn the course material. As in most courses, there is a
boundary separating these two situations. You may give or receive help on concepts covered in lecture or
discussion and on the specifics of Go syntax. You may consult with other students to help you understand
the project specification (i.e., the problem definition). However, you may not collaborate in any way when
constructing your solution; the solution to the project must be generated by you or your group working
alone. Any misrepresentation of another person's work as your own is unacceptable and is a violation of the
honor code. You are not allowed to work out the programming details of the problems with anyone or to
collaborate to the extent that your programs are identifiably similar. You are not allowed to look at or in
any way derive advantage from solutions or code that you did not write.
If you have any questions as to what constitutes unacceptable collaboration, please talk with the instructor.
You are expected to take reasonable precautions to protect your work. You may not post your work in a
publicly accessible location, such as public code repositories. Don't let other students borrow your account
or computer; don't leave your program in a publicly accessible directory; and don't discard printouts in a
public place.
If found responsible for an academic violation, students may be assigned university outcomes, such as
suspension or expulsion from the university, and grade penalties, such as an “F” grade on the assignment,
exam, and/or in the course.
Course Content Distribution and Synchronous Session Recordings Policies
USC has policies that prohibit recording and distribution of any synchronous and asynchronous course
content outside of the learning environment.
Recording a university class without the express permission of the instructor and announcement to the
class, or unless conducted pursuant to an Office of Student Accessibility Services (OSAS) accommodation.
Recording can inhibit free discussion in the future, and thus infringe on the academic freedom of other
students as well as the instructor. (Living our Unifying Values: The USC Student Handbook, page 13).
Distribution or use of notes, recordings, exams, or other intellectual property, based on university classes or
lectures without the express permission of the instructor for purposes other than individual or group study.
This includes but is not limited to providing materials for distribution by services publishing course
materials. This restriction on unauthorized use also applies to all information, which had been distributed to
students or in any way had been displayed for use in relationship to the class, whether obtained in class, via
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email, on the internet, or via any other media. (Living our Unifying Values: The USC Student Handbook, page
13).
Students and Disability Accommodations
USC welcomes students with disabilities into all of the University’s educational programs. The Office of
Student Accessibility Services (OSAS) is responsible for the determination of appropriate accommodations
for students who encounter disability-related barriers. Once a student has completed the OSAS process
(registration, initial appointment, and submitted documentation) and accommodations are determined to
be reasonable and appropriate, a Letter of Accommodation (LOA) will be available to generate for each
course. The LOA must be given to each course instructor by the student and followed up with a discussion.
This should be done as early in the semester as possible as accommodations are not retroactive. More
information can be found at osas.usc.edu. You may contact OSAS at (213) 740-0776 or via email at
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The Office of Student Accessibility Services (OSAS) - (213) 740-0776
OSAS ensures equal access for students with disabilities through providing academic accommodations and
auxiliary aids in accordance with federal laws and university policy.
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A safe and confidential place to share your USC-related issues with a University Ombuds who will work with
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