COMP3300/COMP7303 – Operating Systems

LECTURE NOTES

ASSIGNMENTS
First assignment
Second assignment

TUTORIALS

CONTACT

email
comp3300@itee.uq.edu.au

Lecturer
Philip Machanick
<philip@itee.uq.edu.au>

Tutors
Timothy Brown <s4006402@student.uq.edu.au>
Richard Woon <woon@itee.uq.edu.au>

Feedback
SMS or anonymous web form

EXAM
closer to the end of semester look for the timetable on mySI-net

ITEE

This course or COMP2303?

A new course, COMP2303 Network and Operating Systems principles is available from semester 1, 2005 and is in Part A of the BInfTech list (“red”) course. COMP3300/7303 will run for the last time in its current form in semester 1, 2005. In 2006, it will be replaced by a course which takes COMP2303 as a prerequisite (probably coded COMP3301/7308).

COMP2303 and COMP3300 are incompatible. This creates a problem completing BInfTech under the 2005 plan in 2 cases:

• done COMP3300 already – you can count it as COMP2303. If you want to do the Networks&Systems major, you can substitute any other Part B (“blue” course) to replace COMP3300 in the major
• finishing in 2005 and not yet done COMP33300 – you may make the same substitution but you must pass COMP3300 because it will not be offered again

Otherwise, you must do COMP2303 and consider doing the replacement for COMP3300 in 2006.

Consultation time: Thursday 10:00-11:00 78-615 (other times by appointment)

Pre-exam consultation:

• 78-343 at 10:00 on 17 June 2005
• bring questions: I will not be driving the session

Assignment 2 solution is now available.

Assignment 2 Results are now available.

Output for another test case added for Assignment 2.

Results and a solution (with notes on marking) for Assignment 1 are available (except a few which have problems in determining the final mark), as is the question for Assignment 2. Small update to debugging information: 10 May 2005.

Feedback options added 7 March 2005 (use the web form for anonymous feedback; a reply can be sent to the SMS feedback).

Resources page updated 4 March 2005 (links checked, a few added).

The course profile for 2005 is available (small adjustment 2 March: the date for Monday of week 2 was wrong). You should be able to buy the 2005 lecture notes through pod.

The course newsgroup is archived at http://www.itee.uq.edu.au/cgi-bin/fetch?newsgroup=uq.itee.comp3300.

If assignments overall score less than 50%, calculation B below will be used instead of calculation A: this enables students without practical skills to use the examination to achieve a grade of at least a 5. Students who have achieved at least 50% averaged over both of their assignments will receive the maximum of calculation A and calculation B. While the grade from calculation B is purely based on the examination, this grade is not the sole assessment in the course because it is not possible to achieve a grade of 6 or 7 without passing the assignment component.

You must achieve at least 50% on the final exam to achieve a grade of 4 or higher.

Operating Systems is part of the Core defined as essential topics in a Computer Science curriculum in Curriculum 2001, the standard developed by the ACM and the IEEE Computer Society. This course is aimed at providing a reasonable balance of a broad survey of the field and in-depth knowledge. If you only need breadth, you will have the option of focusing on relatively conceptual questions. If you would like to explore the topic in more depth, alternative questions will test your ability to do systems programming in C.

SI-net has timetable details (including room allocations). Sign-up for tutorials must be done using SI-net.

COMP3300 is a 2 unit course, offered only at St Lucia in Semester 1. There are 3 one-hour lectures each week:
Monday at 12:00,  Tuesday at 9am,  Friday at 8am.

Questions? Direct them to comp3300@itee.uq.edu.au.

FAQ:
Q: Can I use the 7th edition of the textbook, rather than the 6th edition?
A: The 7th edition may be available when the course starts, but we are working from the 6th edition, because it was uncertain whether the 7th edition would be ready on time. So make sure you don’t get the 7th edition.

Q: Can I use the older 6th edition of the textbook, rather than the new 6th edition with added Windows XP coverage that is for sale in the bookshop?
A: Any version of the 6th edition is good; XP is only covered in one added chapter and the rest of the book is substantially unaltered. But do not get an earlier edition.

Q: I am not sure if I am interested in learning to code in C: will this course be OK for me?
A: C programming is an optional focus in the course. You need to follow the basic concepts and be able to explain C code, or write C-like pseudocode as your minimum exposure to systems programming. This year, assignments in C are optional, but you will have to do them to score a 5 or better overall on the course (if you score less than 50% on the assignments, your exam will be used as the sole assessment, and your final grade will be capped at 5). This gives you the option of spending less time on the course if you don't expect in any case to get a higher grade than a 5. The exam will have the option of answering a question requiring C knowlege but you will have another alternative.

Q: What if I get 51% for my assignments 65% for the exam? Wouldn’t I have been better off not doing the assignments as in that case the exam alone would have resulted in a grade of 5?
A: I will calculate the mark both ways and anyone who passed the assignments will get the maximum of the two calculations.

Q: What operating systems will we be covering?
A: Any which happen to illustrate the concepts. We will draw examples as far as possible from common systems (Windows NT and family, Mac OS X, Linux, Solaris) so as to maintain interest, but the focus of the course is on principles.

Q: Will detailed solutions to the tutorials be posted?
A: The tutorial questions are deliberately designed to be open-ended to promote discussion. Notes on how to address them will be posted. A focus on the notion that there is an answer is something you need to move away from as you get closer to graduating. In the real world, there is seldom a model answer and even if there was one, you are being paid to be the first to solve a problem, not to duplicate a piece of work someone else has done.

Q: Is there any problem if members of the class work out solutions to tutorial questions and share them?
A: No problem. Feel free to discuss them on the newsgroup. I will give feedback if I can keep up, most specifically if someone appears to be on the wrong track.

The Textbook
Operating System Concepts by Silberschatz, Galvin, & Gagne