George Mason University
Department of Computer Science

CS 471 - Operating Systems

Spring 2015

Instructor: Dr. Hakan Aydin

Description: This course covers the principles of operating systems theory and practice. Fundamental concepts such as processes, synchronization, scheduling, memory management, file systems and security will be presented.

Prerequisites: Grade of C or better in CS 310 and CS 367. The students should be fluent in C programming language in order to complete the course work, which includes substantial programming projects. Prerequisites will be strictly enforced.

Meeting Time and Location: Wednesday 4:30 - 7:10 PM, Art and Design Building Rm. 2003.

Course Outcomes: Upon completion of this course, the students should be able to:

Readings: Required Textbook: Operating System Concepts by Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne (9th Edition, John Wiley & Sons 2012, ISBN 978-1-118-06333-0).
Modern Operating Systems (3rd edition, Prentice Hall 2008, ISBN: 0-13-600663-9) by A. S. Tanenbaum is another good book on the principles of operating systems.

Instructor Office Hours: Monday 3:00 - 4:00 PM and by appointment (Office: Engineering Building, Rm. 5308)

Graduate Teaching Assistant (GTA): Rahul Goswami (rgoswam2@masonlive.gmu.edu)
GTA Office Hours: TBD

Topics:

Grading: Grading components will be as follows.

The students must achieve a total score of at least 90 (out of 100) to be considered for an A. No early midterm/final exams will be given and make-up exams are strongly discouraged.  A student should present an official and verifiable excuse to miss a midterm/final exam (such as a doctor's note). A total score less than 50 or a final exam score less than 40 will result in F.

All exams are closed book. The final exam will be cumulative; that is, it will include all topics discussed during the term. Unlike the midterm and final exams, the timing of the quizzes will not be announced in advance.

Late homework/assignment submissions will be marked down 25% for each day. The students are responsible for keeping back-ups of their work while they are working on an assignment.

All students must abide by the GMU Honor Code and CS Department's Honor Code and Academic Integrity Policies during the semester. The students are supposed to work individually on the assignments. Collaboration will be allowed only for the group assignments, within each group. We reserve the right to use automated tools such as MOSS to detect plagiarism. Violations of the Honor Code will result in an F. Those violations will be also reported to the GMU Honor Council.

Class Home Page: Throughout the term, all course material (announcements, slides, handouts, etc.) will be available on the GMU Blackboard system

Computer Accounts: All students should have accounts on the central Mason Unix system (mason.gmu.edu) and the VSE Unix cluster (aka zeus.ite.gmu.edu). Instructions and related links can be found here. Your programs will be tested and graded on mason and zeus servers. If you develop your programs on systems other than mason or zeus servers, it will be your responsibility to port them to one of these two systems before the submission deadlines.

Classroom Behavior: During the lectures, the students should avoid behavior that may distract others, including chatting, sleeping, playing games. The use of electronic devices (including laptops, tablets, cell phones, smartphones, etc.) is not allowed in this class. If you feel that your learning will be hampered by not having access to your tablet/laptop computer for note-taking or other course-related purpose, you should speak to the instructor at the beginning of the term.

Disability Statement: If you have a learning or physical difference that may affect your academic work, you will need to furnish appropriate documentation to GMU Disability Resource Center. If you qualify for accommodation, the DRC staff will give you a form detailing appropriate accommodations for your instructor. If you have such a condition, you must talk to the instructor during the first week of the term about the issue.