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Textbook: Readings in Database Systems 4th Edition edited by Hellerstein and Stonebraker. An additional suggested text is Gray and Reuter's Transaction Processing: Concepts and Techniques Prerequisites: The basic prerequisite is to pass the entrance exam in class. It will cover undergraduate operating systems material at the level of Berkeley's CS162, and will be pass/fail. It will not be difficult if you've had an undergraduate course, though you may need to "page in" the material. The test will have no effect on your grade; it is purely for admission, to ensure that everyone has a solid foundation, and in turn a high level of discussion. The test is on the second day of class, Thursday September 1. Exams, Papers, etc. The main work of this class is to read steadily and deeply, while working toward a group research project of publishable quality. Each student will be individually responsible for writing up a short summary of every paper. An example summary from a past year (written by a distinguished alumnus) is available for reference. There will be one midterm exam (albeit near the end), and no final exam. Research projects are a critical aspect of the course. You goal is to do some quality systems research; that is, to add to our understanding of how to build systems. Research projects must be written up in a term paper, and will be presented in a poster in a departmental mini-conference. Suggested project ideas will be provided by the instructors, but you are strongly encouraged to come up with your own project ideas. Potential projects include implementation or analysis of some piece of an OS, a DBMS, or an internet service; extending one of these systems with new functionality; or measurement and analysis of existing systems with the goal of better understanding issues in system design. |