In this offering of the course, we will focus on two key topics: (1) how platform heterogeneity impacts the operating system and (2) Security and the OS (potential vulnerabilities of the OS, the impact of security requirements on the OS, and the OS features and mechanisms for enforcing security and privacy).
It is required that students are familiar with basic operating system concepts (processes, threads, synchronization, memory management, file systems) and the architectural (interrupts, atomic actions, etc.) and programming features (data structures such as lists, queues, hash tables, etc.) that underlie their implementation. This is equivalent to PSU courses CS201 and CS333, or CS532. We will NOT have time to cover basics, other than extremely short review. If you want to self-check your OS basics knowledge, you can see for example the free online textbook Three Easy Pieces.
This is a 500-level graduate class. Interested undergraduates may be admitted with consent of the instructor - however, be aware that this is a 3 CREDIT Graduate Class, there is no 4 credit undergraduate option. So please review the implications with your advisor before asking the instructor for permission to register.
Students not enrolled in the CS graduate program who have an undergraduate degree (BS or BA) in Computer Science are welcome to take this class with Instructor permission. Email the Professor with your undergraduate transcript (unofficial is fine) and a resume or brief description of your technical work history, if any.