CS 352 Spring 2002Handout #1 (C. Edmondson-Yurkanan)

CS352 Computer Systems Architecture

Course: CS352 - Computer Systems Architecture
Spring 2002
Unique Numbers: 51220 and 51225
Instructor: Chris Edmondson-Yurkanan
TAY 4.136;  phone: 471-9546; chris@cs.utexas.edu
Office Hours: MW 4:30 - 5:30
Teaching Assistants: Iqbal, Qasim (qasim@cs.utexas.edu);  TTH 4:30 - 5:30
Ozdal, Mustafa (ozdal@cs.utexas.edu);  TTH 11:15 - 12:15
Class Meetings: MWF 1p.m. and 2p.m., GEO 112 
Class Information: http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/dragon/cs352/spr2002/
news group:  utexas.class.cs352ey
Prerequisites: The following courses, with a grade of at least C: CS 307, CS 310, CS 315, CS 328, CS 336, M 408D, PHL 313K, EE 316; and knowledge of C++ or Java.
Course References: Required: Patterson & Hennessy, Computer Organization and Design, The Hardware/Software Interface, Morgan Kaufmann, 2nd Edition.  Errata for the book.

Background reference: Hennessy & Patterson, Computer Architecture, A Quantitative Approach, Morgan Kaufmann, 2nd Edition.  Errata sheet for the book.

Supplemental material will be made available over the course of the semester.  You are responsible for all material covered in lectures (that may not be in the text).
 
Course Objectives:
In this course, you will learn about the basic principles and current practices of computer architectures and organizations. At the end of this course, you will understand how computers are organized and what influences have determined the architectures of processors, memory systems, and input/output systems. You will also learn how to evaluate and improve computer system performance through analysis and computer simulation.

Student Evaluation:
Your performance in this class will be evaluated through assignments (both homeworks and a project), 2 midterms, and a final. The weights of each of these components is listed below:

Assignments will be given approximately every week-10 days and will usually be due at 2p.m. These will include paper/pencil analyses, experiments, using the SimpleScalar architecture tool, and a project.  Given the very small weight of each homework, each day late that a hmwk is turned in, will be -10% (no exceptions).  Late day penalties for the project will be spelled out in the assignment handout.  Every assignment also has a limit on the number of late days.

I will allow at most two students to work together on a homework (but not the project). You should each turn in your copy of the assignment, but include on the first page of the assignment, the name of the person that you worked with. However. if you rely too much on your classmate, it is very likely to lead to poor performance on the exams. THUS, I suggest the following: If you discuss the assignment with another student, then go do something distracting for 30 minutes, such as surf/email, and then write up your solution.

Other General Information:
The project and several of the homeworks will require use of the Department of Computer Sciences instructional UNIX computing resources. All CS students who meet the prerequisites for CS352 are eligible for a CS department PERMANENT UNIX account. If you do not already have one, then be sure to get one from the UTCS Account Request Page. (Note, the same page also can be used if you are NOT a CS major and need to get a departmental TEMPORARY account.)

Please do take advantage of the departmental online info: FAQs, Docs, etc regarding how to use the machines. You can use the Linux machines or the other Unix systems(running Solaris, Linux, HP-UX) in the TAY basement. And to login remotely to a domain name of a particular OS, read "man cshosts".) You may also want to invest in a good Unix reference book.