15 213 Introduction to Computer Systems Randal E Bryant and Greg Ganger Carnegie Mellon University Fall 2008 1 Organization Class Web Page http www cs cmu edu 213 Note Electronic copies of class handouts and lectures can be found on the class web page Class Message Board http autolab cs cmu edu Note This is the only message board that the 15 213 staff will be monitoring We will not be using Andrew or Blackboard message boards for this class Contacting Teaching Staff Send email to 15 213 staff cs cmu edu This will go to all of the teaching staff Note Please use 15 213 staff cs cmu edu for all questions and concerns rather than single person emails other than scheduling of one on one meetings You will get faster answers and we will better be able to provide consistency Instructors Randal E Bryant Randy Bryant cs cmu edu NSH 4305 x8 8821 Fri 3 30 4 30 NSH 4305 Greg Ganger ganger ece cmu edu CIC 2208 x8 1297 Thu 3 30 4 30 CIC 2208 TAs Taiyang Chen taiyangc andrew cmu edu Tues 6 30 7 30 WeH cluster Tessa Eng yeng andrew cmu edu Thurs 4 30 5 30 WeH cluster Elie Krevat ekrevat andrew cmu edu Wed 6 00 7 00 WeH 3108 Bryant Lee bryantl andrew cmu edu Mon 3 30 4 30 WeH 3108 Christopher Lu czl andrew cmu edu Sun 3 00 4 00 WeH cluster Swapnil Patil svp andrew cmu edu Mon 5 30 6 30 WeH 8203 Vijay Prakash vprakash andrew cmu edu Tues 4 00 5 00 WeH cluster Jiri Simsa jsimsa andrew cmu edu Wed 3 30 4 30 WeH 7205 1 Please see the class Web page for up to date office hours Course Assistant Cindy Chemsak NSH 4303 x8 7884 cindyc cs cmu edu Lecture Tuesday Thursday 1 30 2 50pm Doherty Hall 2210 Recitations A Mon 10 30 11 20 B Mon 10 30 11 20 C Mon 11 30 12 20 D Mon 12 30 1 20 E Mon 1 30 2 20 F Mon 1 30 2 20 G Mon 2 30 3 20 H Mon 3 30 4 20 SH 219 WEH 5312 SH 214 DH 1217 WEH 5310 WEH 5312 WEH 5310 DH 1112 Bryant Lee Vijay Prakash Swapnil Patil Tessa Eng Taiyang Chen Jiri Simsa Elie Krevat Christopher Lu 2 Objectives Our aim in 15 213 is to help you become a better programmer by teaching you the basic concepts underlying all computer systems We want you to learn what really happens when your programs run so that when things go wrong as they always do you will have the intellectual tools to solve the problem Why do you need to understand computer systems if you do all of your programming in high level languages In most of computer science we re pushed to make abstractions and stay within their frameworks But any abstraction ignores effects that can become critical As an analogy Newtonian mechanics ignores relativistic effects The Newtonian abstraction is completely appropriate for bodies moving at less than 0 1c but higher speeds require working at a greater level of detail Oversimplifying matters somewhat our 21x sequence works as follows 211 is based on a simplified model of program execution 212 builds further layers of abstraction 213 introduces greater detail about system behavior and operation This greater detail is needed for optimizing program performance for working within the finite memory and word size constraints of computers and for systems level programming The following realities are some of the major areas where the abstractions we teach in 211 212 break down 1 Int s are not integers Float s are not reals Our finite representations of numbers have significant limitations and because of these limitations we sometimes have to think in terms of bit level representations 2 You ve got to know assembly language Even if you never write programs in assembly The behavior of a program cannot be understood sometimes purely based on the abstraction of a high level language Further understanding the effects of bugs requires familiarity with the machine level model 2 3 Memory matters Computer memory is not unbounded It must be allocated and managed Memory referencing errors are especially pernicious An erroneous updating of one object can cause a change in some logically unrelated object Also the combination of caching and virtual memory provides the functionality of a uniform unbounded address space but not the performance 4 There is more to performance than asymptotic complexity Constant factors also matter There are systematic ways to evaluate and improve program performance 5 Computers do more than execute instructions They also need to get data in and out and they interact with other systems over networks By the end of the course you will understand these realities in some detail As a result you will be prepared to take any of the upper level systems classes at Carnegie Mellon both CS and ECE Even more important you will have learned skills and knowledge that will help you throughout your career 3 Textbook The primary textbook for the course is Randal E Bryant and David R O Hallaron Computer Systems A Programmer s Perspective Prentice Hall 2003 In addition we require you to have the following reference book on the C programming language Brian W Kernighan and Dennis M Ritchie The C Programming Language Second Edition Prentice Hall 1988 This is the classic K R book the standard against which all reference manuals are compared It is an essential part of every computer scientist s library 4 Course Organization Your participation in the course will involve five forms of activity 1 Attending the lectures 2 Preparing for and participating in the recitations 3 Laboratory assignments 4 Reading the text 5 Exams 3 Attendance will not be taken at the lectures or recitation sections You will be considered responsible for all material presented at the lectures and recitations Lectures will cover higher level concepts Recitations will be more applied covering important how to s especially in using tools that will help you do the labs In addition the recitations will help clarify lecture topics and describe exam coverage The textbook contains both practice problems within the chapter text and homework problems at the end of each chapter The intention is that you work on the practice problems right as you are reading the book The answers to these problems are at the end of each chapter Our experience has been that trying out the concepts on simple examples helps make the ideas more concrete In addition the schedule at the end of this document and on the class web page shows specific homework problems with each lecture topic The intention is that you try these out and discuss them in the next recitation You will find that you will get much more out of recitation if you have done some advance preparation The only
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