ILI: Distributed Systems Laboratory

随着国家信息基础设施的出现，“真实的世界”中的计算环境变得越来越分散，这一领域已成为本科计算机科学课程的一部分。需要有实验室设施来支持这一领域的教学。该项目将建立一个专门的分布式计算教学实验室，由一台服务器和12个工作站通过高速ATM交换机连接。该系统模拟了学生在几年内可能在工作场所遇到的环境。除了现有的三门本科课程（网络I，操作系统I和网络科学与工程）之外，还将在常规课程中引入一门新课程（分布式系统介绍）。该领域的课程涵盖了分布式系统的大多数方面，从低级网络协议和编程（通常在数据包级别）到操作系统级别的系统编程，再到基于Web的分布式计算的应用程序级别。该设施将使一个面向实验室的方法来教授分布式计算和算法开发的理论和实践。与校园计算和工程计算网络提供的现有通用计算设施不同，我们建议的设施将为学生提供系统级的设备访问。这将使他们能够做实验，是不可能与通用计算设施，并允许教师创建示范教学大纲，将提供给其他机构。

As the computational environment in the "real world" becomes increasingly distributed with the advent of the National Information Infrastructure, this area has to become a part of the undergraduate computer science curriculum. There is a need to have laboratory facilities to support teaching in this area. This project will establish a dedicated laboratory for distributed computing instruction, consisting of one server and twelve workstations connected via a high-speed ATM switch. The proposed system mimics the environment that the students are likely to encounter in their workplaces in a few years. In addition to the existing three undergraduate courses in this area (Networking I, Operating Systems I, and Science and Engineering of the Web), a new course (Introduction to Distributed Systems) will be introduced in the regular curriculum. The courses in this area cover most aspects of distributed systems, from low-level network protocol and programming (often at the packet level) to system programming at the operating system level to the application level for web-based distributed computing. The facility will enable a laboratory-oriented approach to teaching the theory and practice of distributed computing and algorithm development. Unlike the existing general-use computing facilities provided by Campus Computing and Engineering Computing Network, our proposed facility will provide students system-level access to the equipment. This will enable them to do experiments that are not possible with general-purpose computing facilities, and allow instructors to create model syllabi that will be made available to other institutions.