15-744: Computer Networks Syllabus

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Textbooks

There are no official texts for the course. As background, we suggest several texts:

• Computer Networks: A Systems Approach, third edition, by Larry Peterson and Bruce Davie. It is available in the CMU Bookstore. Covers background networking material that we assume students will already be familiar with.
• Computer Networking: A Top-Down Approach Featuring the Internet, 3rd edition, by James F. Kurose and Keith W. Ross. Covers similar material to Peterson and Davie.
• TCP/IP Illustrated, Volume 1: The Protocols by W. Richard Stevens.
• Unix Network Programming: Networking APIs: Sockets and XTI (Volume 1) by W. Richard Stevens.
• Advanced Programming in the Unix Environment by W. Richard Stevens, Addison-Wesley, 1993.

Grading

Your final grade for the course will be based on the following weights:

• 35% Project
• 40% Midterm exam and final exam (closed book, in-class)
• 15% Homework
• 10% Class and Piazza discussions

The quizzes will be in-class, one near midterm and one near the end of the semester.

The project in 15-744 is an open-ended research project, done in groups of two. The project requires a proposal, a project status report, and a final report (both written and presented).

There will be a few problem sets assigned during the term that will constitute 15% of your grade. Problem sets will be a mix of theory and hands-on programming assignments.

Schedule

Date	Instructor	Topics	Notes	Readings	Reviewer
Part 1: Internetworking
Wed 01/18	SS	Intro: History and context and packet switching. [ppt]		How to read a paper	none
Fri 01/20	SS	Internetworking: Architectural principles, names, addresses [ppt]	Optional papers: CT90,Clark02	Design, Saltzer84	none
Mon 01/23	SS	Optional - routing background material review [ppt]			none
Part 2: Control Plane
Wed 01/25	SS	Interdomain Routing [pptx]	Optional reading: Stability,Vantage02,Neil03,Paul88	Gao2000, MITLec4Notes	none
Fri 01/27	SS	Project meetings			none
Mon 01/30	SS	Software Forwarding [ppt] [pptx2]	RouteBricks	Click(sections-1,2), OpenFlow(read-in-full)	Hun Namkung
Wed 02/01	SS	Travel			none
Fri 02/03	SS	SDNs [ppt] [pptx2]	Optional: Ethane RoadToSDN	4D(read-in-full), Onix(read-intro-only)	Vamshi Konagari
Part 2: Programmable Data Plane
Mon 02/06	SS	Router Design [ppt] [pdf2]	Optional reading: D+97 (the "Lulea" algorithm), BV01, EffiCuts	McK97(read-in-full), KCY03(read-intro-only)	Guoyao Feng
Wed 02/08	SS	Travel			none
Fri 02/10	SS	Programming the Network/Evolution [ppt] [pdf2]	FIA, ESM	ActiveNetworks(skim), P4	Pratik Fegade
Mon 02/13	SS	Middleboxes and NFV [ppt] [pptx2]	Optional: Aplomb	CoMb(read-in-full), NFV(skim-through)	Tiancheng Huang
Part 3: Resource Management
Wed 02/15	SS	Optional - transport background material review [ppt]			none
Fri 02/17	SS	End-to-End Congestion Control [ppt] [pptx2]	Optional papers: just read sec 1-3 in TFRC, RED BCCA01, CJ89, TCPModeling98.	VJ88(read-in-full), TFRC(read-intro-only)	Eric Hu
Mon 02/20	SS	Router-Based Resource Allocation [ppt]	Optional papers: CSFQ	WFQ(read-in-full), XCP(read-intro-only)	none
Part 4: Data Centers
Wed 02/22	SS	Data center topology/routing [pptx]	Optional: VL2, Google, Facebook	Portland(read-in-full)	none
Fri 02/24	SS	Data center scheduling [pptx] [pdf2]	Optional: pFabric, Hedera	C-through(skim), CoFlow(read-in-full)	Norman Ponte
Mon 02/27	SS	Data center transport [pptx] [pptx2]	Optional: Incast	DCTCP(read-in-full)	Daehyeok Kim
Wed 03/01	SS	No class - Open House			none
Fri 03/03	SS	Review/project meetings			none
Mon 03/06	SS	No class			none
Wed 03/08	SS	Exam 1			none
Fri 03/10	SS	No class - mid-semester break			none
Mon 03/13	SS	No class - mid-semester break			none
Wed 03/15	SS	No class - mid-semester break			none
Fri 03/17	SS	No class - mid-semester break			none
Part 5: Content Delivery
Mon 03/20	SS	Network Measurements [pptx]	See also Speed of Light Internet, HOT, Traffic Map		none
Wed 03/22	SS	Distributed Hash Tables, P2P [ppt] [odp2]	See also DHT Geometry Comparison paper, P2P	DHTSurvey(read), Chord(skim)	Gaurangi Saxena
Fri 03/24	SS	No class			none
Mon 03/27	SS	No class			none
Wed 03/29	SS	Data-oriented networking, BitTorrent [pptx] [pptx2]	Optional: DOT, DONA, DTN, BitTyrant	CCN(read), RE(skim)	Robert Maratos
Fri 03/31	SS	DNS, CDN [pptx] [pptx2]	Optional: end-user mapping, Early DNS, Measuring CDNs	EDNS(skim), CDNvsICN(read)	Devdeep Ray
Mon 04/03	SS	CDN and Video Streaming [pptx] [pdf2]	Optional papers: Akamai Live, C3, Video Survey, CongestionManager99	Akamai-CDN, Festive(first-2-sections)	Prashasthi Prabhakar
Part 6: Wireless
Wed 04/05	SS	Wireless Networks overview and architectures [ppt] [pptx2]	Optional: MACAW	CSMA(skim), BPSK97(skim)	Zhuoqun Chen
Fri 04/07	SS	Making the Best of Broadcast [pptx]	Optional: MORE, ExOR slides: ppt, pdf, Chaotic.	ExOR(skim), XorsInTheAir(skim), MIMO(read)	none
Mon 04/10	SS	Next Gen Wireless [pptx]	White Spaces SIGCOMM talk Slides: pptx, Optional reading: Roofnet	RFID(skim), WhiteSpaces(read)	none
Wed 04/12	SS	Project meetings			none
Part 7: Security
Fri 04/14	SS	Security: DDoS [pptx]	Optional: InferDDoS, DDoS_Taxonomy	AmplificationHell(skim)	none
Mon 04/17	SS	Security: NIDS and NIPS [ppt]	Optional: Honeycomb	Bro(read), Normalizer(skim)	none
Wed 04/19	SS	No class - travel			none
Part 8: Miscellaneous
Fri 04/21	SS	No class - Spring Carnival			none
Mon 04/24	SS	Privacy [pptx] [pdf2] [pptx2]	Optional: Infranet, PrivateMiddleboxes	APIP(read), Tor(skim)	Alexandra Snoy
Wed 04/26	SS	No class - travel			none
Fri 04/28	SS	No class - travel			none
Mon 05/01	SS	Project meetings			none
Wed 05/03	SS	more project meetings			none
Fri 05/05	SS	Exam 2			none
Mon 05/08	SS	Project writeups due			none