34330 Execution Environments for Distributed Computing (EEDC), Spring 2009
Master in Computer Architecture, Networks and Systems (CANS)
Computer Architectura Department (AC), Technical University of Catalonia (UPC)
ECTS credits: 6

OFFICIAL COURSE DESCRIPTION : Guia docente” (Spanish)

OBJETIVOS:

El objetivo del curso es ofrecer una visión de los desarrollos y la investigación en los entornos de ejecución para sistemas paralelos y distribuidos. En el curso se hará especial énfasis en los entornos requeridos en las nuevas aplicaciones ebusiness y grid. Se estudiará la organización interna y la gestión que recursos requerida para garantizar funcionalidades y calidad de servicio.

CONTENIDOS: Distributed object technologies and protocols, Internal organization of middleware, Grid middleware, Middleware for eBusiness applications, Middleware Performance and Analysis, New Middleware Challenges: Autonomic Computing

METODOLOGÍA: Esta asignatura es avanzada y los conceptos básicos se suponen ya conocidos en asignaturas anteriores y está enfocada principalmente a introducir al estudiante en los conceptos más avanzados.

Con clases magistrales se introduciran los temas que se trabajarán sobre artículos recientes publicados en congresos o revistas especializadas y propuestas de proyectos en desarrollo. Los alumnos deberán realizar la lectura y discusión de estos artículos.
Los alumos realizaran un trabajo personal y presentaran un tema de investigación relacionado con la asignatura. El estudiante tendrá que desarrollar su capacidad crítica para evaluar la adecuación de las soluciones presentadas o, en su caso, proponer posibles ideas.

De las 150 horas de trabajo, la distribución será:

· 60 horas (4 horas semana, 15 semanas) de clase presencial. Estas 60 horas se distribuirán en clase magistrales, trabajos, casos de estudio y debate de artículos de investigación y presentación de trabajos
· 90 horas de trabajo no presencial: lectura de artículos de investigación, realización de trabajos, preparación de las presentaciones y estudio.

EVALUACIÓN:

La evaluación se basará en

(a) la participación en las discusiones,
(b) entrega de los trabajos propuestos y
(c) en un trabajo final individual o por grupos

INSTRUCTOR

Jordi Torres
Phone: +34 93 401 7223
Email : torres@ac.upc.edu
Office : Campus Nord, Modul C6. Room 217.
Lecture and meeting times: Wednesday and Thursday from 5pm to 7pm.
Classroom: to be announced
Office hours: By appointment.

COURSE DESCRIPTION:

Nowadays, business and scientific organisations have a large amount of critical workflow processes that depend upon a set of heterogeneous applications. This set of applications can range from transactional applications, with databases, to non interactive applications such as those that perform scientific CPU-intensive computing, document indexing or intensive I/O. To efficiently execute all these kinds of applications, a new execution environment (or middleware) is needed to manage the available resources and simplify the development and integration of the different types of applications and services. These middleware components are crucial to new systems and architectures because of their direct impact on the quality of the service offered by the application.

This course provides an overview of the wide scope of this area and introduces past and current research focusing on conceptual and practical aspects of  Distributed object technologies and protocols, Internal organization of middleware, Grid middleware, Middleware for eBusiness applications, Middleware Performance and Analysis,  and the new Middleware Challenges as Autonomic Computing.

The course also has the objective of introducing the student to research. In general the EEDC course is focused on developing skills rather than content. For this reason each year we focus the course on some of the dichotomies which come to mind when looking at the strategies available to deal with concrete problems in the wider EEDC space and in relation to some problem of the utmost relevance. This year’s special focus is on the green computing.

Based on the previous concepts there will be paper readings assigned for some of the classes. This is an important part of the course and it is required that each student read these before coming to class. We will have two main reading parts in the course, one for general papers and one for more in depth research in the area (related with the research project). Discussions will be led by one or more students and may include a brief presentation of the paper.

All students taking the course are required to complete a research project (or “state-of-the-field” review). The project is intended to provide the student with an opportunity to gain experience with research in a topic related to the content of the course. Moreover we will introduce the student to the research information resources.

Finally we will learn how a research conference is organized. The students will be involved in the organization committees of the Third Workshop on Execution Environments for Distributed Computing (EEDC 2009). All the research projects will be presented at this conference after a standard review process. Finally all the projects will be published as a book chapter in a book published by UPC.

LEARNING OUTCOMES:

On completion of this course you will be able to:

• Students will have a solid understanding of the concepts used in the course. This understanding will provide them with the foundation necessary to be able to pursue further learning on their own.
• Students will be an expert in this important area of computer science that support current internet world.
• Students will have an understanding of the impact of computers in society.
• Students will gain experience to orally communicate ideas and concepts clearly and in an organized manner.
• Students will gain experience to write research reports and books.
• This course will help students to be prepared to enter the scientific computation community in academia or in industry.

COURSE OUTLINE:

Soon more information

MODULE 1- MIDDLEWARE BASICS

MODULE 2- TODAY SCENARIO: CLOUD COMPUTING

MODULE 3- TOPICAL FOCUS: GREEN COMPUTING

GRADING POLICY:

Paper Readings/Presentations: 35%

• Basic papers: 15%
• Research papers: 20%

Research Project: 35%

• Research survey content and writing 25%
• Presentation of the workshop paper 10%

Participation: 30%

• Conference organization and book edition participation 10%
• Class Participation in paper discussions 10%
• Homework 10%

TENTATIVE SCHEDULE:

To be announced

COURSE MATERIAL:

To be announced

COMMENTS:

Basic papers: Reading/Presentation/Class discussion

It is required that each student read the papers assigned in class. You will also have to submit (by midnight the deadline day) a report/presentation about the readings with the main contributions of the papers. Additionally each paper will be presented at the class (with ppt or equivalent) by one group and discussed by the students (the choice will be random). Some suggestions to the content of your class presentation and discussionideas for the presentation of the basic papers will be explained in class.

List of papers: To be announced

Key dates: To be announced

How to read a paper?

S.Keshav. ACM SIGCOMM Computer Communication Review 83 Volume 37, Number 3, July 2007. http://www.sigcomm.org/ccr/drupal/files/p83-keshavA.pdf

Research Paper: Reading/Presentation/Class discussion:

Soon more information.

List of papers: To Be announced . Some suggestions to the content of your class presentation and discussionideas for the presentation could be found here.

Key dates: To Be announced

EEDC’09 Workshop:

Third Workshop on Execution Environments for Distributed Computing (EEDC 2009), june 2009.

Soon more information.

Book:

Soon more information.

Previous edition EEDC’08:

“CLOUD COMPUTING: Execution Environments for Distributed Computation Issues”. J. Torres, I. Goiri and M. Macias Editors. Lulu.com publisher, 2008. ISBN: 978-1-4092-1787-9. http://www.lulu.com/content/3077784

FURTHER INFORMATION:

The instructor will send you messages to Raco FIB to inform you of any news or changes as the course progresses and post the information concerning our classes, extra teaching material, internet resources, etc.

Barcelona, located at the Mediterranean sea in the very north of the Spanish coast, is certainly the most cosmopolitan and economically most active city in Spain. Barcelona is the capital of Catalonia with a 7 millions of population. It has always proved its will to be modern, to follow the latest international tendencies or be ahead of them. To the tourist this is evident specially in its architecture, which so well reflects the general approach to life in this always pulsating city.

Since its foundation over 2000 years ago, the city has served as been the traditional gateway of Spain. Romans, Arabs and Christians have all passed through, leaving their distinct mark on the city. The visitor will gain a sense of Barcelona’s history simply by walking through the city, whether roaming the streets of the Gothic Quarter, built on the original Roman site or the Modernist Eixample district that is illuminated by the exuberant architecture of Antoni Gaudí.

Such diversity and harmony also flourishes in the character of Barcelona’s citizens. Enterprising and hard-working, they also possess a hedonistic streak along with strong civic pride and a love for culture. These traits have made Barcelona into a first-class tourist destination and the perfect setting for meetings and congresses. This open, welcoming city which hosted the Olympic Games in 1992 is now focusing all its energies on another global project: the Universal Forum of Cultures, which is being held in 2004 and will enable the city to complete its seafront area.

Barcelona enjoys a mild climate and an average annual temperature of 17 degrees Celsius. The sun shines on most days of the year and the Mediterranean brings cooling sea breezes to the city and moisture to the atmosphere. Rainfall is light, except during the few rainy months of the year, and needless to say, it rarely snows. Even the lowest temperatures are relatively mild. At June, one can expect temperatures of approximately 25 degrees Celsius.

UPC Information: http://www.upc.edu/eng/practical_info

Information on Barcelona: http://www.bcn.es/turisme/english/turisme

Information on surroundings: http://www.gencat.net/turistex_nou/home_ang.htm

A good reason to visit us: EUROPE’S COOLEST CITIES: Barcelona’s Sense and Sensuality. By Helene Zuber, (from SPIEGEL Online International) http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/0,1518,502312,00.html .

Technical University of Catalonia:

Jordi Torres
UPC, Campus Nord, Modul C6 - 217
C/ Jordi Girona, 1-3. E-08034 Barcelona (Spain)

Phone: (+34) 93 401 7223
email: torres (at) ac.upc.edu

Barcelona Supercomputing Center:

Jordi Torres
BSC-CNS. Nexus II Building
c/ Jordi Girona, 29
08034 Barcelona (Spain)

Phone: (+34) 93 413 7716
Fax: (+34) 93 413 77 21
email: jordi.torres (at) bsc.es

Spype: Jordi.Torres

Facebook: http://es-es.facebook.com/people/Jordi-Torres/538908279

LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/jorditorresvinyals

.Tel: JordiTorres.tel

Google Maps: http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&hl=en&q=41.39+++2.113&layer=&ie=UTF8&z=12&om=1

How to reach my office: My office is in Campus Nord of UPC:

UPC Campus Nord, Modul C6-217
Jordi Girona 1-3
E-08034 Barcelona ( taxi map)

This is located at the Northwest end of Barcelona, not far from Diagonal avenue.

By Plane:

Barcelona airport is at 12 Km from the city. More information about Barcelona’s airport: www.aena.es. You can arrive with a taxi. In front of every terminal you will find a taxi stand. If they are available, they will show a green light with the text LIBRE or LLIURE (it means “available”). The approximate travel price to UPC campus Nord is around 35 €. Show this google map to the taxi driver to reach the UPC campus.

If you rent a car from the airport, please leave “El Prat del Llobregat” and take C-32B. Continue along this route and head towards Ronda de Dalt / Lleida / Girona. Close to Barcelona, take route C-32 passing close to Cornellà del Llobregat and L’Hospitalet. Take B-20 and take Exit 10 called “Carretera d’Esplugues”. Take the street called “carrer del Gran Capità” and turn left towards Sor Eulàlia d’Anzizu street (See this google map).

From downtown:

The most convenient access is by metro:

• Get on Line 3 (green color), direction Zona Universitària. Exit at the last-but-one stop, Palau Reial. This takes 20-25 minutes from the center (e.g., Plaça Catalunya stop).
• At the platform, it doesn’t matter whether you take the front or back exit. But after you pass the ticket counters, make sure you walk to the farthest exit, then left.
• Make a right on the corner of the Palau Reial palace, walk uphill along its plain-looking wall, cross the street. Walk over to the c6 building . Total walking time is 8-10 minutes.
• My office is 217 in floor 2.
• The Zona Universitària metro stop is almost as close. If you like buses better, final stops of lines 7, 33, and 54 are also nearby.
• Hopefully the map above makes it clear.

Also you could take a taxi. Show this google map location to the taxi driver to reach the UPC campus.

My phone again, just in case: (+34) 93 401 7223.

General:

Please visit my post Welcome to Barcelona.