Operating Systems & Systems Administration
Operating Systems
Operating System Organisation models and structures
Process & Object Management kernel services, interrupt handlers, scheduling.
Interprocess Communication event handling, message passing, synchronous-asynchronous, shared memory
Concurrency and Synchronisation semaphores, critical regions, monitors, message passing, multi-threaded processes
Memory Management Organisation algorithms and policies, Virtual Memory Management
I/O Management Device driver design, Buffering and interrupt handling.
File & Persistent Object Management File organisation, directories and naming, index nodes, disk block management. Network & distributed file systems Protection and Security Models for secure computing, access control, capability based systems, access control lists
Networked Systems
Computer network architecture\'s and models Layered models, peer protocols, the ISO OSI model
Protocol Specification and Design Specfication techniques -FSM, layered protocols, error correction Connection vs connectionless protocols
Medium Access Control Protocols MAC techniques
Subnetworks and Internetworks network layer design, routing and switching, addressing and naming network topology
Transport Services TLIs
Network & Distributed Systems Management Security issues, fault, monitoring and accounting issues.
TCP/IP protocols IP layer, ICMP, ARP TCP socket programming Applications IPV4 and IPng Administering a TCP IP network
System Administration Specifying and installing an OS and network Initialise the system for user and applications Install devices, software packages and communication links Making the system secure, investigation of security strategies Instigation of system maintenance - backup, user control Document system and system modification.
Teaching and Learning Methods
For the most part the course will be delivered through practicals and lectures. The theoretical content will be covered in lectures. In the practical sessions students will gain understanding through designing and implementing system software components. For the systems administration part of the course the students will be divided into groups and be required to configure and manage a computer system and offer this computing service to the rest of the cohort.
An extended case-study, supported by focussed tutorials and practicals, will allow the students to follow through an example application from design to implementation, and appreciate the relevance of all the component parts of the module syllabus. Examples of case studies could be: creating a VPN (virtual private network) within the existing network, implementing a firewall/bastion host/proxy security strategy within the network, full automate the user account administration of the system.