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Calendar

LEC # TOPICS KEY DATES
1 Course Overview. Synchronous Networks. Leader Election in Synchronous Ring Networks. Homework 1a handed out
2 Basic Computational Tasks in General Synchronous Networks: Leader Election. Breadth-First Search. Shortest Paths, Broadcast and Convergecast.
3 Spanning Trees. Minimum Spanning Trees. Homework 1b handed out
4 Fault-Tolerant Consensus Problems. Link Failures: The Two Generals problem. Process Failures (Stopping, Byzantine). Algorithms for Agreement with Stopping and Byzantine Failures. Exponential Information Gathering.
5 Number-Of-Processor Bounds for Byzantine Agreement. Weak Byzantine Agreement. Time Bounds for Consensus Problems. Homework 1 due
Deadline for choosing Basic or Advanced track, and for proposing a presentation topic.
Homework 2a handed out
6 Other Kinds of Consensus Problems: k-Agreement. Approximate Agreement. Distributed Commit.
7 Asynchronous Distributed Computing. Formal Modeling of Asynchronous Systems Using Interacting State Machines (I/O Automata). Proof Methods. Homework 2b handed out
8 Asynchronous Message-Passing Systems. Modeling Asynchronous Message-Passing Systems. Basic Computational Tasks in Asynchronous Networks. Leader Election. Breadth-First Search, Shortest Paths, Broadcast and Convergecast.
9 Spanning Trees in Asynchronous Networks. Minimum Spanning Trees. Homework 2 due
Homework 3a handed out
10 Synchronizers. Synchronizer Applications. Synchronous vs. Asynchronous Distributed Systems. Homework 3b handed out
11 Asynchronous Shared-Memory Systems. Modeling. The Mutual Exclusion Problem. Mutual Exclusion Algorithms.
12 More Mutual Exclusion Algorithms Homework 3 due
Homework 4a handed out
13 Bounds on Shared Memory for Mutual Exclusion. Resource Allocation. The Dining Philosophers Problem.
14 Impossibility of Consensus in Asynchronous Shared Memory Systems. Homework 4b handed out
15 Atomic Objects
16 Atomic Snapshot Algorithms. Atomic Read/Write Register Algorithms. Homework 4 due
Homework 5a handed out
17 Translations Between Asynchronous Network Model and Asynchronous Shared Memory Model. Impossibility of Consensus in Asynchronous Network Models. Failure Detectors. Consensus and Atomic Broadcast.
18 Time, Clocks, and the Ordering of Events. State-Machine Simulation. Applications. Homework 5b handed out
19 Stable Property Detection. Distributed Termination. Global Snapshots. Deadlock Detection.
20 Reliable Communication Using Unreliable Channels Homework 5 due
Deadline for first meeting about presentation.
Homework 6a handed out
21 Timing-Based Systems. Modeling and Verification.
22 Timing-Based Systems. Mutual Exclusion. Consensus.
23 Student Presentations. Topics To Be Announced. Homework 6b handed out
24 Student Presentations
25 Student Presentations Homework 6 due
26 Student Presentations