IMPLICIT STUDENT AGREEMENT

By registering for this course, each student agrees to the following items: 

ALL work turned in on projects, homework assignments and exams will be that of the individual student. It is often productive to study with other students. However, if any portions of these are found to be shared between two (or more) students, there will be zero credit given to all students concerned and all students will be disciplined. This policy is in the interest of those students who do their own work, which hopefully applies to all of you in this class. Depending on the size of the class, there may be the possibility of group projects for the term project. This will be determined on a case-by-case basis. In the case of group projects, it will be the responsibility of each student to demonstrate which part of the project was completed by them.
It is the students responsibility to get their assignments submitted on time. 
For students who satisfied the prerequisite at other universities or through work experience, this course assumes that you understand concurrency, synchronization, and UNIX socket programming as well the basics of networking and communication. You should be able to write programs in C. No special assistance or consideration will be offered if your background is inadequate. 
I will assume knowledge of material covered in cs438 and C language programming proficiency. If you covered the introductory material at some other school it is YOUR responsibility to fill in any missing background. Feel free to ask me for advice on appropriate introductory readings if you feel your background is not completely sufficient. 

STUDENT RESPONSIBILITIES

During the semester, you are responsible for completing the assigned readings, paper summaries, class presentations, and the various components of the class project. Although there is no exam currently scheduled for this class, it is up to the discretion of the instructors to introduce an exam if they feel that the students are not contributing sufficiently to the class discussions and presentations. 

The following is an estimated breakdown for grades in the class. But remember, this is a graduate class and grades don't (shouldn't) really matter (i.e., grades shouldn't be your primary or only motivator!). What matters is how much you learn about research in networking and how much it excites you! We hope this class and the project you do meets that goal. 

Readings (15%):
You are expected to read the papers in detail. Not all details will be covered in class. 
For each paper, every student is required to hand in a review of the paper. 
Submissions are due prior to the class when the papers are being discussed.
Summaries should be about one page 
Summary Format 
Concise summary of the paper, providing
An overview of what they actually did
What methods they used
What their results were
A brief critique of the paper, telling
What you think of the work
What things were unclear or not addressed
The merits of the work
Two research questions you would ask the authors
The final summaries will be peer reviews of two class projects, as presented at the end of the semester.
 
Participation (15%):
Due to the nature of seminar style classes, class participation will be counted as part of your grade.
I expect you to attend every class meeting. If you do happen to miss a session, you are responsible for finding out what material was covered and if any administrative announcements were made. You must do so BEFORE the next session (e.g., if there is an assignment given during the missed session, you are still responsible for completing it by the deadline along with the other students). 
You are strongly advised to read the papers for a particular lecture before attending the lecture. This will greatly enhance your understanding of the subject matter as well as your ability to participate in class discussions. 
 
Class Presentations (20%)
Each student will be responsible for 2 class presentations. These presentations are based on the class readings and will be assigned over the course of the semester.
 
Semester Research Project (50%):
One semester-long research project will be assigned. The project will involve emulating and evaluating some network features that will be discussed throughout the course.   This project will be a significant part of your grade.   You will be responsible for designing the research project with the guidance of the class instructors.  The deliverables for this project will include an initial meeting with the staff, an initial proposal, an extended proposal with outlined challenges and approach, a status report with implementation details and initial results, and a conference-style paper describing the results of the project.  At the end of the semester, students will present their projects to the class.
Initial Meeting (0%)
Individual meetings scheduled the week of September 3rd.
initial Proposal (5%)
Due September 20th.
The initial proposal should be approximately two pages, normal font, normal margins, and describe the area of your project and the specific problem you are trying to solve.
Give a brief description of the problem you intend to work on. However, the more information you give , the more feedback you will get.
Include at least five related papers with standard bibliographic references.
Extended Proposal with Related Work (10%)
Due October 4th.
The extended proposal should be approximately five pages, normal font, normal margins.
Build on the description of your project from the initial proposal.
focus on challenges and your approach.
Explain why your problem is interesting and mention how people have been addressing the problem in past research. 
If possible, explain the limitations of current approaches. 
Describe how you plan to tackle the problem (i.e., through simulation, emulation and/or implementation) and how you plan to evaluate your solution (i.e., what metrics will you use to evaluate performance?).  
Status Report (10%)
Due November 1st.
Project meetings scheduled the week of November 5th.
The status report should build approach described in your extended proposal.
Indicate any changes to your approach to your research project.
Include implementation details and initial results.
Final Project (20%)
Due December 6th.
Conference quality paper
12 - 20 pages
Normal fonts (10 point)
Normal margins (an inch each side)
Normal sized figures.
Look at all of the papers we have been reading as a guideline for formatting.
I will take points off if there is not enough material (i.e., too short).
And most important of all SPELLCHECK you document. If I find spelling mistakes that a spell checker would have found, I will take points off. Same for poorly organized/written references.
To bring it all together, you want to be able to answer the following questions (this is by no means a comprehensive list):
What is the problem?
Why is this problem important?
How are you going to solve/evaluate this problem?
What is different from other people's work?
What are your contributions?
Content (Page counts are just estimates and are probably low)
Abstract: (1/4 page)
Intro: (1 page)
Quick explanation of problem, your solution (basically why, what, how).
Why this is an interesting problem and a high level overview of your contribution.
Motivation and background: (3 - 4 pages)
Highlight the challenges in solving this problem.
Formalize the problem space, analytically or via the mechanisms
Present your approach in the light of other people's work
Explain why your solution is better, more robust, etc
Extensive related work showing that you have considered the current research in the area.
Approach: (3 - 4 pages)
A detailed description of what you did and why you made particular choices.
This is best if it parallels the discussion and formalization in the previous section.
Evaluation: (3 - 4 pages)
How do you evaluate your solution.
Explain the metrics that you chose for the evaluation and why you chose them.
Explain your results, both positive and negative.
Conclusions and future directions: (1/2 page)
Explain what your learned.
Point to future research directions to extend this research 
Project Presentation (5%)
Date TBA
Either a class presentation or a poster depending on the number of projects in the class.
 
Midterm Exam:
In general, I believe that the best way to learn the material for this class is through reading, class discussions and class projects. Therefore, if I am satisfied with the class participation and the insight shown in paper summaries, I will not give a midterm exam.
However, I reserve the right to give a midterm if I believe I need a midterm to effectively evaluate the students.
If given, there will be one midterm. It will be based on course readings and class discussions. More details will be given if necessary.