Course Overview

1. Assorted Topics

• Fire alarms
  • Keep calm, leave swiftly, but leave no one behind
• IT Systems is a new module, successor to CSOS
  • CSOS students are very welcome, relevant is Learnweb course of 2023
• eLectures recordings
  • Available if no technical problems, but please use only in exceptional cases
• Exchange students?

2. Motivation

• What do you see?

  “Screenshot of knote web application” under CC0 1.0; from GitLab

• What might be happening?
  • From a systems’ perspective?
  • Abstractions?

2.1. Course Objectives and Goals

• Objectives
  • Discuss how hardware and software systems are built, using abstraction, and how they work together
  • What is happening underneath?
    • Cloud Infrastructure: Explain basic concepts, deploy simple containerized system
    • Operating System (OS): Explain how OSs do their job, use them, inspect what is happening
    • Computer Architecture: Build (simulated, yet realistic) computer by breaking task into simpler ones

• (Long-term) Goals
  • Inspect and control any computer, at any level of interest
  • Digital sovereignty, sustainability
    • Knowledge empowers to use/build better solutions that serve our interests
    • E.g., end-of-life for 240 million PCs with Windows 11, more millions when Apple ends support for Intel CPUs

2.2. Course at a Glance (1/4)

• Method: Explore abstractions bottom-up

1. Computer Architecture
   • Build a complete, general-purpose, programmable computer system, called Hack, from ground up, starting with elementary logic gates
     • Simulated, Nand2Tetris
     • Sequence of projects
   • Play and experiment with this computer, at any level of interest
   • (Prerequisite: Binary numbers; tutorial with self-tests)

2.3. Course at a Glance (2/4)

• Method: Explore abstractions bottom-up

1. Computer Architecture
2. Experiment with OS concepts
   • Explain core OS management concepts, e.g., processes, threads, virtual memory

   • Use GNU/Linux command line and explore system

     “Tux, the Linux mascot” under CC0 1.0; from Wikimedia Commons

     • OS part starts with The Command Line Murders
   • Explore sample Java code
     • (Prerequisite: Java programming, compilation, execution)

2.4. Course at a Glance (3/4)

• Method: Explore abstractions bottom-up

1. Computer Architecture
2. Experiment with OS concepts
3. Explain virtualization, experiment with containerization
   • Explain core concepts

   • Build images, run Docker containers

     “Docker logo” under Docker Brand Guidelines; from Docker

     • Build and run knote web application seen initially

2.5. Course at a Glance (4/4)

• Method: Explore abstractions bottom-up

1. Computer Architecture
2. Experiment with OS concepts
3. Experiment with containerization
4. Set up simple cloud application

   • Run Kubernetes cluster on local machine

     “Kubernetes logo” under Kubernetes Branding Guidelines; from GitHub

   • Deploy knote web application seen initially

3. Course Organization

3.1. Course Components

• Course with 6 CP, at least 8h per week
  • Joint sessions in class (no traditional lectures, details below)
    • Tuesday (10:15 a.m.): Recap of lecture material
    • Wednesday (12:15 p.m.): Exercises
    • 2x90 minutes = 3h
  • Self-study, 5h per week
    • Flipped classroom (details below)
    • Including quizzes in Learnweb: Published as course progresses
      • Self-study quizzes to support your learning
      • Quizzes for study work (50% of total points required), deadlines on Thursdays (except public holidays, then Friday)
• Final exam for 100% of final grade
  • You must pass both, study work and exam, for credits
    • Not recommended, but can be done in different terms/years

3.2. Course Material

• Everything provided in or linked from Learnweb
  • Material developed and published as OER on Gitlab
• Computer Architecture
  • (Nisan and Schocken 2005) The Elements of Computing Systems, MIT Press
    • Book chapters and material for projects at https://www.nand2tetris.org/course
      • (Book chapters hyperlinked from icon for reading person)
    • Gratis course at Coursera
• Operating Systems
  • (Hailperin 2019) Operating Systems and Middleware
• Cloud Infrastructures
  • Variety of papers and software documentation

3.2.1. OER on GitLab

• Presentations such as this one are maintained as Open Educational Resources (OER) on GitLab
  • Sources: https://gitlab.com/oer/oer-courses/it-systems
    • Please, contribute with bug reports (issues) or merge requests!
  • Presentations: https://oer.gitlab.io/oer-courses/it-systems/
    • Note: PDF formats
  • Usage hints: https://oer.gitlab.io/hints.html
    • Note: URL parameters
      • https://oer.gitlab.io/oer-courses/it-systems/03-Boolean-Logic-I.html?audio-advance=-1&audio-speed=1.5
  • Work in progress, presentations “ready” when link in Learnweb

3.3. Schedule

3.4. Prerequisites

• We suppose that you can convert between decimal, binary, and hexadecimal numbers
  • Tutorial with self-tests
• We suppose that you can program in Java
  • Including compilation and execution
    • Which requires installation of JDK
• Quickstart with Nand2Tetris software tomorrow (requires JRE)
  • Please install ahead of time and come with Laptop

3.5. Past Course Evaluations and Results

• IT Systems is a new module
  • First incarnation in 2024
    • Nominated for teaching award by student council
  • Successor to Computer Structures and Operating Systems (CSOS)

• CSOS evaluation in 2023 highly positive

  “group discussion” by ProSymbols under CC BY 3.0 US; cropped from the Noun Project

  • Average grade of 1.84 (1 is best); improved from 3.04 in previous year
  • Average student grade of 2.5; improved from 3.1 in 2022
    • Failure rate of 11% (9 out of 98 students failed the exam, 2 more students failed the exercises); improved from 25% in 2022
  • Students usually report that our type of interaction and work is unknown to them
    • Please trust me and overwhelming scientific evidence (alluded to next), and try this out

3.6. Q&A

4. On Learning and Teaching

4.1. Learning Objectives

• Later presentations contain Learning Objectives
  • What we want you to have learned (after lecture and exercises)

• Content + action verb

  “Bloom's Taxonomy” by Center for Teaching Vanderbilt University under CC BY 2.0; from flickr

  • Action verb specifies level of skill
    • Think of exam question!
  • Bloom’s taxonomy
• Examples
  • Apply algorithm X in sample scenario
  • Argue about relative strengths and weaknesses of Y and Z
  • Course Objectives on earlier slide

4.2. Learning (1/2)

• Learning

  • Requires active work

    “Brain training” by Shocho under CC BY 3.0 US; cropped from the Noun Project

    • To change protein structures in brains, just like muscles
    • E.g., deliberate practice, retrieval practice, spaced repetition
  • Getting information out of heads
    • Misconception: Learning = getting information in
    • Precondition for silent learning: Writing material
      • Preferably a laptop (for writing and experiments)
  • Three suggestions to learn about learning
    • Learning Platform Information Systems (student-driven, in Learnweb)
    • See book Make it stick (student recommendation!)
    • https://aliabdaal.com/the-ultimate-guide-to-studying-for-exams/ (with YouTube videos at the end)

4.3. Learning (2/2)

• Consequences
  • During (traditional) lectures, I learn, you do not (much)
    • (Physics Nobel laureate Carl Wieman compares lecturing in education to bloodletting in medicine; both are bad approaches that were popular once)
  • This course provides learning opportunities during our meetings
    • Where you can benefit from my presence
    • Which requires your preparation
    • Which requires active work on your part, instead of passive listening
    • (Which may not meet your expectations and may contradict your feeling of learning …)
• (My teaching statement justifies the above with scientific references.)

4.4. Flipping IT Systems

• CSOS has been flipped since 2017, last year following (Kapur et al. 2022):

  • Improved learning outcomes based on productive failure, active learning, and instructor support: Fail, Flip, Fix, Feed

    “Conflict” by lastspark under CC BY 3.0 US; cropped from the Noun Project

    • Fail
      • You attempt to solve a task before being instructed
      • Possibly without success
      • You activate prior knowledge, diagnose own learning, stimulate (meta-) cognitive processes
    • Flip: You work on self-study material ahead of meeting
    • Fix, Feed
      • Class meetings are shaped by you: What do you wish for?
      • We discuss and work on tasks (“failed” and new ones, exercises and previous exam tasks)
      • This is where I am around and we spend limited, valuable time

4.5. Course Rhythm

• On Wednesdays
  • Publication of new course material and quiz for study work
    • Unlocked when you submit fail task
      • Unlocking suggested by students last year
    • New tasks on the “Completion Progress” in Learnweb

  • Session

    “experience” by Nithinan Tatah under CC BY 3.0 US; cropped from the Noun Project

    • Conclude current topic, work on tasks
      • Including Q&A on current study work
    • Outlook on new material, initial work on Fail task
• Flip
  • Learn on your own, with self-study tasks
• On Tuesdays
  • Revisit Fail task, Fix jointly if necessary, Feed

4.6. Your Thoughts

• Anonymous pads in Learnweb for our sessions

  “dialogue” by Template under CC BY 3.0 US; cropped from the Noun Project

  • For your input and notes as well as my session plans
• My Questions
  • Why did you enrol in a presence university?
    • Why do you attend sessions? On Campus?
    • Why would you like to come to campus?
    • Is everything fine as it is?
      • Proposed rhythm?
    • What stresses you? What brings you joy?
  • How should learning at a presence university look like?
    • What are your and my roles?

Bibliography

License Information

Source files are available on GitLab (check out embedded submodules) under free licenses. Icons of custom controls are by @fontawesome, released under CC BY 4.0.