| Location | Contact Info |
|---|---|
| 🏫 Office: Not on campus Fall 2023 | 📞 Phone: 301-613-9130 |
| 🕟 Office Hours: By appointment | ✉️ Email: rharvey@loyno.edu |
This course introduces students to the world of internet and networked systems development. Concepts related to distributed systems development; concurrent and asynchronous processing; process communications and network transport protocols; distributed application architecture and design; deployment, monitoring and debugging of internet-based systems; and web of things development will be covered.
This course explores the concepts and technologies that are used in modern Internet systems, and provides the necessary skills and knowledge of software technologies needed for creating Internet/Web services. It is designed to expose students to web content presentation and generation technologies, programming, and building multi-tiered client/server web applications.
One of:
To be successful in this course, students are expected to have practical experience building software, and in particular, should be comfortable working with data structures, designing classes, and writing software modules.
Students will experience the design and construction of internet-based systems through hands-on interaction with course material. The course will provide students with a basis of theory upon which to reflect upon experiences: designing and building server-side systems that must serve multiple client system types; designing and building several types of client systems that operate and interact with the server system concurrently and asynchronously; debugging process timing and network failure issues; and building systems on networked physical devices.
Upon completion of this course, students should be able to:
📗 Distributed Systems, 3rd Edition, by Maarten van Steen and Andrew S. Tanenbaum. Maarten van Steen, 2017. ISBN 978-15-430573-8-6 (print), 978-90-815406-2-9 (digital).
Companion website: https://www.distributed-systems.net/index.php/books/distributed-systems-3rd-edition-2017/.
This book is available free online. You do not need to purchase a printed copy of this textbook.
📘 Building the Web of Things, 1st Edition, by Dominique Guinard and Vlad Trifa. Manning Publications, 2016. ISBN 978-16-172926-8-2.
Companion website: https://webofthings.org/book/.
This book is available for sale online for about $35.
Supplies for IoT projects will be provided for use during the course. If you treat the supplies with care and return them at the end of the course, you will not need to buy anything.
If you wish to build something to keep after the course is complete, or if you damage university equipment while it is under your care, you will need to purchase those items yourself. Please consult with the instructor about what to buy.
📙 Eloquent Javascript, 3rd Edition, by Marijn Haverbeke. Marijn Haverbeke, 2018. ISBN 978-15-932795-0-9.
Companion website: https://eloquentjavascript.net/.
This version of the book is currently only available online. The online version is also interactive, allowing you to try out code and explore the output while you read.
Later this year, a print version should be available from No Starch Press. If you would like to purchase the book, you can get there from the book website.
📕 Designing Distributed Systems, 1st Edition, by Brendan Burns. O'Reilly Media, 2018. ISBN 978-14-919836-4-5.
Companion website: http://shop.oreilly.com/product/0636920072768.do.
This book will be a good reference for the project, particularly if you choose to use a container-based architecture to build your API and web components.
At least one copy of this book will also be on reserve in Monroe Library for the duration of the semester.
The grading scale is the standard 10-point scale.
| Letter Grade | Percentage Range |
|---|---|
| A | 93 – 100 |
| A- | 90 – 92 |
| B+ | 88 – 89 |
| B | 83 – 87 |
| B- | 80 – 82 |
| C+ | 78 – 79 |
| C | 73 – 77 |
| C- | 70 – 72 |
| D+ | 68 – 69 |
| D | 60 – 67 |
| F | 59 and below |
The following schedule of topics and activities represents the best estimation of the semester schedule based on available information at the time of writing. Dates and activities are subject to change in response to needs that come up during the semester. You will be notified in class or via Blackboard about any adjustments to the schedule.
| Week • Session | Date | Topics | Activities | Readings & Preparation |
|---|
This is a course about being a professional. In order to do a professional job, you first have to be present. As such, attendance is required.
If there is a reason you must be absent, please arrange with the instructor in advance. Any absence not arranged with the instructor and approved in advance will result in a loss of the daily classtime participation grade. (See grading policy above.)
Please come to class on time and remain until class is dismissed.
Cell phones must be turned off during class.
Students must check their Loyola email daily.
As a professional, if you miss a deadline, there are consequences.
For major course projects, you should treat the instructor as your management. In many cases, with early notice of a delay in completion of work, project schedules can be adjusted to accomodate the delay. Managers who learn of a delay at or just before the deadline tend to perceive the employee as irresponsible, and may formally reprimand or even remove the employee from the project.
Notify the instructor as soon as you are aware of a delay in completion of project work, and you will have an opportunity to negotiate a new deadline, if possible. Please be aware that dependencies in subsquent deadlines in the project schedule may prevent such an accomodation.
For all other classroom activities, late work will not be accepted, subject to the exceptions below.
The only exceptions to this classroom policy are for absences which fall under the University Excused Absence policy.
Under that policy, excused absences require written documentation. Excused Absences due to illness have to be documented through the Office of Student Affairs or the Office of Disability Services.
Failure to appropriately document such absences will result in zero points received for the assignments due during that class period, and for the daily participation grade.
In a professional setting, there are significant consequences for dishonesty and lack of integrity, including legal consequences, market reaction, and employer discipline or termination of employment.
As your instructor for this course, I have gone out of my way to ensure that you have a great opportunity to learn the course material in both theoretical and concrete ways. Your part in this learning effort is to do your own original work and give appropriate credit for legitimate help you have received.
In keeping with this, students are expected to maintain the highest standards of academic and professional integrity. Behavior that violates these standards is not acceptable.
Some examples of unacceptable behavior in this course are:
Cheating on quizzes or examinations, plagiarism, improper acknowledgment of sources in essays, and the use of a single essay or paper in more than one course without permission are considered very serious offenses and shall be grounds for disciplinary action as outlined in the current bulletin. Agreement between the student and the faculty member that a violation has occurred, or no response from the student, will result in the assignment of a lower grade or an F to the test or assignment, or in the case of a serious violation, a lower grade or F for the course.
Dishonesty breaks trust, and will be taken very seriously.
In this course, if I suspect you are in violation of the University policy on Academic Honesty and Plagiarism in any way, whether on required assignments, exams, project work, extra credit assignments, or anything else related to this course, I will impose the highest penalty allowed.
For your benefit, the University policy on Academic Honesty and Plagiarism is available in the 2017 University Bulletin at http://2017bulletin.loyno.edu/academic-regulations/academic-honesty-and-plagiarism, including procedures associated with processing violations of the policy. Please read it and be familiar with it, as you will be responsible for ensuring your own compliance with it.
Please maintain an atmosphere of respect toward others.
At times, ordinary university operations are interrupted as a result of tropical storms, hurricanes, or other emergencies that require evacuation or suspension of on-campus activities. To prepare for such emergencies, all students will do the following during the first week of classes:
Practice signing on for each course through Blackboard.
Provide regular and alternative e-mail address and phone contact information to each instructor.
In the event of an interruption to our course due to the result of an emergency requiring an evacuation or suspension of campus activities, students will:
Assuming a power source is available....
Further information about student responsibilities in emergencies is available on the Academic Affairs web site: http://academicaffairs.loyno.edu/students-emergency-responsibilities.
If you have a disability and wish to receive accommodations, please visit the Student Success Office in Marquette Hall 112 or email success@loyno.edu or call (504) 865-2990. Please note that before any accommodations can be implemented, you must obtain an official Course Accommodation Record from Disability Services for my signature.