FIT4001 is core in BSE and is mapped from the existing unit CSE4333. IEAust requires this unit for BSE acreditation.

Define here the reasons for changing the unit

Core for BSE, introducing parallel and distributed architecture and programming. Available for BCS (Honours) and BSc (Honours).

Mapped from CSE4333.

Distributed systems are in common use today and the adoption of parallel and grid-based sytems is increasing. This unit gives a firm grounding in the types of hardware, the paradigms for programming, the tools and the algorithms used to support such systems. Thus an understanding of the power and limitations of these systems is gained with experience in how to program them.

At the completion of this unit, students will have:

Knowledgeof:

1. A variety of parallel architectures, such as bus-based, massively parallel, cluster, vector.
2. A variety of parallel programming paradigms, synchronization and parallelization primitives, message passing, data parallel, tuple space.

Understandingof:

3. Concurrency, synchronicity and parallelism.
4. The design issues of parallel systems.

Skillsin:

5. Designing, developing and debugging parallel programs using a variety of paradigms.

ASCED: 020103 Programming

Modern computer systems contain parallelism in both hardware and software. This unit covers parallelism in both general purpose and application specific computer architectures and the programming paradigms that allow parallelism to be exploited in software.

The unit examines both shared memory and message passing paradigms in both hardware and software; concurrency, multithreading and synchronicity; parallel, clustered and distributed supercomputing models and languages. Students will program in these paradigms.

RecommendedReading

Reading material including research papers, programming manuals and system specifications, will be distributed electronically or in hardcopy.

Reference Material:

G.R. Andrews: Foundations of Multithreaded, Parallel and Distributed Programming, Addison-Wesley, 2000.

I.T. Foster: Designing and Building Parallel Programs, Addison-Wesley, 1995.

M. Maekawa, A.E. Oldehoeft, R.R. Oldehoeft: Operating Systems Advanced Concepts, Benjamin/Cummings, 1987. }

The teaching of the unit will be conducted through lectures and assignments. The lectures will present the conceptual and theoretical aspects of the unit addressing all objectives. The assignments will enhance the students understanding of the subject matter. Programming assignments will assist students in achieving objectives 2, 4 and 5. Assignments involving directed reading and research will assist with objectives 1, 3 and 4.

The teaching of the unit will be conducted through lectures and assignments. The lectures will present the conceptual and theoretical aspects of the unit addressing all objectives. The assignments will enhance the students understanding of the subject matter. Programming assignments will assist students in achieving objectives 2, 4 and 5. Assignments involving directed reading and research will assist with objectives 1, 3 and 4.

Assignments require both the writing and running of parallel code with the use of visualization, and written reports based on student's investigation of the history, development and evaluation of a variety parallel architectures. Both aspects fully cover the material in the unit and address all unit objectives.

Assessment is by assignments 100%. Programming assignments ensure objectives 2, and 5 are met; directed reading and research assignments ensure objectives 1 and 3 are met; and all assignments contribute to meeting objective 4.

2 hours of lectures per week for 13 weeks in each semester, in high-tech lecture theatre

None

None

Clayton lecturer for 13 weeks.

A library impact statement has been completed for CSE4333. There are no additional requirements as most of the unit content is already covered in existing units which are adequately catered for by existing library resources.

Faculty of Information Technology

FIT2022, or CSE2302 and CSE2/3324; in addition students must have completed 24 points of level 3 units.

Types of parallelism within a computer architecture; processes, scheduling, inter-process communication; and experience with multiple programming languages.

Sita Ramakrishnan