18-345: Introduction to Telecommunication Networks

Spring 2013

This course introduces fundamental concepts of telecommunication networks. Underlying engineering principles of telephone networks, computer networks, and integrated networks are discussed. Topics in the course include: telephone and data networks overview; OSI layers; physical layer and coding; data link protocol; flow control, congestion control, routing; local area networks (Ethernet, Wireless, etc.); transport layer; introduction to high-speed networks (MPLS, ATM, Gigabit Ethernet); performance evaluation techniques. More detailed information can be in the course syllabus.

This course uses Blackboard only for project submission. All course information will be made available on this web site. The course also has a bboard (cyrus.academic.ece.18-345.discuss) that will be used for announcements and questions/answers for the projects.

Prerequisites: Probability Theory (36-217 or sequence of 36-211,212 or 36-225,226) and C/C++ programming skill (15-213).

News

• 4/26/13: We will have the second exam on Wednesday, May 1, in class. I will have office hours on Tuesday 11-noon and Wednesday 9:30-10:30.
• 3/3/13: This week, Prof. Steenkiste will have office hours Monday 9-10, instead of Tuesday.
• 2/23/13: Midterm is on March 4, in class.
• 1/27/13: piazza policy information added.
• 1/15/13: Peter Steenkiste will not have office hours on 1/2/13 because of travel.
• 12/27/12: Web site created.

Instructor

Prof. Peter Steenkiste
E-mail: prs@cs.cmu.edu
Office: Gates 9107
Office Hours: Tuesday 11-noon

Teaching Assistants

Hugo Sousa Pinto E-mail: hpinto@andrew.cmu.edu Office: PH B42 Office Hours: Tuesday 10-11 am or send e-mail

Tai Guo E-mail: taig@andrew.cmu.edu Office Hours: Monday 10:30-11:30 am Office: HBH 237

Textbook

Communication Networks, Second Edition, by A. Leon-Garcia and I. Widjaja, McGraw-Hill, ISBN 0-07-246352-X.

Course schedule

Lectures will be held Monday and Wednesday in 12:30-2:20PM, in PH 226A. Recitations will be held Friday, 10:30-11:20AM, in PH A20. Note that we only have recitation sessions when there is something listed on the schedule for that Friday.

Tests

There will be 6 quizzes and 2 exams in the course.

Quizzes: Your best 5 out of 6 quizzes will be counted 3% each toward the final grade, for a total of 15%. Each quiz will be given in the last 30 minutes of the lecture on the given date. There will be NO "make-up" quiz if you miss any of these. They will be held in the lecture room.

Exams: The two exams are each 110 minutes long and worth 25% each. Both will be held in the lecture room. Both exams are closed book.

Exam 1 will cover lectures 1-14. It will be given on Monday Mar 4. The solutions are posted here.

Exam 2 will be on May 1. It will cover the entire course, but with emphasis on lectures 15-26.

Homeworks

Problem sets will be assigned throughout the course. These assignments will be collected but will NOT be graded. They are provided to help you understand the material and will not be counted toward the final grade. The solutions will be provided. Homeworks will typically be handed out the week before a quiz, covering the same material as the quiz.

Projects

The course includes a series of four network software projects. The objective of the projects is to expose students to network software programming and to reinforce key networking concepts in a hands-on fashion. The four projects combined are worth 35% of the total grade.

Please use the course bboards (cyrus.academic.ece.18-345.discuss) for questions regarding the projects. The course will have a limited number of recitations in which we discuss the projects, and tips and tools that may be useful. The document Dave's Notes on Software Engineering for Systems Hackers may also be useful.

Piazza Policy

This course uses the Piazza web site for answering questions. The home Piazza page for this course is at: https://piazza.com/cmu/spring2013/18345/home. When posting questions on Piazza, students must keep in mind the collaboration guidelines listed in the syllabus and discussed in the first lecture. Use those guidelines to determine:

• Whether to mark your post "private to the instructors" or public;
• How much detail and help to provide in an answer to a fellow student

Part of the learning process is struggling with the material until you arrive at the right insight for you to understand it. Posting too much detail in response to a request for assistance can impair learning. On the other hand, sometimes it is great to be nudged in the right direction when you're not able to get out of a rut. And, of course, misunderstandings of the assignment or tools available should be helped rapidly. Please use your best judgement when posting to the Piazza site, as if you were collaborating with your friends in person. A few rough guidelines:

• Please do post and answer publicly: Misunderstandings of the assignment; clarifications about the requirements; bugs in the assignment spec or reference implementation or tests; small, detailed questions about the operation of system calls, functions, etc. Things that look like they'd go in the FAQ are good candidates for asking or answering.
• Please don't post or answer publicly: code (remember that each team needs to code its own project); in-depth explanations of how your system works; questions about the best approach for architecting the system at a high level; questions about your grade; problems with your partner; etc.

Please use your judgement between these two examples. If you post privately, please let us know whether or not it would be OK to mark the post public if we feel it would be beneficial to the class to make it public.

Grading

Grades will be determined based on 5 quizzes (15% total), 3 projects (35% total), and 2 exams (50% total). A distribution of grades for assignments returned so far can be found here.