Systems Seminar: Prof. Larry Peterson, Computer Science Department, Princeton University

The Scout Operating System

Abstract

Scout is a communication-oriented operating system targeted at network appliances; e.g., network cameras and disks, individual nodes in scalable servers, hand-held and portable devices, and network routers. One of the central ideas in Scout is the path abstraction, which is essentially the extension of a network connection into the host operating system. Scout makes the path its primary abstraction, with resource allocation, scheduling, optimizations, fault-isolation, and security done on a per-path basis. This talk motivates Scout's design, defines the path abstraction, and reports our experiences using Scout to build a variety of network appliances.

Speaker Bio

Larry Peterson is a Professor of Computer Science at Princeton University. Prior to joining Princeton, he was the Head of the Computer Science Department at the University of Arizona. His research focuses end-to-end issues related to computer networks, he has been involved in the design and implementation of x-kernel and Scout operating systems, and he is a co-author of the textbook "Computer Networks: A Systems Approach". Dr. Peterson is the Editor-in-Chief of the ACM Transactions on Computer Systems. He as also served on the editorial board for IEEE/ACM Transactions on Networking and on program committees for SOSP, SIGCOMM, OSDI, and ASPLOS. He is also a member of the Internet's End-to-End research group.