CIS*3110 (W12) Assignments

Operating Systems
CIS*3110 (W12)

Assignments

There are three (3) equally weighted assignments. Each assignment is due by 23:55h (i.e. 5 minutes before midnight) on the day it is due; assignments, including any documentation, are submitted electronically. Late assignments are not accepted, and will be assigned a grade of 0. Assignments are to be done individually (see note below).

	Topic	Due date
Assignment 1	Signals/signal handling	Sunday, Feb. 5, 2012
Assignment 2	Process management	Sunday, Mar. 4, 2012
Assignment 3	Distributed programming	Thursday, Apr. 5, 2012
Bonus Assignment	Design/problem solving	Monday, April 16, 2012 @ noon

Guidelines and Policies for Assignment Submission

Assignment Submission :
The following should be handed in for each assignment submission:
- Assignments are submitted electronically via the department Moodle server (a submission dialog appears at the bottom of the assignment link under Moodle once submissions are open):
  1. organize your submissions directory (include all files that are to be submitted and ensure your name and student ID appear in the heading of every file you submit).
  2. run tar in that directory to turn everything into a single file.
  3. run gzip to compress the resulting tar file.
  4. use a web browers to log in to the Moodle system and choose the appropriate assignment for submission; you will be prompted to select the file that you are submitting after which you will confirm the submission.
  5. note: you can view the status of your submission at any time through the Moodle system, so you can verify that you have submitted correctly; for the record, we will not accept "I thought I submitted it" as a reason for non-submission.
- Other Requirements : Any other requirements as specified by a given assignment must be satisfied completely.
Requests for re-grade:
if you wish to have an assignment re-graded, you have seven (7) calendar days from the day results are made available to the class to request one. Regrade requests are made in-person, during scheduled TA office hours. No requests for regrade will be handled by e-mail. You must make any materials relevant to your request available to the TA at the time of the request. If the TA is unable to resolve your problem to your satisfaction, you may then appeal to your instructor during office hours within seven (7) days of your initial regrade request.
Absolutely no regrades will be considered for any reason after the initial seven day period.
Coding Style Guidelines :
Part of your mark will reflect coding style. Although there is no single correct coding style, you should strive to make your code as readable and internally consistant as possible. Such programs are easier to test, debug, maintain and modify. Please consider the following points when writing code:
- All source files should have a comment header describing the purpose of the module/program; similarly, all subroutines should have a comment header clearly describing its function, input, output and error conditions (input and output are best expressed in terms of preconditions and postconditions).
- All identifiers (variables, subroutine names, etc.) should have descriptive names, with the possible exception of loop indices.
- Literal constants (or so-called "magic numbers") are to be avoided---used named constants for counting limits, array sizes and so forth.
- Indentation and use of whitespace should be consistent throughout the code.
- Ideally, a subroutine is a small block of code that performs a single function. If a subroutine is getting too large or is doing too many things you should probably separate it into several separate subroutines.
- Commenting should be appropriate (i.e. you would not comment an increment statement as what it is doing is obvious), and assist someone unfamiliar with your code to understand what it is doing.
Operating Environment :
Programming assignments are to be implemented only in the language or with the specific tools specified by the assingment in question, and are required to compile and run using the software available under Linux in the underdgraduate lab environment provided by the department (which for this course, is *specifically* and *only* the machines in REYN 001A). You are free to develop your programs on any platform you wish, however it is entirely your responsibility to ensure that by the time it is handed it it runs on the department lab systems.
Code that does not compile, cannot be run productively in the specified university lab environment or that uses forbidden features/functionality will be assigned a grade of 0.
Late submissions:
Late assignments are not accepted, and will be assigned a grade of 0.

A Note Regarding the Expectation of Independent Work:

The work you turn in for assignments is expected to be your own. This is to say that you are expected to be the sole author of any code and/or documentation that you produce related to an assignment in this course. A piece of code or algorithm taken from any outside source (whether a web site, book or otherwise) must be properly referenced in the code in which it is used. Additionally, students should not be sharing their source code or written documentation with other students. It is considered academic misconduct to represent work for which you are not the original author as your own. This includes more than one student turning in even portions of the same assignment. Any instances will be dealt with seriously.

Having stated this, it should be noted that students are encouraged to collectively discuss design issues or strategies for problem solving related to an assignment. What is expected however is that any work and impelementations resulting from these discussions be independently produced by each student. Note that both the student who shares work or leaves work where others may find it and the student who uses the work are implicated to varying degrees. Please take care not to leave your work around, or leave a workstation without logging off. It is ultimately your responsibility to protect the integrity of your own work.

Last Modified: 2012 / 04 / 10