CS 276 -- Distributed Computing and Computer Networks
Homework Assignment #1-#5 Guidelines
See Syllabus for Due Dates
Assignment Overview
The goal of this assignment is gain a better understanding of an
area of networking beyond what is covered in class. Essentially
you will be doing a literature search across the higher quality
networking workshop/conferencing proceedings and magazines/journals.
You will collect a set of relevant references, read these papers,
and write a very brief review of each. Your report is essentially
an ``area summary''. Beyond these basic
instructions, you are free to use some creativity and present
your report in whatever style is most effective for conveying
your results. For the basically uncreative, some
guidelines/suggestions are given below.
Assignment Details
- Topics: This quarter, we will cover 5 broad topics. You
are to prepare an ``area summary'' for 4 out of the 5 topics.
- Turnin: The four topics that you choose are up to you
(you may turn in all five and I will take the four best grades).
You must turn in each assignment by the end of class on the day
it is due; no exceptions. Assignments should be turned
in as a hard copy; email is not an option.
- Area Summary Structure Guidelines: An area summary
could start by briefly introducing the area and then describing
how each of the papers relate to the area and how the
papers relate to each other. After this introduction, the
area summary should include a review of each of the papers
A rough number of papers to include per area summary is 5-10.
However, this does not mean you should chose the first 5-10
papers you find. You need to do a wide search and then choose 5-10
papers that you best understand and have the strongest opinion about.
- Paper Review Guidelines: A review for a paper is
supposed to be short and to the point (a rough word count
is about 250 words). It should contain:
(1) a brief summary of the specific paper topic area,
(2) a description of the paper's goals,
(3) a brief description of the mechanics of the paper (i.e. what is
actually in the paper),
(4) an analysis of what the paper accomplishes (may differ from what the
authors claim, see #2), and
(5) an evaluation of the merits/weaknesses of the paper.
- Places to Look for Papers: On the first day of class,
we will discuss good quality workshops/conferences and magazines/journals.
We will also talk about how to find copies of papers.