CSE 410: Systems Programming

Introduction

Ethan Blanton
Department of Computer Science and Engineering
University at Buffalo
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Welcome to CSE 410

My name is Ethan Blanton.
Contacting me:
Email: [email protected]
Office: Davis 334
Office Hours: Monday 13:00-15:00
Wednesday 11:00-12:00
or by appointment
The syllabus is available on the course web page, at
https://www.cse.buffalo.edu/~eblanton/course/cse410/.

So are these slides!

© 2018 Ethan Blanton / CSE 410: Systems Programming

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Expectations
For this course, I expect that you:
Will be respectful to me, TAs, classmates
Attend every lecture
Attend every recitation
Adhere strictly to the academic integrity policy
Will seek assistance early if necessary
Meet prereqs; among other things:
Have some experience programming
Understand linked lists and object references

Most of all, behave as adults and strive to maximize your

and your classmates’ learning experience in this course.

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Academic Integrity

I take academic integrity very seriously.

Violators will
fail this course, and
be referred upward for further sanctions.

I and the TAs will watch for violations.

Automated tools will be used to identify shared code.
Online resources (e.g., Stack Overflow, GitHub) will be
monitored for copying.

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Academic Integrity (continued)

You may: You MAY NOT:

Seek help from instructors Share code with

classmates
Discuss concepts with
classmates Use code from anywhere
else
Use anything from the text
with clear attribution Discuss implementation
with classmates

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Academic Integrity — Good Practices

To ensure a pleasant semester, please:

Be careful with permissions on code on GitHub,
Bitbucket, shared UB filesystems, etc.
Don’t even look at each others’ code!
Cite everything
Review the department  and University  policies

If in doubt, ask!

© 2018 Ethan Blanton / CSE 410: Systems Programming

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Having a Pleasant Semester

I intend for this course to be fun and rewarding.

You’ll get out of it what you put in; no more, no less.
I do not take well to grade negotiation.
If you want a better grade, do better work.
If you’re willing to put in the time, I’m willing to help.

© 2018 Ethan Blanton / CSE 410: Systems Programming

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Other Policies

Entire submissions or exams will be re-graded only for

grading errors.
No incompletes will be given.
No makeup exams will be given.
No grades will be changed for any reason other than
grading error.

© 2018 Ethan Blanton / CSE 410: Systems Programming

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Systems Programming

This course is concerned with systems programming.

You will learn:
More about the structure and properties of computer
systems
How architecture affects programs
How to effectively write efficient and correct programs
The C programming language and POSIX API

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Programming in Context

Programming doesn’t occur in a vacuum.

Computer systems have greatly influenced our:
Programming languages
Development tools
Preferred algorithms

This course will help you understand that context.

© 2018 Ethan Blanton / CSE 410: Systems Programming

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Platform

We will be learning about Linux on x86-64.

This is a very common and easily obtainable platform.
To help you, I have prepared a virtual machine image.
You should use this image if possible.
You are not required to use it, but your submissions are
required to work on it!

© 2018 Ethan Blanton / CSE 410: Systems Programming

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Course Materials and Activities I

Materials to learn from:
Lectures
The text: Computer Systems: A Programmer’s
Perspective (Third Edition) by Bryant and
O’Hallaron [2].
The recommended text The C Programming
Language (Second Edition) by Kernighan and
Ritchie [3].
Recitations
Assigned (required) readings
Suggested (optional) readings

© 2018 Ethan Blanton / CSE 410: Systems Programming

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Course Materials and Activities II

Activities to learn from:

Projects
Recitation activities
Homeworks (assigned but not graded)
Exams

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Readings

Most lectures will have both required and optional

readings.
Readings will appear at the end of the slides.
You must read the required readings even if I do not
mention them in class.
You may wish to read the optional readings:
to expand your understanding of related topics
to help you understand the required material

© 2018 Ethan Blanton / CSE 410: Systems Programming

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Assistance
Our primary forum for assistance will be Piazza.
You should have been added to our course Piazza.
Please consult existing postings before asking a question!
However, if you’re not sure your question is
answered, ask!
If you wish to include code, solutions, etc., send a
private message to the instructors!

I will post important course announcements and materials

to Piazza.

© 2018 Ethan Blanton / CSE 410: Systems Programming

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Programming Projects

A significant portion of your course grade will be projects.

These are individual projects.

Projects will be written in C.

Projects must run on the course VM image.

You should download and configure this image in a VM.

© 2018 Ethan Blanton / CSE 410: Systems Programming

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GitHub Classroom
We will use GitHub Classroom
for assignment distribution
for providing assistance

You must have (or create!) a GitHub account.

You are expected to use git and GitHub for development.
E.g., TAs won’t look at code unless it’s on GitHub!
Info:
Git help: Git book , tutorial , Google 

© 2018 Ethan Blanton / CSE 410: Systems Programming

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Project Assistance
Your TAs will be your primary source of help for projects.
To get the most out of your TAs, do:
try the obvious things first,
create minimal examples to show problems, and
consult the documentation.

To avoid wasting TA time and failing to get help, don’t:

ask for help before you’ve tried to understand the
problem, or
start at the last minute.

© 2018 Ethan Blanton / CSE 410: Systems Programming

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Programming Tools

I will talk a lot about tools this semester.

You will be expected to use a few tools for this course:
The C compiler
make
The gdb symbolic debugger
A programmer’s editor
Others …

We will help you learn these tools.

© 2018 Ethan Blanton / CSE 410: Systems Programming

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Editors
I don’t care what editor you use, but it must be a
programmer’s editor, and be capable of:
Syntax highlighting
Automatic indentation
Brace/parenthesis/etc.matching
Extensibility

Neither I nor the TAs will help you if you are not using an
appropriate environment when you seek help!
My personal recommendation is Emacs.
Emacs is installed and configured on the VM image.

© 2018 Ethan Blanton / CSE 410: Systems Programming

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Project Submission
We will submit using Autograder.
Submission rules:
Submitted w/in 24 hours of the deadline: -20%
Doesn’t count Saturday or Sunday
Doesn’t count University holidays
Projects submitted after 24 hours will not be accepted

Example 1: Project is due Friday at 11:59 PM, turned in

Monday at 3 PM — 20% penalty.
Example 2: Project is due Monday at 11:59 PM, turned in
Wednesday at 12:15 AM — not accepted.

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Today’s Assignments
Immediately:
Read the Syllabus.
Join our Piazza instance.

By Beginning of recitation, 2018-08-29:

Create a GitHub account if you don’t already have
one.
Download and install the course VM.

By Friday, 2018-09-07:
Complete the Academic Integrity Quiz at
https://www.cse.buffalo.edu/~eblanton/misc/
academic_integrity/ and turn it in on Autograder.

© 2018 Ethan Blanton / CSE 410: Systems Programming

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Recitation

We have Recitation this Wednesday!

© 2018 Ethan Blanton / CSE 410: Systems Programming

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Next Time ...

An overview of C
An overview of the POSIX API
A little bit about data types

© 2018 Ethan Blanton / CSE 410: Systems Programming

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References I
Required Readings
[1] Ethan Blanton. Course Syllabus.
https://www.cse.buffalo.edu/ eblanton/course/cse410/materials/2018-
1F/syllabus.pdf.
[2] Randal E. Bryant and David R. O’Hallaron. Computer Science: A Programmer’s
Perspective. Third Edition. Pearson, 2016.

Optional Readings
[3] Brian W. Kernighan and Dennis Ritchie. The C Programming Language.
Second Edition. Prentice Hall, 1988.

© 2018 Ethan Blanton / CSE 410: Systems Programming

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License

Copyright 2018 Ethan Blanton, All Rights Reserved.

Reproduction of this material without written consent of
the author is prohibited.
To retrieve a copy of this material, or related materials,
see https://www.cse.buffalo.edu/~eblanton/.

© 2018 Ethan Blanton / CSE 410: Systems Programming