Welcome to EECS 440 Advanced Networking

1. Welcome to EECS 440Advanced Networking

2. What is this class about? • Goal: to help you learn how to do the networking research • Read research papers • Argue and convey your ideas • Execute a research project • Write a research paper • Test your ability to generate research ideas • Learn about hot topics in networking

3. Typical Path • Pick a research topic (e.g., security, congestion control, wireless nets, etc.) • Learn as much as you can about the topic (read papers) • Generate a research idea (something that nobody else did before) • Execute your idea (e.g., modeling, simulations, implementation, measurements) • Write a paper and submit to a conference/journal • Present the paper at a conference

4. Typical Problems • You may know a topic that you are interested in • Yet, you don’t know the related work • It is sometimes hard to generate an idea, even if you know the related work • By the time you come up with an idea, several quarters may pass (it took me 2 years!)

5. How to do it all? • Projects: • You should come up with a research project • Ph.D. students should come up with their own projects • MS and undergraduate students should consult with my Ph.D. students about ongoing projects, or come up with your own ideas (details at the end) • The goal is to generate quality networking research and potentially submit the best work to networking conferences • Classes: • Discuss various networking research topics (e.g., security, congestion control, wireless nets, etc.) • Learn how to read papers • Final: • Generate a research idea (something that nobody else did before)

6. What do I expect from you: • This is not an ordinary class • This is a reality show! • I’ll treat you as my PhD students • I’ll expect you to behave as my PhD students: • Independent • Self-motivated • Hard-working

7. Overview • Administrative stuff • Classes: • Reading papers • Paper reviews • Presentations/debating • Project topics • Projects: • Topics / contact information

8. Course Overview • Seminar class: paper reading + a big project • Each class a new paper • More on the class structure later

9. Teaching Stuff • Aleksandar Kuzmanovic (akuzma@northwestern.edu), Office Hours: by appointment For projects: Send an e-mail • TA: no TA

10. Prerequisites and Course Materials • Required: CS340 (Intro to computer networking) • Highly Recommended: OS or having some familiarity with Unix systems programming • No required textbook – paper reading! • Recommended • Computer Networking: A Top-Down Approach Featuring the Internet, [KR], Second Edition, James Kurose and Keith Ross, Addison Wesley, 2005

11. Grading • No exams for this class • Class: 50% • Paper reading summary 15% • In class paper presentation and debating 20% • Class participation and discussion (when you are not directly debating) 15% • Project 50% • Proposal 5% (up to 1 page) • Midterm report 10% (up to 5 pages) • Project presentation 15% • Final report, 10 pages, 20% • Research idea 20% • Required, up to 3 pages, 20%

12. Communication and Policies • Web page: http://www.cs.northwestern.edu/~akuzma/classes/EECS440-f09/ • Group e-mail advnet-f09@cs.northwestern.edu • Send emails to the instructor for questions inappropriate in newsgroup • Paper reading summary is due by 2PM on Mon and Wed • Send it to me • You can miss one paper summary without any consequences

13. Overview • Administrative stuff • Classes: • Topics • Paper readings and reviews • Presentations/debating • Research ideas • Projects: • Topics

14. Course Topics • I tried to pick interesting papers (breadth vs. depth), a combination of old and new papers • Congestion control • Routing • Content distribution networks • Data dissemination protocols • Internet data centers • Denial of service attacks • Wireless networks • QoS and net neutrality • OSNs and computer networking

15. Reading papers • Why read? • Decide what to read • Reading for breadth: build a framework • Reading in depth: Challenge what you read • if you will lead a debate

16. Reviews • Should… • Point out the paper's contributions, strengths as well as weaknesses. • Think in terms of what makes good research? • What qualities make a good paper? • What are the potential future impacts of the work? • Note that there is no right or wrong answer to these questions • A review's quality will mainly depend on its thoughtfulness. • Restating the abstract/conclusion of the paper will not earn a top grade.

17. Writing Reviews (2) • Write a very brief summary of each paper, to be emailed to me before the class (.txt please) • Summary should include: • Paper title and its author(s) • A short paragraph summary (what is this paper about?) • A paragraph of the most significant new insight(s) you took away from the paper (what is good? what is the contribution?) • A paragraph of the one or two most significant flaw(s) of the paper (what is bad?) • Explain what reference would you read next and why • Give a grade to the paper (1-5)

18. Overview • Administrative stuff • Classes: • Topics • Paper readings and reviews • Presentations/debating • Research idea • Projects: • Topics

19. Defense (1) • 30 minutes; should present as if it were his/her own • The point is to make a compelling case why the contribution is significant. • the context of the contribution, • prior work, • If an older paper: how the work has influenced the research community or industry's directions (impact) • If newer paper: arguments for the potential impact

20. Defense (2) • should go well beyond a paper "summary“ • The defense should not critique the work other than to try to pre-empt attacks from the offense (e.g., by explicitly limiting the scope of the contribution). • The defense should also try to look up related work to support their case

21. Offense (1) • 20 minutes; • Should critique the work, and make a case for • missing links, unaddressed issues, lack of impact, inappropriateness of the problem formulation, etc. • The more insightful and less obvious the criticisms the better • While the offense should prepare remarks in advance, they should also react to the points made by the defense. • Hint: The offense should also try to look up related work to support their case

22. Offense (2) • The defense and offense will be allowed follow up arguments, • The class will question either side either for clarifications or to add to the discussions and controversy and make their own points on either side. • Use Powerpoint (feel free to use existing presentations from the Web)

23. Overview • Administrative stuff • Classes: • Topics • Paper readings and reviews • Presentations/debating • Research ideas • Projects: • Topics

24. Research Idea (1) • At the end of semester, you should hand in a research proposal • Up to 3 pages including references • Something that nobody else did before • What would you do? • How would you do it?

25. Research idea (2) • Writing the research-idea documents: • What is the main idea? • Why is it important/interesting? • What is the related work? • What would you actually do? • How would you execute the idea: • Modeling, simulations, experiments? • What is the expected outcome?

26. Overview • Administrative stuff • Classes: • Topics • Paper readings and reviews • Presentations/debating • Research idea • Projects: • Topics

27. Project Contacts • Ionut Trestian (ionut@northwestern.edu) • Yong Wang (yong-wang@northwestern.edu) • Aaron Ballew (aaronballew2010@u.northwestern.edu)

28. Timetable • Week 2 (Wednesday 9/30) Find a partner, choose a topic for your project, and meet with the instructor (or get an agreement via e-mail). • Week 3 (Monday 10/5) Write an introduction describing the problem and how you plan to approach it (what will you actually do?). Include motivation (why does the problem matter?) and related work (what have others already done about it?). 3 pages total. • Week 6 (Wednesday 10/28) Update your paper to include your preliminary results. 5 pages total. Midterm presentations. • Week 10 (Monday 11/30 and Wednesday 12/2): Final presentations by all groups. • Week 11 (Friday 12/11) Turn in your completed paper. 10 pages total.