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Distributed Systems

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CS 425 : ECE 428

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Fall 2025

 

Latest Announcements and News (please check often) - Oldest First:


  • [8/26] First Lecture. All subsequent announcements will be on Piazza: see link on Assignments page.
  • [8/25]: All 4cr students MUST form a group and fill out the form linked from on the Assignments page (see red font at top of that page) by 9/1 Monday 5 pm
  • [8/15] All students (on-campus and online/Coursera): By Friday 8/29 please complete this survey (on-campus, remote, and MCS-Coursera, MCS Chicago students, everyone!). Please complete regardless of whether you've managed to successfully register : [Survey]
  • [8/9] Website created. Some links may not work, and some information may be inaccurate, before the first day of lecture Aug 26th.

Syllabus/Course Information Sheet/Course Details Sheet: [pdf]

Basic Information:

Class Sessions Meet: Tue and Thu, 2.00 PM - 3.15 PM, at 0027/1025 Campus Instructional Facility (CIF).

All Coursera (MCS-DS) Students Go Here For All Course Content: [Coursera MCS Online CS425 Website] (log in before you access the site)

All other (non-MCS-DS students) should use this current website (not the Coursera website)

Discussion Forum for all students, on-campus, online and MCS-DS (fastest way to get queries answered): Piazza 

To mail staff, email: cs-425-staff@mx.uillinois.edu

Course Staff: 

Office Hours: 

Textbook:

[Recommended, but not Required] Coulouris, G., Dollimore, J., Kindberg, T., and Blair G., Distributed Systems: Concepts and Design, Addison-Wesley, Fifth Edition, 2011, ISBN: 0132143011. Please note: We will refer to chapter, section, and problem numbers ONLY in the Fifth Edition. If you use an older edition, correct interpretation/translation of these numbers is solely the students' responsibility (no excuses).

[Supplementary (Optional) Textbooks]

Lots of readings from the Web

Sukumar Ghosh. Distributed Systems: An Algorithmic Approach. 2006 CRC Press, ISBN: 1584885645. (Available online free at the UIUC library)

A. Tanenbaum and M. Steen, Distributed systems: principles and paradigms, Prentice Hall, Second Edition, 2005, ISBN: 0132392275.

Prerequisites: CS 240/241/340/341 or ECE 391 or equivalent course on Operating Systems or Networking (approval of instructor required for latter). While these are co-requisites, we expect all incoming students to know fundamentals of OS and networking (and for 4 cr on-campus students, basic Sockets programming).

Grades:  Canvas

Waitlist/Unable to Register: This year the department is unable to maintain a waitlist. Please do not email Indy to give you an override. In the past everyone who wanted to get in (on-campus sections), has managed to, eventually (though there's no guarantees!). Please continue submitting HWs and MPs on time, as if you were fully registered. If you can't enroll by September 30th, email Indy.

MP Groups (4 cr only): Fill form by Monday 9/1 via [This Link] (before clicking, login Google Apps@Illinois via your illinois.edu account)

Student Survey: Regardless of whether you're registered for this course or not registered, regardless of whether you are on-campus or online -- [Please take survey at this link] (Fill by Friday 8/29)

Lecture Videos [Mediaspace] (On-campus Students only, MCS Online Students should watch the Coursera video lectures.).

This Mediaspace channel is visible to everyone who is logged in with a UIUC netid.

 

 


Academic Integrity Policy for CS425 (Please Read)

We adhere by the CS academic integrity policies outlined at this webpage. It is the course policy that all of the work you submit for grading, or in support of graded material, as an individual or project group, shall be your own product, from inception to completion. The only resources you can avail of in your HWs and MPs are the provided course materials (slides, textbooks, etc.), and communication with instructor/TA via newsgroup and email. With others (apart from yourself for HWs, and apart from your group-mate for MPs) you can only discuss course materials and the HW/MP specs. Study groups are recommended but you cannot discuss ideas or solutions to HWs and MPs. Please do not reveal solutions on any of these fora including Piazza. Exams are closed-book, closed-notes, unless otherwise specified.

We rigorously check every submitted HW and MP (including code) for violations of academic integrity.

All violations of this academic integrity policy are treated seriously in this course. Don't risk it - just avoid cheating and the temptation to! That way, you'll learn more and years later you will be happier about standing up for yourself.

Statement on CS CARES and CS Values and Code of Conduct

All members of the Illinois Computer Science department - faculty, staff, and students - are expected to adhere to the CS Values and Code of Conduct. The CS CARES Committee is available to serve as a resource to help people who are concerned about or experience a potential violation of the Code. If you experience such issues, please contact the CS CARES Committee. The instructors of this course are also available for issues related to this class.

Important Campus Message on Emergencies: Run, Hide, Fight (Please Read)

The campus would like you to read the following important message on safety in case of an emergency: [Link].