Seminar on Programming Languages and Program Analysis

Virtual Machines

• Lecturer: Noam Rinetzky
• Time: Tuesday, 14:00–16:00, Semester A, 2015/16
• Location: Ornstein 110
• Course Number: 0368-4487-01
• Reception Hour: Sunday 16:00-17:00

Topic

In this seminar we will discuss the emerging trend of virtualization in computer system. We will go over the book "Virtual Machines: Versatile Platforms for Systems and Processes" by Jim Smith and Ravi Nair. We will discuss virtualization at the level of single machine, and if time permit, at the level of cloud computing. Beside the book, we may also cover more recent research papers on the topic.

Virtual machines (from the book): Virtual Machine technology applies the concept of virtualization to an entire machine, circumventing real machine compatibility constraints and hardware resource constraints to enable a higher degree of software portability and flexibility. Virtual machines are rapidly becoming an essential element in computer system design. They provide system security, flexibility, cross-platform compatibility, reliability, and resource efficiency. Designed to solve problems in combining and using major computer system components, virtual machine technologies play a key role in many disciplines, including operating systems, programming languages, and computer architecture.

Requirements

• You are required to be present in every lesson, unless coordinated ahead with the lecturer.
• Every student is expected to:
  • Be present in every lesson, unless coordinated ahead with the lecturer.
  • Give a 70-80 minutes talk about his or hers assigned topic.
  • Answer students questions during the talk.
  • Say something original (i.e., not written in the book/paper) about the topic. For example, download and execute two implementation of an algorithm and evaluate them, extend the discussion regarding one of the references in the book/paper, make an interesting connection to a topic discussed in a previous talk, say his or hers personal impressions regarding the discussed technique.
  • Lead a discussion a summary discussion.
  • Write a short (1 page) summary about the discussed topic, the original contribution, and the main points that came out during the discussion.
  • Participate in the discussions led by other students.

Format

• Use the seminar's themes for your presentation and summary: [Presentation theme] [Summary theme].
• Name your presentation and summary using the seminar's naming conventions, e.g.,
  • seminar1516a-lec1-presentation.pptx
  • seminar1516a-lec1-summary.docx
• The talk can be given either in Hebrew or in English. The slides and the summary should be written in English.
  
  
• Mathematical fonts for Powerpoint and Word can be found here.

Schedule