General Notes

In this unit, you should do the following:

• Attend lectures, take notes, ask questions.

• Attend your tutorial/practical, seek feedback from your lecturer on your work.

• Prepare for and strive to do well in the quizzes

• Read appropriate sections of the text, add to your notes and prepare questions for your lecturer/tutor.

• Prepare answers to tutorial questions.

• Work on any assignments that have been released. 

Please note it is to your benefit to attend most of the classes, prepared to participate in discussions, ask and answer questions, and provide perspectives from your own background and workplaces. Resources to assist your learning Digital recordings of lectures are available as Echo360 through iLearn login. These are provided for review material and in case of missing lectures. Recordings should not be relied upon and copyrighted material may be omitted. iLearn is used for out-of-class communication as well as forums where active discussion of issues is encouraged. iLearn can be found at can be found at http://learn.mq.edu.au. You are encouraged to review iLearn weekly and to do background reading before each class.  

Requirements to Pass this unit

In this unit, the final mark will be calculated by combining the marks for all assessment tasks according to the percentage weightings shown in the assessment summary. There are no hurdles in this unit.

Concretely, in order to pass the unit, you must obtain an overall total mark of 50% or higher. Students obtaining a higher grade than a pass in this unit will (in addition to the above)

• have a total mark of 85% or higher to obtain High Distinction;

◦ have a total mark of 75% or higher to obtain Distinction;

◦ have a total mark of 65% or higher to obtain Credit.

You are encouraged to:

• set your personal deadline earlier than the actual one;

• keep backups of all important assessed tasks;.

• make sure no one else picks up your printouts. All work submitted should be readable and well presented.

You should never commit plagiarism in any of your submitted work, including tutorial and practical answers.

Special Consideration

The Special Consideration Policy aims to support students who have been impacted by short-term circumstances or events that are serious, unavoidable and significantly disruptive, and which may affect their performance in assessment. If you experience circumstances or events that affect your ability to complete the assessments in this unit on time, please inform the convenor and submit a Special Consideration request through ask.mq.edu.au.

Written Assessments: If you experience circumstances or events that affect your ability to complete the written assessments in this unit on time, please inform the convenor and submit a Special Consideration request through ask.mq.edu.au.

Assignment Submission Guidelines and Late Submission

Your assignment is to be submitted online using Turnitin.

Online quizzes, in-class activities, or scheduled tests and exam must be undertaken at the time indicated in the unit guide. Should these activities be missed due to illness or misadventure, students may apply for Special Consideration.

All other assessments must be submitted by 5:00 pm on their due date.

Should these assessments be missed due to illness or misadventure, students should apply for Special Consideration.

Late Submission

From 1 July 2022, Students enrolled in Session based units with written assessments will have the following late penalty applied. Please see https://students.mq.edu.au/study/assessment-exams/assessments for more information. 

Unless a Special Consideration request has been submitted and approved, a 5% penalty (of the total possible mark) will be applied each day a written assessment is not submitted, up until the 7^th day (including weekends). After the 7^th day, a grade of '0' will be awarded even if the assessment is submitted. Submission time for all written assessments is set at 11:55 pm. A 1-hour grace period is provided to students who experience a technical concern. 

For any late submission of time-sensitive tasks, such as scheduled tests/exams, performance assessments/presentations, and/or scheduled practical assessments/labs, students need to submit an application for Special Consideration.  

In this unit, late submissions will be accepted as follows: 

• Quiz 1: NO, unless Special Consideration is granted  
• Quiz 2: NO, unless Special Consideration is granted  
• Assignment 1: YES, Standard Late Penalty applies 
• Assignment 2: YES, Standard Late Penalty applies 

Methods of Communication

Our primary means of communication will be through your university email and announcements on iLearn. It is crucial to consistently check your university email for important updates and information related to the course. Additionally, significant announcements will be posted on iLearn, a centralized platform for accessing vital details about the course. Should you have any queries or require assistance from the teaching staff, including the unit convenor, you have two communication channels. Firstly, you can post your queries on the iLearn discussion board, providing an interactive space for instructors and peers to engage in discussions. Alternatively, you may send emails to the corresponding addresses of the teaching staff using your university email address for official communication. Through these communication methods, we aim to ensure effective and timely dissemination of information and provide the necessary support throughout the course.

 

Note:

COMP8270 is an on-campus offering.

COMP8270 is taught via lectures and workshop sessions: 1 hour per week for the problem-solving part and 2 hours per week for the hands-on lab part. (Read below for more details.)

Lectures

Lectures are used to introduce switch/router design and cloud architectures and protocols and put them in a wider context. You are encouraged to ask questions of the lecturer, both during and outside the lecture, to clarify anything you might not be sure of. Lecture notes will be made available each week, but these notes are intended as an outline of the lecture only and are not a substitute for your own notes or the recommended reading list.

It should be noted that no single text book completely covers the content of this unit. A large portion of the lecture material is drawn from research papers, white papers, and standard documents. Students are encouraged to read the weekly recommended reading list to gain a solid understanding of the topics that are covered.

Quizzes

There will be two quizzes in the following weeks: 5 and 10. These quizzes will be held in the workshop session. A quiz is a short test that will be based on your previously covered lecture material. For example, the week 5 quiz will be based on lectures done in weeks 1 to 4. The quiz questions will be handed over to you at the beginning of your class. Each quiz contributes 15% of the total mark and serves as a feedback mechanism to monitor your progress in the unit.

Assignments

There are two assignments in this unit. Assignment 1 is a problem-solving assignment to help the students get accustomed to dealing with real-world problem situations and issues. Assignment 2 is a group project report and presentation. In this assignment, students will leverage their knowledge of network systems and cloud computing to research and critically analyse relevant literature in the discipline and present conclusions

Workshop

The workshop includes tutorial-based problem-solving and hands-on lab sessions. Its exercises aim to reinforce the concepts discussed in the lectures by engaging students in hands-on, practical, and paper-based problem-solving activities. Tutorial sessions are scheduled for the first half of the semester, starting in week 2. It's important to note that the tutorial exercises are not formally assessed. However, the more you practice such questions, the better prepared you will be for quizzes and assignments. The solutions to these exercises will be regularly posted on the iLearn unit page, allowing you to review and discuss them with your lecturer or peers. This will maximize the feedback you receive on your work. If you encounter any difficulties, don't hesitate to seek help from the teaching staff.

The hands-on lab exercises begin in week 7 (confirmation will be provided in the first lecture). During these sessions, students have the opportunity to enhance their networking skills under the guidance of a demonstrator. There will be one 2-hour workshop session each week, starting in week 7, and each lab exercise is worth 2 marks, contributing to an overall weighting of 10%. These sessions take place in a specially equipped networking laboratory, and it's important to note that labs cannot be conducted outside of the assigned sessions.

Weeks 12 and 13 serve as catch-up weeks, providing an opportunity to complete any workshop exercises that were missed during the semester. Each week, students receive exercises to work on. Keeping up with these exercises is crucial, as it enhances your understanding of the unit's content and prepares you for assignments.

Note: Please note that catch-up classes are intended for students who have missed a few labs due to genuine reasons. Special consideration approval is required for students who have missed a maximum of two labs. Students who have failed to attend any lab class during the semester are not allowed to use these sessions to make up for missed work.

Late Submission

From 1 July 2022, Students enrolled in Session based units with written assessments will have the following late penalty applied. Please see https://students.mq.edu.au/study/assessment-exams/assessments for more information. 

Unless a Special Consideration request has been submitted and approved, a 5% penalty (of the total possible mark) will be applied each day a written assessment is not submitted, up until the 7^th day (including weekends). After the 7^th day, a grade of '0' will be awarded even if the assessment is submitted. Submission time for all written assessments is set at 11:55 p.m. A 1-hour grace period is provided to students who experience a technical concern. 

For any late submission of time-sensitive tasks, such as scheduled tests/exams, performance assessments/presentations, and/or scheduled practical assessments/labs, students need to submit an application for Special Consideration.  

In this unit, late submissions will be accepted as follows: 

• Quiz 1: NO, unless Special Consideration is granted  
• Quiz 2: NO, unless Special Consideration is granted  
• Assignment 1: YES, Standard Late Penalty applies 
• Assignment 2: YES, Standard Late Penalty applies 

Technologies Used

• GEM 5 Garnet Simulation tool.
• Mininet Simulation tool.
• Cloud based tools.

Methods of Communication

Our primary means of communication will be through your university email and announcements on iLearn. It is crucial to consistently check your university email for important updates and information related to the course. Additionally, significant announcements will be posted on iLearn, a centralized platform for accessing vital details about the course. Should you have any queries or require assistance from the teaching staff, including the unit convenor, you have two communication channels. Firstly, you can post your queries on the iLearn discussion board, providing an interactive space for instructors and peers to engage in discussions. Alternatively, you may send emails to the corresponding addresses of the teaching staff using your university email address for official communication. Through these communication methods, we aim to ensure effective and timely dissemination of information and provide the necessary support throughout the course.

 

TEXT

There is no single text book containing material that could address all the topics of the unit. All necessary reading material and elaborate and detailed notes on lecture topics will be provided by the lecturer every week.

Other Useful Books (You need not buy unless you believe you need to own one)

• Dan C. Marinescu Cloud Computing, 2nd Edition Theory and Practice ISBN: 978-0-12-812810-7 eBook ISBN: 9780124046412:
• Rajkumar Buyya, Christian Vecchiola, and Thamarai Selvi, Mastering Cloud Computing, Morgan Kaufmann, ISBN: 978-0-12-411454-8, Burlington, Massachusetts, USA, May 2013.
• Comer, D.E., Network Systems Design using Network Processors. Pearson (Prentice Hall):

Tentative Schedule
Week 1	Unit Introduction Switching Design and Switched Architectures
Week 2	Router Architectures
Week 3	Interconnection Networks I
Week 4	Interconnection Networks II
Week 5	Packet Classification	Quiz 1 (in Week 5 Workshop)
Week 6	Address Lookup
Week 7	Software Defined Networking I
Week 8	Software Defined Networking II	Assignment 1 is due Friday, Week 8.
	BREAK
Week 9	Data Center and Cloud Computing
Week 10	Virtualization	Quiz 2 (in Week 10 Workshop)
Week 11	Assignment 2 - Group Presentation	Assignment 2: Group Report is due Friday, Week 11.
Week 12	Assignment 2 - Group Presentation
Week 13	Guest talk, Unit Review

The hands-on lab component of workshops will be assessed.

Grades

At the end of the semester, you will receive a grade that reflects your achievement in the unit

• Fail (F): does not provide evidence of attainment of all learning outcomes. There is missing or partial or superficial or faulty understanding and application of the fundamental concepts in the field of study; and incomplete, confusing or lacking communication of ideas in ways that give little attention to the conventions of the discipline.

• Fail (FH): has obtained a raw mark over 50, yet failed all available attempt of at least one hurdle assessment. 

• Pass (P): provides sufficient evidence of the achievement of learning outcomes. There is demonstration of understanding and application of fundamental concepts of the field of study; and communication of information and ideas adequately in terms of the conventions of the discipline. The learning attainment is considered satisfactory or adequate or competent or capable in relation to the specified outcomes.

• Credit (Cr): provides evidence of learning that goes beyond replication of content knowledge or skills relevant to the learning outcomes. There is demonstration of substantial understanding of fundamental concepts in the field of study and the ability to apply these concepts in a variety of contexts; plus communication of ideas fluently and clearly in terms of the conventions of the discipline.

• Distinction (D): provides evidence of integration and evaluation of critical ideas, principles and theories, distinctive insight and ability in applying relevant skills and concepts in relation to learning outcomes. There is demonstration of frequent originality in defining and analysing issues or problems and providing solutions; and the use of means of communication appropriate to the discipline and the audience.

• High Distinction (HD): provides consistent evidence of deep and critical understanding in relation to the learning outcomes. There is substantial originality and insight in identifying, generating and communicating competing arguments, perspectives or problem solving approaches; critical evaluation of problems, their solutions and their implications; creativity in application.

In this unit, the final mark will be calculated by combining the marks for all assessment tasks according to the percentage weightings shown in the assessment summary. There are no hurdles in this unit.

Concretely, in order to pass the unit, you must obtain an overall total mark of 50% or higher. Students obtaining a higher grade than a pass in this unit will (in addition to the above)

• have a total mark of 85% or higher to obtain High Distinction;

◦ have a total mark of 75% or higher to obtain Distinction;

◦ have a total mark of 65% or higher to obtain Credit.

You are encouraged to:

• set your personal deadline earlier than the actual one;

• keep backups of all important assessed tasks;.

• make sure no one else picks up your printouts. All work submitted should be readable and well presented.

You should never commit plagiarism in any of your submitted work, including tutorial and practical answers.