Distributed Computing
ETH Zurich

Principles of Distributed Computing (FS 2015)

This page is no longer maintained. Up-to-date versions of lecture and exercise material can be found here.

Distributed computing is essential in modern computing and communications systems. Examples are on the one hand large-scale networks such as the Internet, and on the other hand multiprocessors such as your new multi-core laptop. This course introduces the principles of distributed computing, emphasizing the fundamental issues underlying the design of distributed systems and networks: communication, coordination, fault-tolerance, locality, parallelism, self-organization, symmetry breaking, synchronization, uncertainty. We explore essential algorithmic ideas and lower bound techniques, basically the "pearls" of distributed computing. We will cover a fresh topic every week.

Course pre-requisites: Interest in algorithmic problems. (No particular course needed.)

Course language: English.

Lecture by Roger Wattenhofer Wednesday 8.15-10.00 @ CAB G 51.

Exercises organized by Philipp Brandes, Exercise A: Wednesday 10.15-12.00 @ CAB G 52; Exercise B: Wednesday 13.15 - 15.00 @ LFW C 11

Reading Assignment. A reading assignment (PDF) complements the course. The content covered in the assignment will be part of the exam.

We offer a Q&A session in CAB G51 on August 17 from 3pm to 5pm. Please send your questions to Michael König until August 13.

Sample exams: 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009
Please note that the topics covered in this course change from year to year and thus some of the questions in those exams are not covered this year.


Lecture material


Title Lecture Notes Exercises Responsible Assistant Additional Material

Chapter 0
Introduction
PDF 1:1
PDF 2:1
[peleg] Preface, Chapter 1
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Chapter 1
Vertex Coloring
PDF 1:1
PDF 2:1
Exercises
Solutions
Philipp Brandes
[peleg] Chapter 7
Slides by S.Schmid, TU Berlin
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Chapter 2
Tree Algorithms
PDF 1:1
PDF 2:1
Exercises
Solutions
Pascal Bissig
[peleg] Chapter 3-5
[hkpru] Chapter 7
Slides by S.Schmid, TU Berlin
  •  

Chapter 3
Leader Election
PDF 1:1
PDF 2:1
Exercises
Solutions
Pascal Bissig
[aw] Chapter 3
[hkpru] Chapter 8
Slides by S.Schmid, TU Berlin
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Chapter 4
Distributed Sorting
PDF 1:1
PDF 2:1
Exercises
Solutions
Laura Peer
[leighton] Chapter 1.6 & 3.5
[clr] Chapter 28
Slides by S.Schmid, TU Berlin
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Chapter 5
Shared Memory
PDF 1:1
PDF 2:1
Exercises
Solutions
Jara Uitto
[aw] Chapter 4
Slides by S.Schmid, TU Berlin
  •  

Chapter 6
Shared Objects
PDF 1:1
PDF 2:1
Exercises
Solutions
Sebastian Brandt
Slides by S.Schmid, TU Berlin
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Chapter 7
Maximal Independent Set
PDF 1:1
PDF 2:1
Exercises
Solutions
David Stolz
[peleg] Chapter 8
Slides by R. Wattenhofer
Slides by S.Schmid, TU Berlin
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Chapter 8
Locality Lower Bounds
PDF 1:1
PDF 2:1
Exercises
Solutions
Jara Uitto
[peleg] Chapter 7.5
Slides by S.Schmid, TU Berlin
Ramsey Theory Slides by J. Suomela
Alternative Version thanks!
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Chapter 9
Social Networks
PDF 1:1
PDF 2:1
Exercises
Solutions
Michael König
Slides by S.Schmid, TU Berlin
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Chapter 10
Synchronization
PDF 1:1
PDF 2:1
Exercises
Solutions
Laura Peer
[peleg] Chapter 6 & 25
[aw] Chapter 11
Slides by S.Schmid, TU Berlin
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Chapter 11
Hard Problems
PDF 1:1
PDF 2:1
Exercises
Solutions
Sebastian Brandt
Slides some additional Slides
Animation of APSP Algorihm by Jukka Suomela
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Chapter 12
Wireless Protocols
PDF 1:1
PDF 2:1
Exercises
Solutions
David Stolz
Slides by Y.-A. Pignolet
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Chapter 13
Stabilization
PDF 1:1
PDF 2:1
Exercises
Solutions
Barbara Keller
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Chapter 14
Labeling Schemes
PDF 1:1
PDF 2:1
Jochen Seidel
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All Chapters
Principles of Distributed Computing
PDF 1:1
PDF 2:1


References

These books are available at CS text book collection.

[peleg] Distributed Computing: A Locality-Sensitive Approach
David Peleg.
Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM), 2000, ISBN 0-89871-464-8
[aw] Distributed Computing: Fundamentals, Simulations and Advanced Topics
Hagit Attiya, Jennifer Welch.
McGraw-Hill Publishing, 1998, ISBN 0-07-709352 6
[hkpru] Dissemination of Information in Communication Networks
Juraj Hromkovic, Ralf Klasing, Andrzej Pelc, Peter Ruzicka, Walter Unger.
Springer-Verlag, Berlin Heidelberg, 2005, ISBN 3-540-00846-2
[leighton] Introduction to Parallel Algorithms and Architectures: Arrays, Trees, Hypercubes
Frank Thomson Leighton.
Morgan Kaufmann Publishers Inc., San Francisco, CA, 1991, ISBN 1-55860-117-1
[clr] Introduction to Algorithms
Thomas Cormen, Charles Leiserson, Ronald Rivest.
The MIT Press, 1998, ISBN 0-262-53091-0 oder 0-262-03141-8