Advanced Computer Networking

Covid 19 Information

Participation in in-person courses is only allowed for persons who are vaccinated, recovered, or tested negative for COVID-19. You are not permitted to attend courses if you have typical symptoms of LV SARS-CoV-2 on the day of course meeting, are subject to quarantine, or have a positive test result of any kind. Please, inform yourself ahead of time about the conditions for participation under https://www.tum.de/en/about-tum/news/coronavirus/corona-teaching-exams/. If you belong to a risk group and are thus subject to a severe progression of the illness, you are required to take the necessary measures for your own protection if you plan to take part in the COVID-19 LV, or to refrain from participating. The TUM Corona Crisis Task Force (krisenstab-coronavirus@tum.de) or your attending physician can advise you in this regard.

Content

The lecture presents advanced concepts for building computer networks. Examinations of network protocols and network algorithms are the foundation of this lecture. Basic techniques for the construction of local area networks (LAN) and wide area networks (WAN) are explained. Mechanisms and protocols for inter-domain and intra-domain routing are discussed and possible attack scenarios are demonstrated. Concepts and mechanisms of modern transport layer protocols are presented. Furthermore, different tunneling protocols for networks are discussed. Measurements of single network nodes and Internet-wide measurements are introduced and explained. Modern techniques (OpenFlow, P4) for software-based packet processing are demonstrated.

Remote Lecture

For this semester, it will again be possible to participate in the course fully remotely. If the situation allows it we also try to offer the possibility to attend the lecture in presence. Thus, there will be a live stream and the recording will be provided. You need to be registered for the lecture via TUMonline to get access to the lecture via live.rbg.tum.de. Exercises will be held remotely and live on the Thursday slot about each 3 to 4 weeks and will not be recorded.

Material

After the course has started, the lecture material including exercise sheets can be found at https://acn.net.in.tum.de or cloned via git clone git@acn.net.in.tum.de:material after you uploaded an ssh key via Moodle.

Recordings of the lecture will also be available on the website.

Moodle

In the Moodle course we will post some material with special copyrights that we cannot put into the regular material repository. At the beginning of the semester you can upload your SSH public key in the Moodle course. This allows you to take part in the exercise and the project. You will get access to your git repository with your SSH key.

Exercise

During the semester we will hand out exercise sheets. After a preparation time of one week, exercises are handed in (via git repository) the first time and we will discuss the results in class. A week after the discussion, exercises must be corrected by yourself and handed in for a second time (also via git repository). The first and the second correction are graded afterwards. Overall you can earn up to 60 credits for the grade bonus from the exercise. Exercises will be held remotely and live on the Thursday slot about each 3 to 4 weeks and will not be recorded.

Project

During the semester you will implement your own software router based on the packet processing framework DPDK. For this project we will provide you with several VMs hosted on servers of our chair. There will be graded milestones in this project. Overall you can earn up to 10 credits for the grade bonus from the project.

Grade Bonus

By successfully participating in exercise and project you can earn up to 15 extra credits on top of the credits you achieve for the written exam. You can earn 75 credits from the written exam; the credits from the exam suffice to get a grade of 1.0. The maximum achievable number of credits for the exercise is 60, and 10 for the project. Your final grade is calculated as follows:

bonusCredits = minimum(15, creditsExercise/6 + creditsProject)
finalGrade = grade(creditsFinalExam + bonusCredits)

Only passing grades (4.0 or better) can be improved with the bonus credits. The grade bonus is also valid for the retake exam.

In case of academic misconduct (e.g. copying without citing) in exercise or project leads to a disqualification from the bonus system.

Registration

Please register for the course and exam in TUMonline.

Exam

The date for the exam is February 28, 2022 starting at 11:30am (CET). This exam is conducted remotely via TUMexam, more details about the examination process will be presented in the lecture. The official date is published on TUMonline.

Retake Exam

There will be a written retake exam. Participation in the retake exam does not require the registration / participation in the regular exam. The grade bonus is also valid for the retake exam.

The preliminary date for the exam is April 11, 2022 starting at 2:15pm (CEST).