Course goals
Distributed algorithms for fault tolerance
Autumn 2003
During the first lecture a short investigation of backgrounds and
expectations
will be performed (on muddy cards). The following course goals will be
checked to be in line
with the results of this investigation.
- To get an insight into the history of development and importance
of
fault-tolerance algorithms for distributed systems.
- To understand what are the major classifications, concepts and
terms
which define classes of distributed systems, fault-tolerance problems
therein
and solutions to some of these problems: Elements of robust algorithms,
in particular concensus and broadcast algorithms,
group mechanisms and stablising algorithms.
- To understand the underlying failure models for which strong
results
are available.
- To understand major limitations of achieving fault-tolerance with
the
help of robust algorithms in an asynchronous setting.
- To study a well-known problem that is solvable within a
synchronous
setting: Byzantine agreement.
- To get an overview of stablising algorithms and to study examples
of
such algorithms.
Last Modified 03-11-03
Simin Nadjm-Tehrani