Cloud Computing Concepts, Part 1

Week 1 provides an orientation to cloud computing concepts, delving into the history, economics, and new aspects of clouds. Additionally, it covers the fundamental distributed system concept and introduces the MapReduce paradigm, scheduling, and fault-tolerance. The module also includes interviews with industry experts, providing valuable insights into the field.

Week 2 explores gossip, membership, and grids in the context of distributed systems. It delves into the multicast problem, the gossip protocol, group membership lists, failure detectors, and grid applications and infrastructure. The module also features an interview with an expert in the field, offering exclusive perspectives on the covered topics.

Week 3 focuses on peer-to-peer (P2P) systems, covering the introduction to P2P systems, along with specific examples such as Napster, Gnutella, FastTrack, BitTorrent, Chord, Pastry, and Kelips. Additionally, it features insights into the Blue Waters Supercomputer, providing a real-world perspective on the application of P2P systems.

Week 4 delves into key-value stores, time, and ordering in distributed systems, covering the rationale behind key-value/NoSQL, specific implementations such as Cassandra and HBase, and the principles of time and ordering. The module also includes an interview with an expert in the field, providing valuable insights into the covered topics.

Week 5 focuses on classical distributed algorithms, exploring global snapshot, multicast ordering, reliable multicast, virtual synchrony, the consensus problem, and specific algorithms like Paxos. The module also includes a conclusion to the course, preparing learners for the final exam and offering a space for reflection on the course experience.