CSCI1675

Designing High-Performance Network Systems

Fall 2026

How can we understand the performance of network systems and make them
faster? To explore this question, we will break it down into pieces,
including (i) how to define and measure a system’s performance, (ii) how
to determine what factors in the system’s design affect its performance,
and (iii) how to use this information to make the system faster. Through
lectures, labs, readings, and hands-on programming projects, we will
explore topics including throughput-latency curves, tradeoffs between
open and closed request generation, and concurrency. Hands-on projects
will involve modern Linux technologies such as perf and io_uring, as
well as modern microservice architecture tools such as Kubernetes and
distributed tracing frameworks. The class will consist of lectures,
short homework assignments that reinforce lecture content, and 4 project
assignments with programming and technical writing components that
explore these topics in greater detail.