EECS 485: Web Systems

Summer 2020

A holistic course of modern web systems and technologies, covering front end and back end. Build an Instagram clone in the first half of the semester, and a Google clone in the second.

Syllabus

Course Meetings

The course will consist of live lectures and discussion/lab sessions. We will be using Zoom. All lectures and discussions/labs will be recorded and posted to Piazza.

• Lecture: MTWR 1:30 - 3:00PM Eastern time (yes, four days a week!)
  Lecture Zoom Link: https://umich.zoom.us/j/99643331691
  
• Discussion/Lab: MW 3:00 - 4:00PM Eastern time
  Discussion Zoom Link: https://umich.zoom.us/j/99062495076
  
• Office Hours:
  • MRF 9am-12pm; MW 7pm-10pm (with Emily)
  • MTW 10am-12pm; WF 10pm-12am (with Andrew)
  • MW 4pm-5pm (with Kevin)
  Office Hours Zoom Link: https://umich.zoom.us/j/91248476635
  Office hours are conducted through Zoom. Join the big room for group questions, and we'll make breakouts for individual questions.
  Join this Lobster OH Queue if you need individual attention.
  

The recordings are managed in a thread on Piazza. The lecture slides will be posted on the schedule below and on the public Google drive.

Course Resources

There are several resources you should be aware of this semester:

• Piazza will be the primary form of communication. If you have questions, please start by searching Piazza first. You are automatically enrolled in the course Piazza.
• Slack — We have set up a course-wide Slack channel for direct communication. You can use this to find and communicate with group members, or DM Kevin if you need individual attention outside of lecture and office hours. Join the Slack channel by clicking here (UM login required).
• autograder.io — You will submit projects to the autograder.io website. There are five projects in this course, all of which involve submission to autograder. You are automatically enrolled.
• GradeScope — GradeScope will be used to administer occasional quizzes. You are automatically enrolled.

Online Event Calendar

Open calendar in new window

This table will be updated regularly with links to slide decks.

Date	Content	Deadline
Wed Jul 1	Introduction (Slides)	Class Begins
Thu Jul 2	Web Basics (Slides)
Mon Jul 6	Dynamic Pages (Slides)
Tue Jul 7	Sessions (Slides)
Wed Jul 8	Encryption (Slides)
Thu Jul 9	Web Security (Slides)
Fri Jul 10		Project 1 Due
Mon Jul 13	REST APIs (Slides)
Tue Jul 14	Javascript 1 (Slides)
Wed Jul 15	Javascript 2 (Slides)
Thu Jul 16	Asynchronous Programming, React, Closures (Slides)
Fri Jul 17		Project 2 Due
Mon Jul 20	Networking (Slides)
Tue Jul 21	Google File System (Slides)
Wed Jul 22	Map Reduce (Slides)
Thu Jul 23	Exam Review
Fri Jul 24		Project 3 Due
Sat Jul 25		Midterm Exam Released
Mon Jul 27	Blockchain (Slides) Guest lecture by Tadge Dryja	Midterm Due Noon Eastern!
Tue Jul 28	Information Retrieval 1 (Slides)
Wed Jul 29	Information Retrieval 2 (Slides)
Thu Jul 30	Information Retrieval 3 (Slides)
Fri Jul 31
Mon Aug 3	Systems, Processes, Threads, and Sockets (Slides)
Tue Aug 4	Scaling Static and Dynamic Content (Slides)
Wed Aug 5	Machine Learning (Slides)
Thu Aug 6	Recommender Systems (Slides)
Fri Aug 7		Project 4 Due
Mon Aug 10	Ads and Auctions (Slides)
Tue Aug 11	Ethics (Bias moved to 8/12) (Slides)
Wed Aug 12	Bias, TOR, and Dark Web (Slides)
Thu Aug 13	Final Exam Review
Fri Aug 14		Project 5 Due
Sat Aug 15		Final Exam Released
Mon Aug 17	Career Planning, Interviews	Final Exam Due Noon Eastern!
Tue Aug 18		Class Ends Project 5 Due (no late submissions allowed)
Fri Aug 21

Syllabus

Course Summary: This course is a contemporary exploration of modern web-based information systems. It willintegrate concepts from multiple computer science topics used in the design, development, anddeployment of web-based applications, services, and knowledge systems. While broad inscope, it will also cover several key concepts in depth, including: web networking protocols, webdatabases and applications, web services, web search, web-relevant security issues,web infrastructure, and web-relevant data mining. Students will learn how to incorporate theseconcepts into an engineering process that includes design, analysis, development and testing,using technologies such as HTTP, XML, JavaScript, AJAX, and others.

Students will form teams to implement assignments on Linux-based web servers usingopen-source components. These assignments will culminate in students implementing their ownlarge-scale web search engine, roughly comparable to Google or Bing. At the end ofthis course, students will understand the science behind web-based information systems andthe engineering principles for building them.

Objectives

This course is about the design and development of information systems in wide area networks.Its primary goal is to take a holistic view of modern web systems and their constituenttechnologies. By the end of this course, successful students will be able to:

• Understand how n-tiered architectures can be used to implement secure, scalable systems.
• Design and develop database-driven websites and applications
• Understanding XML and JSON as messaging and data exchange mechanisms
• Utilize JavaScript to improve database-driven websites
• Analyze server logs to understand system performance and user behavior
• Understand designs for modern search engines and data centers
• Understand Web "semantic systems," such as auctions, recommendation systems, and search ranking.
• Understand critical components of the modern Web infrastructure: DNS, Content Delivery Networks, etc.
• Be confident about picking up a manual and quickly mastering any new web-relatedlanguage, at any level of the software "stack"

Prerequisites

Students are required to have taken EECS 281.

Textbook

There is no required textbook for this course. Optional sources include:

• JavaScript: the Good Parts, by Douglas Crockford
• Flask Web Development: Developing Web Applications with Python, by Miguel Grinberg

Course Communication

Piazza should be your primary resource for communicating with course staff. You are allowed to ask general questions, however, you must not post your own entire solutions to projects (doing so is a violation of the Honor Code). Please make private posts if you are unsure whether your question contains too much sensitive code.

You can also use the course Slack to communicate with each other and with course staff. However, this is not a guaranteed method of communication (e.g., Kevin may not respond immediately to Slack posts or Direct Messages).

If you have a private issue to discuss, email Kevin Leach (your primary instructor) at kjleach@umich.edu. Also Cc Emily and Andrew. Please put EECS 485 in the subject line of any email-based correspondence.

Course Projects

This course contains 5 programming assignments. The first is individual, and the remainder are in optional groups of 2 to 3. You can form a different group for each project. Course staff will randomly assign a group if you like. Groups are recommended, but not required.

All team members will normally earn the same grade on their joint work. At the end of each group assignment, we will ask each group member to describe and evaluate the contributions ofother group members. Based on this feedback, we may adjust the grades for students whosubstantially under-participate in projects to reflect their actual level of participation. In case of disputes regarding participation, an instructor may examine commit logs and/or interview group members on the project’s design and implementation.

For those retaking the course: if you submitted a project in a previous term, you may not be in agroup for that same project this term.

Exams

There are two exams this semester (see the Calendar). These cover all lecture, discussion, and project materials.

Exams will be delivered remotely. You will download a package containing an Exam PDF and a text file in which to supply answers. You will upload your answer file to a special URL (to be determined). You will have two hours to complete your exam after you download it. You are responsible for downloading, completing, and uploading your own exam.

Exams are open notes and internet, but you cannot discuss any part, question, or concept on the exam with anyone else. If you have a question, you must make a private Piazza post, a slack DM to course staff, or an email to course staff. Any communications during the exam window aside from those with course staff are considered an Honor Code violation.

Quizzes

From time to time, we will administer quizzes via GradeScope to ensure that you are staying on top of the material. These quizzes are trying to make sure you do not binge watch lecture recordings at the last minute. Quizzes will be released after lecture, and will be due before lecture the next day (due at 1:30PM eastern time the following day). There are no extensions or make ups for quizzes, and absolutely no late quizzes accepted. There are four types of quizzes:

• code word. We announce a word or phrase in lecture that you must enter to receive credit
• concept. You are given one to three questions on concepts discussed during a lecture period.
• summary. You are asked to summarize a lecture within four sentences or fewer
• activity. You are asked to participate in some online activity to receive credit.

Late Policy

The late policy is established only for Projects. We will not accept late quizzes. If you have an extenuating circumstance (bereavement, illness, etc.), then you must provide documentation. Extensions for projects are given at the discretion of course staff. Similarly, we may grant extensions on Exams based on unforeseen emergencies.

If you do not have a documented extenuating circumstance, then late submissions for Projects will be penalized by h% for h hours submitted late. For example, if you submit a Project 48 hours after the deadline on the course calendar, then we will remove 48% from your final score for that specific project. It is your responsibility to know the project deadlines and how late you are submitting.

Grading

Your grade is computed as follows

Assignment	Percentage of Grade
Programming Projects	10% each (50% for all 5)
Exam 1	20%
Final Exam	20%
Quizzes	5%
Professionalism	5%

To pass the course, you must receive a passing average Project score and a passing average Exam score. By default, the treshold for "passing" is 70%. However, if exam averages are lower than 80%, the passing threshold for the exams will be lowered to one standard deviation below the average exam score.

Professionalism

As a remote and compressed course, you are expected to comport yourself professionally. By default, you will be given your Professionalism points at the start (5% of your grade). There are three ways to lose your five Professionalism points.

• If you exhibit a pattern of asking questions on Piazza or via Slack DM that have already been answered or that are clearly part of the specification, then you will lose a point for each occurrence (out of five points).
• If the course staff directly email your UM email account, you must respond within four days. Each day you do not respond after four days will result in one point lost.
• If the course staff email you and request a direct face-to-face meeting, you must make time for it within the week unless you have an extenuating circumstance. If you do not make time to meet with the course staff within a week, you lose all your professionalism points.

At the instructor's discretion, if you receive a 0 on your Professionalism score, we reserve the right to give you a failing grade.