CS 680 Internet Systems Research
Spring 2005

Description
Survey of Internet systems research including the anatomy of the web, search engine architecture and algorithms,  information retrieval, crawling, personalization, contextual computing, collaborative environments, peer-to-peer systems, personal information management systems, and the semantic web.
pre-requisite: CS 662 Artificial Intelligence (see instructor if you are missing this and would still like to take the course).

USEFUL LINKS: Paper Commentary Blog  Guidelines for Commenting  Special Lecture Series Course Wiki

FINAL REVIEW

Instructor
Dr. David Wolber
Office: Harney 539
Phone: (415) 422-6451
Email: wolber@usfca.edu
Homepage: www.cs.usfca.edu/~wolber
Office Hours: Mondays 3-4, Wednesdays 11-12, and by appointment.

Activities
Reading and Research-- Read seminal and current research papers to gain knowledge of the state-of-the-art and the process of research.

Produce a Documentary/Research Paper-- The goal of the projects is to produce publishable work in the form of a research paper or documentary video. The first project, encompassing the initial eight weeks of the semester, will produce a research paper along with other deliverables (code, wiki, etc.). The second project will produce a documentary video clip of 10-20 minutes (along with other deliverables).
 

Develop Innovative Software-- Though this course does not focus on software development, the research projects will require the development of software. Some projects will extend the existing Webtop system.

Develop Course Wiki/Blog -- The product of student commentaries will be a publicly available Internet Systems Research Blog and Wiki.

Course Structure
Prior to each class session: Each student will read the assigned paper and write commentaries following these guidelines. All commentaries should be cut-and-pasted into a single document, printed out, and brought to class.

Each class session: There will be a one hour discussion of the paper, including lecture and discussion. Students are required to participate in discussions and part of the grade is dependent on this participation. Generally, the other hour of the course will be devoted to the projects-- groups of 2 or 3 will meet, discuss, perform research on the web, give mini-reports to the class at large, develop software, etc. The professor will float between groups eavesdropping, suggesting, learning, etc. We will also have some guest speakers: Jim Pitkow from moreover.com, Eytan Adar from the HP Information Dynamics Lab, and Igor Ranitovic from the Internet Archive are already signed up.

The assigned papers allow for a breadth-first exploration of the field, while the projects allow for a more in-depth study of a particular area and an opportunity for creative work.

Students are also required to attend three research talks outside of class during the semester. These talks may be events in the Bay Area or from specific USF special lecture series talks. Your instructor will suggest a number of talks and you may suggest ones to him. Students will write commentaries as with the readings (see guidelines).

Projects
There will be two projects for the course, one due prior to spring break, and one at the end of the year.
Project I
Project II

Topics, Papers, Software, and Lectures
(Reading and Responses Due by class time on date given)

FINAL REVIEW

Grading

Important Dates