Isolation is the semantic problem of systems. Virtualization buys performance by introducing self-reference. What a kernel cannot decide, it bounds. Fourteen sessions that build hypster, the hypervisor in selfie, into an operating system with processes, threads and locks, and turn a model checker on the result. Week 1 follows the selfie talk; the book is What is Intelligence? Discovering Unproven Truth, whose Computing chapter is this class. The purpose, shared with the companion classes, is a deep understanding of basic computer science principles, deep enough to position generative AI and whatever comes next properly.
| wk | station | deck | assignment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | spine | What is Selfie? | print-your-name | |
| 2 | II | The Machine, Again | assembler-parser | |
| 3 | III | Emulation | self-assembler | |
| 4 | III | Virtual Memory | ||
| 5 | III | Time-Sharing | processes | |
| 6 | III | Self-Hosting | fork-wait | |
| 7 | III | Processes | fork-wait-exit | |
| 8 | III | Concurrency | lock, threads | |
| 9 | III | Runtime Systems | threadsafe-malloc | |
| 10 | IV | Verifying Systems Code | treiber-stack, rotor-bounds | |
| 11 | IV | Cost | ||
| 12 | III | Universality for Systems | ||
| 13 | V | Agents as Processes | ||
| 14 | VI | What is a System? |
Assignments are autograded; see assignments/systems-assignments.md and the grader. Companion classes: Introduction to Computer Science and Compiler Construction.