Virtualized games for teaching about distributed systems

Authors:
Joel Wein;Kirill Kourtchikov;Yan Cheng;Ron Gutierez;Roman Khmelichek;Matthew Topol;Chris Sherman
Affiliations:
Polytechnic Institute of NYU, Brooklyn, NY, USA;Polytechnic Institute of NYU, Brooklyn, NY, USA;Polytechnic Institute of NYU, Brooklyn, NY, USA;Polytechnic Institute of NYU, Brooklyn, NY, USA;Polytechnic Institute of NYU, Brooklyn, NY, USA;Polytechnic Institute of NYU, Brooklyn, NY, USA;Polytechnic Institute of NYU, Brooklyn, NY, USA
Venue:
Proceedings of the 40th ACM technical symposium on Computer science education
Year:
2009

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Abstract

Complex distributed systems are increasingly important in modern computer science, yet many undergraduate curricula do not give students the opportunity to develop the skill sets necessary to grapple with the complexity of such systems. We have developed and integrated into an undergraduate elective course on parallel and distributed computing a teaching tool that may help students develop these skill sets. The tool uses virtualization to ease the burden of resourcing and configuring complex systems for student study, and creates varied "firefighting" gaming scenarios in which students compete to keep the system up and running in the presence of multiple issues. Preliminary experience indicates that (1) students find the tool engaging and (2) it is a manageable way in which to give students a novel perspective on interaction with complex distributed systems.