One Minute Evaluations for 4-6 February

CS 537 - Client-Server Interfaces

1. Topic: Stateful/stateless servers; sockets API.

   Didn't get: More TCP, UDP.

   One minute response: We're going to be using TCP and UDP more than studying them in this class.

2. Didn't get: Did not get stateful and stateless; how would parameterizing help to locate a server faster, like if I have only one server I would have to hardwire it.

   One minute response: State is memory; a stateless server can't remember anything. Parameterizing server location is not a technique for improving performance, but rather for improving flexibility. True, but what happens when there's another server; you client is now less flexible because it can't use the second server.

3. Topic: Client server interfaces; architectures.

   Didn't get: Difference between stateful and stateless servers; everything else was clear.

   One minute response: Imagine you go into a restaurant and say to the server "The usual." A stateful server understands what you mean; a stateless server doesn't and has to be given the full order each time .

4. Topic: Sockets, connections binding, everything was good. Client and server architecture was good too.

   Didn't get: If you have time, can you explain "everything in Unix is a file, including sockets".

   One minute response: Sure&comma but more accurately it should be "almost everything on Unix looks like a file." Plan 9, on the other hand...

5. Topic: Socket APIs, issues with client and server architectures, server architectures, Iterative and concurrent servers.

   Didn't get: Nothing.

6. Topic: API for sockets and connections; set-up, connect, tear-down in both UDP and TCP; single-threaded vs. multi-threaded servers.

   Didn't get: Didn't understand the uses of multi-thread servers.

   One minute response: Imagine a grocery store with one check-out register; that's a single-threaded server. Now imagine a grocery store with many check-out registers, all of them open; that's a multi-threaded server.

7. Topic: API, sockets, TCP, UDP initiator, responder, client issues, server issues, architectures.

   Didn't get: Initiator and responder are a little bit confusing.

   One minute response: "Initiator" is another name for a client; the client initiates interaction with the server. "Responder" is another name for a server; the server responds to the client's interaction.

8. Topic: We were talking about client-server communication, like establishment of connection; behavior of client-servers; performance constraints.

9. Topic: Client-server behaviors, architectures.

   Didn't get: More complex when to choose which architecture for servers with respect to concurrency.

   One minute response: We haven't considered concurrency yet; we'll start easy by looking at iterative architectures first.

10. Topic: About server and client implementations.

    Didn't get: About middleware, WSDL and how it does the mapping. Can you please explain these in other classes.

    One minute response: We'll be looking at the third section of the course.

11. Topic: We talked about the socket APIs and the client/server architectures.

    Didn't get: Trying to understand how to develop the toolkit.

    One minute response: You develop toolkits through experience; if you find yourself writing the same bit of code over and over (actually, you should only need to rewrite it once), it should be put in a function or a class and added to your toolkit, .

12. Topic: Client and server architecture.

    Didn't get: Didn't find much too difficult this time.

13. Topic: This week we learned about the implementation and architecture of clients and servers, and the Socket API.

    Didn't get: The concurrency in server is a little bit confusing and state vs. stateless servers.

    One minute response: We haven't covered concurrency fully; at this point you should understand only that concurrency is a technique for possibly improving server performance.

14. Topic: TCP, UDP transaction structure; sockets; three-way handshakes; four-way handshakes; client-server concurrency; behavior of iterative server.

15. Topic: UDP TCP responders and Initiators; client behavior and server behavior; issues; client skeleton; iterative vs. concurrency.

16. Topic: Client behavior; server behavior; API; functions like connect() and bind(); the difference between shutdown() and close(); concurrency vs. iteration.

This page last modified on 13 February 2003.