Syllabus
Computer Science EN.601.229
Computer Systems Fundamentals
Fall, 2025 (3 credits, E)

Please note that this syllabus could be updated during the semester. Any updates will be mentioned in class and on Courselore.

Instructor

David Hovemeyer, daveho@cs.jhu.edu

Office: Malone 240A

Office hours: Tuesday 12–2 pm, Thursday 1–3 pm, via Zoom (see Courselore for link)

Course Assistants

Head CAs:

CAs:

Coming soon!

Meeting

Class meetings are in-person:

Section 01: MWF 9:00–9:50 am, Hodson 213
Section 02: MWF 10:00–10:50 am, Hodson 213

Textbook

Recommended: Bryant and O’Halloran, Computer Systems: A Programmer’s Perspective, 3rd ed.

Optional: Computer Organization and Design (MIPS edition)

Online Resources

Lecture notes, assignments, and public information about the course will be posted on the course website, https://jhucsf.github.io/fall2025. You should check the course website frequently.

Courselore (announcements, discussion): https://courselore.org/

Gradescope (assignment/exam submission and grading): https://www.gradescope.com/ (note that you will access Gradescope using Canvas)

Videos will be posted on Canvas: go to http://my.jhu.edu, log in, choose Education → Canvas, choose EN.601.229.01.FA25 from courses, then choose Panopto Video

Course Information

Course Goals

By the end of the course you will

  1. Understand machine data types and arithmetic
  2. Be able to understand and write assembly language programs
  3. Understand machine-level memory organization
  4. Understand some types of machine-level security vulnerabilities and how to avoid introducing them
  5. Understand memory hierarchies
  6. Understand architectural features of modern processors, and how to optimize code for efficient execution
  7. Understand how linkers enable the creation of executables from separately-compiled modules
  8. Understand dynamic linking and run-time loading of shared objects
  9. Understand process address space layout
  10. Understand virtual memory translation hardware and how it is used for memory isolation and sharing
  11. Understand basic principles of computer networking
  12. Use networking APIs such as sockets to implement network applications
  13. Use concurrency using abstractions such as threads

This course will address the following Criterion 3 Student Outcomes:

Graduates of the program will have an ability to:

2) Design, implement, and evaluate a computing-based solution to meet a given set of computing requirements in the context of the program’s discipline.

Course Topics

Course Expectations & Grading

Class meetings will consist of lecture and discussion, interspersed with in-class activities.

Your course grade will be determined as follows:

You have a total of 120 late hours to use as needed for homework assignments throughout the course. If you are planning on using more than 48 late hours on an assignment, please send a private message to the instructors on Courselore to let us know. Assignment submissions which exceed the maximum number of late hours will (generally) not be considered for credit. Having said that, we understand that exceptional circumstances can arise. If you are in a situation where you think you may need additional late hours, please notify your instructor as soon as possible.

You are expected to attend class in person. The participation credit is earned by participating in peer instruction quizzes during class. You will need an iClicker remote to participate in these quizzes. Please see the Participation credit page for more information.

Grading scale

Note that upper bounds are exclusive and lower bounds are inclusive.

Average Letter grade
97 or above A+
93–97 A
90–93 A-
87–90 B+
83–87 B
80–83 B-
77–80 C+
73–77 C
70–73 C-
67–70 D+
60–67 D
below 60 F

Key Dates

The Schedule lists exam dates.

The Assignments page lists assignments and their due dates.

Assignments & Readings

The Schedule lists the topics and readings for each day.

The course’s Canvas site (under Panopto Video) hosts the lecture videos.

Ethics

The strength of the university depends on academic and personal integrity. In this course, you must be honest and truthful, abiding by the Computer Science Academic Integrity Code:

Cheating is wrong. Cheating hurts our community by undermining academic integrity, creating mistrust, and fostering unfair competition. The university will punish cheaters with failure on an assignment, failure in a course, permanent transcript notation, suspension, and/or expulsion. Offenses may be reported to medical, law or other professional or graduate schools when a cheater applies.

Violations can include cheating on exams, plagiarism, reuse of assignments without permission, improper use of the Internet and electronic devices, unauthorized collaboration, alteration of graded assignments, forgery and falsification, lying, facilitating academic dishonesty, and unfair competition. Ignorance of these rules is not an excuse.

Academic honesty is required in all work you submit to be graded. Except where the instructor specifies group work, you must solve all homework and programming assignments without the help of others. For example, you must not look at anyone else’s solutions (including program code) to your homework problems. However, you may discuss assignment specifications (not solutions) with others to be sure you understand what is required by the assignment.

If your instructor permits using fragments of source code from outside sources, such as your textbook or on-line resources, you must properly cite the source. Not citing it constitutes plagiarism. Similarly, your group projects must list everyone who participated.

Falsifying program output or results is prohibited.

Your instructor is free to override parts of this policy for particular assignments. To protect yourself: (1) Ask the instructor if you are not sure what is permissible. (2) Seek help from the instructor, TA or CAs, as you are always encouraged to do, rather than from other students. (3) Cite any questionable sources of help you may have received.

On every exam, you will sign the following pledge: “I agree to complete this exam without unauthorized assistance from any person, materials or device. [Signed and dated]”. Your course instructors will let you know where to find copies of old exams, if they are available.

Please note that submitting code, writing, or other products generated by AI (including but not limited to ChatGPT and Github Copilot) is considered to be a violation of academic ethics.

Policies

Mental Health Statement

Many students struggle at times with stress and mental health concerns. Johns Hopkins University Mental Health Services has a range of services to support students with their mental health. Beyond clinical services, JHU also has many resources available to support overall student well-being.

For 24/7 behavioral health support, The Johns Hopkins University Behavioral Health Crisis Support Team (BHCST) pairs experienced, compassionate crisis clinicians with specially trained public safety officers on every shift on and around the Homewood campus, seven days a week. The BHCST will provide immediate assistance to those who need it and link individuals in crisis to ongoing support services in the days and weeks that follow. BHCST can be reached directly at 410-516-9355 or by calling Public Safety, 410-516-4600 or 7777, and asking to be connected to a BHCST clinician.

If you have concerns about a yourself or another student, please contact:

Academic Integrity

The strength of the university depends on academic and personal integrity. In this course, you must be honest and truthful. Ethical violations include cheating on exams, plagiarism, reuse of assignments, improper use of the Internet and electronic devices, unauthorized collaboration, alteration of graded assignments, forgery and falsification, lying, facilitating academic dishonesty, and unfair competition.

Report any violations you witness to the instructor. You can also contact:

Disability Services

Johns Hopkins University is committed to providing welcoming, equitable, and accessible educational experiences for all students. If disability accommodations are needed for this course, students should request accommodations through Student Disability Services (SDS) as early as possible to provide time for effective communication and arrangements.

For further information about this process, please refer to the SDS Website or email SDS Homewood: studentdisabilityservices@jhu.edu.

Inclusivity

The following statement was provided by the Homewood Council on Inclusive Excellence and is incorporated into all WSE course syllabi.

Johns Hopkins University is committed to creating a classroom environment that values the diversity of experiences and perspectives that each student brings. Everyone deserves to be treated with dignity and respect. Fostering an inclusive climate is important because research and experience show that students who interact with peers who are different from themselves learn new things and experience tangible educational outcomes. We invite you to help create a welcoming, vibrant and intellectually engaging classroom climate. Note that you should expect to be challenged intellectually by the instructor, the TAs, and your peers, and at times this may feel uncomfortable. Indeed, growth often requires being pushed beyond your comfort zone. However, at no time in this learning process should someone be singled out or treated unequally based on any aspect of their identity (visible or invisible).

If you ever have concerns in this course about harassment, discrimination, or any unequal treatment, or if you seek accommodations or resources, please reach out to your instructor or the TAs, who will take your communication seriously and seek mutually acceptable resolutions and accommodations. Reporting will never impact your course grade. You may also share concerns with the department chair, the Director of Undergraduate Studies [link to heads/DUS document], the WSE Associate Dean of Outreach and Belonging (Darlene Saporu, dsaporu@jhu.edu), the KSAS Assistant Dean for Diversity and Inclusion (Araceli Frias, afrias3@jhu.edu) or the Office of Institutional Equity (oie@jhu.edu).

In handling reports, people will protect your privacy as much as possible, but faculty and staff are required to officially report information for some cases (e.g., sexual harassment).