Robert Marmorstein Assistant Professor Department of (Math and) Computer Science Longwood University East Ruffner 329 Tel: (434)395-2185 Office Hours: 1:00pm-2:00pm MTWRF or by prior appointment)

The Problem of the Month

The problem of the month and a list of past winners can be found here.

Classes

Assignments, syllabi, and class notifications can be accessed by following the links below. If you are a student in one of my classes, you should check the course web site at least once a week to be sure that you have not missed an important announcement (a new due date, for instance).

About me

I did my graduate work at the College of William and Mary, where my dissertation work was on Firewall Analysis and Repair (source code). As part of my research, I developed ITVal, a tool for verifying iptables-based firewalls on Linux. I have also been published in several Usenix conferences, including LISA and Freenix. I am a huge open-source fanatic and run Linux on pretty much everything I touch. My favorite distributions are Arch Linux and Gentoo. I am the faculty advisor for Longwood's acm chapter and serve as a member of the technology planning committee(TPPT).

About my family

Beth and I were married in 2004. She taught high school math until our daughter was born, but is now very happy to be a stay-at-home mom. Abby will turn 2 on Feburary 13th. We have another baby on the way, but are waiting to find out whether it will be a boy or a girl.

How to get (at least) a B in my classes

If you plan to pass my courses, there are four things that you absolutely need to do. Computer Science isn't a magical skill that some people are born with and others aren't. If you work hard at these four things, you will almost always be able to earn at least a "B" in my class. If you don't, you will probably not pass the course. They may seem kind of obvious, but most students who fail do so because they did not keep up in one of these four areas.

Show up for class on time

The book and other class resources are helpful, but usually are not enough to get you a passing grade in my class. It is very important to show up for each class to make sure that you are getting ALL of the material. Furthermore, if you don't show up for class, you are likely to miss assignments. I also give unannounced pop quizzes, so if you can't make it to a class be sure to clear it with me ahead of time.

Take notes in class

Not only will taking notes help you stay awake, they can also be an excellent means of reviewing. You don't need to write down everything I say, but it is probably a good idea to copy down any definitions, theorems, examples, or code I write on the board.

Complete assignments on time

Late work really hurts your grade. It also makes it harder to keep up with the rest of the class as we cover increasingly difficult material.

Take advantage of office hours

If you're really stuck on something, ask me about it. I won't do your work for you, but a lot of the time I can point you to a solution or help you understand what you missed.

Research

Whether or not you plan to go to grad school, a research project can be a great way to develop important research, writing, and technical skills. It is also a very good resume filler. Doing research on a topic you are interested in helps you develop marketable skills and build a deeper understanding of that area. If you are interested in pursuing a research project in operating systems, security, formal methods, or system administration, shoot me an e-mail or drop by my office to talk about setting up a 492 directed study course.

Current research projects

• Debugging Tools for Graphical Applications (with Michael Souza)
• Linux Kernel Driver Development for a USB nerf missile launcher (with Charlie Trainum)
• Active Learning in an upper-level Networking Course

Past research projects

• Adapting Linux firewall polices to XML (with Nathan Welch)
• Analysis of e-mail address harvesting using address poisoning(with Damian Bailey)

Other ideas for research

Here are some ideas for undergraduate research projects:

• Integrating intrusion detection tools with package management systems
• Implementation of a multicast-based image cloning system
• Developing open-source parental control software
• Performance comparison of Linux and Cisco QOS implementations
• Development of firewall testing and debugging tools
• Developing a Linux device driver
• Parallelizing algorithms which have mathematical or scientific significance

Publications

Here are some of my research publications. They can give you a good idea of which topics I have been working on recently: