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Comp 464: Distributed Systems Y4s1 Question Paper

Comp 464: Distributed Systems Y4s1

Course:Bachelor Of Science In Computer Science

Institution: Kabarak University question papers

Exam Year:2009

COURSE CODE: COMP 464
COURSE TITLE: DISTRIBUTED SYSTEMS
STREAM: Y4S1
DAY: WEDNESDAY
TIME: 9.00 – 11.00 A.M.
DATE: 05/08/2009
INSTRUCTIONS:
ANSWER QUESTION ONE AND ANY OTHER TWO

QUESTION ONE 30MKS
a) What is a distributed system 2mks
b) What are the components of distributed systems 3mks
c) Discuss four characteristics of distributed systems 8mks
d) As a computer Science student. In what areas of management would you advice
Kabarak University to implement a distributed system. 4mks
e) State six key design issues to be considered when developing a distributed system
3mks
f) Discuss four essential properties of a transaction 8mks
g) Give any two examples of a distributed system 2mks
QUESTION TWO 20MKS
a) Assume you are a bank employee. Discuss any three reasons why you would advice
your Employer to implement a distributed system in managing the customers accounts
6mks
b) Discuss any three disadvantages of distributed systems 6mks
c) Compare and contrast an ordinary operating system and a distributed operating
Syste m 4mks
e) Discuss the importance of object oriented in distributed systems 4mks
QUESTION THREE 20MKS
a) Discuss four aspects of transparency 8mks
b) Give and briefly explain any four types of transparencies 12mks
QUESTION FOUR 20MKS
a) Discuss any three features of a good distributed file system 6mks
b) Give at least three advantages of file replication 3mks
d) What is Inter-Process Communication (IPC) 1mk
e) Discuss any three IPC mechanisms 6mks
f) Discuss any two models of communication in a DS 4mks
QUESTION FIVE 20MKS
a) State the ten steps of a remote procedural call (RPC) 5mks
b) What is the importance of replication in a DS 3mks
c) Give four examples of data stores in a DS 4mks
d) Give two examples of data centric consistency model 4mks
e) State the concurrency related problem that would result from each of the following
scenarios 4mks
i. Transaction A reads the current balance value. Transaction B updates the balance
from 500 to 600. Later, Transaction A immediately updates the balance by adding
50 to the original value, increasing it to 550. The balance now contains 550 and
B’s update is lost.
ii. A data item, holding say 500, is updated to 550 by transaction A. subsequently;
transaction B reads the data item (550) as the balance. Unfortunately, transaction
A aborts restoring the value 500 to the data item. Transaction B processed a dirty
value.
iii. Transaction B reads the current value of a data item, say 500. Transaction A
updates the data item to 550. Finally, transaction B completes its processing by rereading
the current value, but the new value 550 is returned.
iv. Transaction B processes all debit and credit transactions for a particular customer
by reading all relevant rows from a table. While processing the rows, transaction
A inserts a new row corresponding to a new credit transaction. Finally, transaction
A rereads all rows in the table as part of final processing. The number of rows in
the initial read does not match the number returned in the final read.

Comp 464: Distributed Systems Y4s1 Question Paper

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