(use default 1″ margins and 12-point font).
The paper needs to be technical in nature, i.e. while you can address the ethical, cultural, political, … issues, the brunt of the paper should link to the concepts discussed in class. Avoid the use of the personal tense (I, we, you), except at the end where you can conclude with a personal note, your view on the topic.
Add a separate cover page for the title (no page number). The final page should be an annotated bibliography (3+ sentences each). You should have 4+ on-topic sources. At least three should be “published” sources, which have been peer-reviewed or come from a curated collection. Do not include the bibliography in your page count.
Credit your sources carefully with foot- or end-notes. When using someone else’s words, use quotes. But quotes should be used very sparingly – when the author is well known, whose words carry more weight because of his/her authority, or when something is said in a very “poetic” way, where how it is said is as much of importance as what is said. In general you should paraphrase instead and put in your own words. Block quotes should be avoided (that’s where a couple of sentences are quoted verbatim and typically offset by increased margins and single spacing). Use the following Citation Reference from IEEE.
Proofread your paper carefully – do not exclusively depend on the spell checker. Check for grammar errors also (such as incomplete sentences, subject/verb agreement) etc. Make sure antecedents of pronouns are clear.
Your paper will be checked by TurnItIn – the similarity index it computes should be less than 10%.
Rubric:
1 Content: 50%
2 Organization (use of paragraphs, connecting sentences, intro and conclusion): 15%
3 Spelling and Grammar: 15%
4 Bibliography: 10%
5 Formatting (cover page, length, use of foot/endnotes,…): 5%
Topic:
While IBM’s 360 family dominated the mainframe market, DEC (Digital Equipment Corporation) was the leading vendor of minicomputer with their PDP line. Address the following (in no particular order):
• short overview of the major manufacturers (e.g. importance of the pioneering CDC 160A, DDP-116, DG’s Super Nova)
• how are minicomputers different from mainframes (in terms of architecture, target customers, packaging, applications, price, OEMs, …)
• how did minicomputers overcome the 2 drawbacks of shorter word lengths (address space and precision)
• what was IBM’s response to the competition of minicomputers
• what explains the popularity of DEC (a.o. DMA, transistors, Unibus, own vs lease…)
• overview of the DEC series
• short biography of Ken Olsen
• Grosch’s law
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