Tia Newhall

Tia Newhall

Centennial Professor of Computer Science

Computer Science Department
Swarthmore College
500 College Ave
Swarthmore, PA 19081

office: 249 Sci Cntr
email: newhall [at] swarthmore.edu

(I go by Tia, she/her)

I'm a professor in the Computer Science Department at Swarthmore College. I received my Ph.D. in Computer Science in 1999 from the University of Wisconsin where I was advised by Bart Miller. My general research area is parallel and distributed systems.

Current Semester

Fall 2024 Schedule
    CS31 Introduction to Computer Systems 11:20 TR
Singer 33
    CS31.D Introduction to Computer Systems 1:O5: R Clothier 16
    CS93: TBA .
    Office Hours 2-4: M
and by appointment
Sci Ctr 249
    Research Fridays .

Past Courses:

Some links to past courses I've taught (most include links to course webpages from multiple past semesters):
  CS21   Introduction to Computer Science (most recent S'24)
  CS31   Introduction to Computer Systems (most recent F'24)
  CS35   Data Structures and Algorithms (most recent S'02)
  CS44   Database Systems (most recent F'20)
  CS45   Operating Systems (most recent S'14)
  CS75   Compilers (most recent S'09)
  CS87   Parallel & Distributed Computing (most recent F'23)
  CS85   Distributed Systems(S'08)
  CS97   Senior Conference (S'00)

Research

My general research area is parallel and distributed systems. My main projects, Nswap and Nswap2L, implement fast backing storage systems for cluster computers. Nswap is a network RAM system for Linux clusters. Nswap allows individual cluster nodes with over-committed RAM to locate and use idle RAM of other nodes in the cluster. The goal of the project is to speed-up the runtime of cluster applications by avoiding the slow swapping to disk that normally occurs when a node doesn't have enough RAM space for the programs it is running. Nswap2L implements a virtualization layer on top of a heterogeneous collection of cluster storage devices including Nswap Network RAM, Flash SSD, disk and other cluster-wide backing store. It is added as a single block device to individual cluster nodes that transparently manages block placement on the set of underlying heterogeneous storage devices.

Projects:

Grants:

Selected Publications

Textbook: Dive into Systems: A Free on-line Textbook

Selected Conference and Journal Publications (student co-authors marked with `*`)


Computer Science Graduate School Resources


Summer Research Opportunities for Undergraduates

CS Job Searching Resources


Diversity in Computer Science Links