ConcurrentMentor: A Visualization System for Distributed Programming Education

The study of distributed systems is increasingly fundamental to a Computer Science curriculum. Yet, the design of applications to run over distributed systems is complex and mastery of fundamental concepts is challenging for students. In order to assist in distributed systems instruction, we have developed ConcurrentMentor, a visualization system for distributed programming. This system reveals the behavior of a distributed program and its underlying communication protocols while the program executes. Input to the visualization system is generated by an accompanying communication library that closely follows abstractions of communication found in distributed systems literature. No program instrumentation is required