# Instaclustr Masters scholarship in conjunction with University of Canberra [Blog](/blog/)>[Team](/blog/category/team/)>Instaclustr Masters scholarship in conjunction with University of Canberra Instaclustr Masters scholarship in conjunction with University of Canberra ========================================================================== February 09, 2017 | By [ Ben Bromhead](https://www.instaclustr.com/blog/author/benb/) [ ](https://x.com/intent/tweet?text=Instaclustr%20Masters%20scholarship%20in%20conjunction%20with%20University%20of%20Canberra&url=https://www.instaclustr.com/blog/instaclustr-masters-scholarship-conjunction-university-canberra/) [ ](https://www.linkedin.com/shareArticle?mini=true&url=https://www.instaclustr.com/blog/instaclustr-masters-scholarship-conjunction-university-canberra/&title=&summary=Instaclustr%20Masters%20scholarship%20in%20conjunction%20with%20University%20of%20Canberra&source=) Overview -------- As part of our commitment to contributing back to the [Apache Cassandra open source project](https://cassandra.apache.org/) and the wider community we are always looking for ways we can foster knowledge sharing and improve usability of Cassandra itself. One of the ways we have done so previously was to open up our internal builds and versions of Cassandra (). We have also been looking at a few novel or outside the box ways we can further contribute back to the community. As such, we are sponsoring a masters project in conjunction with the Australian based University of Canberra. Instaclustr engineering team members will be available to provide advice and feedback to the successful candidate. Background ---------- Distributed database systems are relatively new technology compared to traditional relational databases. Distributed advantages provide significant advantages in terms of reliability and scalability but often at a cost of increased complexity. This complexity presents challenges for testing of these systems to prove correct operation across all possible system states. The scope of this masters scholarship is to use the Apache Cassandra repair process as an example to consider and improve available approaches to distributed database systems testing. The repair process in Cassandra is a scheduled process that runs to ensure the multiple copies of each piece of data that is maintained by Cassandra are kept synchronised. Correct operation of repairs has been an ongoing challenge for the Cassandra project partly due to the difficulty in designing and developing comprehensive automated tests for this functionality. Project scope ------------- The scope of this project is to: - survey and understand the existing testing framework available as part of the Cassandra project, particularly as it pertains to testing repairs: - consider, research and develop enhanced approaches to testing of repairs; and - submit any successful approaches to the Apache Cassandra project for feedback and inclusion in the project code base. Details ------- Australia is a pretty great place to advance your education and is welcoming of foreign students. We are also open to sponsoring a PhD project with a more in depth focus for the right candidate. For more details please don’t hesitate to get in touch with us at . [ Add Instaclustr as a preferred source on Google ](https://google.com/preferences/source?q=instaclustr.com) ![mail icon]()#### Get the latest articles for open sourceIn your inbox Sign up now ### Related content [ Zero Downtime Migration to Instaclustr Yes, we can migrate existing Cassandra clusters to Instaclustr without any downtime. Here's what to expect from the process... ](https://www.instaclustr.com/blog/zero-downtime-migration-to-instaclustr/) [ Workflow Comparison: Uber Cadence vs Netflix Conductor When choosing what’s right for your company’s opensource workflow needs it is important to know the difference and similarities ... ](https://www.instaclustr.com/blog/workflow-comparison-uber-cadence-vs-netflix-conductor/) [ Will Your Cassandra Database Project Succeed?: The New Stack Open source Apache Cassandra® continues to stand out as an enterprise-proven solution for organizations seeking high availability... ](https://www.instaclustr.com/blog/will-your-cassandra-database-project-succeed-the-new-stack/) ×Sign upto ourNewsletter -----------------------