COMPUTER NETWORK

1. Data Communication Concepts A Communication model / layer

To discuss computer networking, it is necessary to use terms that have special meaning. Even other computer professionals may not be familiar with all the terms in the networking alphabet soup. As is always the case, English and computer-speak are not equivalent (or even necessarily compatible) languages. Although descriptions and examples should make the meaning of the networking jargon more apparent, sometimes terms are ambiguous. A common frame of reference is necessary for understanding data communications terminology. An architectural model developed by the International Standards Organization (ISO) is frequently used to describe the structure and function of data communications protocols. This architectural model, which is called the Open Systems Interconnect Reference Model (OSI), provides a common reference for discussing communications. The terms defined by this model are well understood and widely used in the data communications community - so widely used, in fact, that it is difficult to discuss data communications without using OSI's terminology. The OSI Reference Model contains seven layers that define the functions of data communications protocols. Each layer of the OSI model represents a function performed when data is transferred between cooperating applications across an intervening network. Figure 1.1 identifies each layer by name and provides a short functional description for it. Looking at this figure, the protocols are like a pile of building blocks stacked one upon another. Because of this appearance, the structure is often called a stack or protocol stack. Figure 1.1: The OSI Reference Model

A layer does not define a single protocol - it defines a data communications function that may be performed by any number of protocols. Therefore, each layer may contain multiple protocols, each providing a service suitable to the function of that layer. For example, a file transfer protocol and an electronic mail protocol both provide user services, and both are part of the Application Layer. Every protocol communicates with its peer. A peer is an implementation of the same protocol in the equivalent layer on a remote system; i.e., the local file transfer protocol is the peer of a remote file transfer protocol. Peer-level communications must be standardized for successful communications to take place. In the abstract, each protocol is concerned only with communicating to its peer; it does not care about the layer above or below it. However, there must also be agreement on how to pass data between the layers on a single computer, because every layer is involved in sending data from a local application to an equivalent remote application. The upper layers rely on the lower layers to transfer the data over the underlying network. Data is passed down the stack from one layer to the next, until it is transmitted over the network by the Physical Layer protocols. At the remote end, the data is passed up the stack to the receiving application. The individual layers do not need to know how the layers above and below them function; they only need to know how to pass data to them. Isolating network communications functions in different layers minimizes the impact of technological change on the entire protocol suite. New applications can be added without changing the physical network, and new network hardware can be installed without rewriting the application software.

Although the OSI model is useful, the TCP/IP protocols don't match its structure exactly. Therefore, in our discussions of TCP/IP, we use the layers of the OSI model in the following way: Application Layer The Application Layer is the level of the protocol hierarchy where user-accessed network processes reside. In this text, a TCP/IP application is any network process that occurs above the Transport Layer. This includes all of the processes that users directly interact with, as well as other processes at this level that users are not necessarily aware of. Presentation Layer For cooperating applications to exchange data, they must agree about how data is represented. In OSI, this layer provides standard data presentation routines. This function is frequently handled within the applications in TCP/IP, though increasingly TCP/IP protocols such as XDR and MIME perform this function. Session Layer As with the Presentation Layer, the Session Layer is not identifiable as a separate layer in the TCP/IP protocol hierarchy. The OSI Session Layer manages the sessions (connection) between cooperating applications. In TCP/IP, this function largely occurs in the Transport Layer, and the term "session" is not used. For TCP/IP, the terms "socket" and "port" are used to describe the path over which cooperating applications communicate. Transport Layer Much of our discussion of TCP/IP is directed to the protocols that occur in the Transport Layer. The Transport Layer in the OSI reference model guarantees that the receiver gets the data exactly as it was sent. In TCP/IP this function is performed by the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP). However, TCP/IP offers a second Transport Layer service, User Datagram Protocol (UDP), that does not perform the end-to-end reliability checks. Network Layer The Network Layer manages connections across the network and isolates the upper layer protocols from the details of the underlying network. The Internet Protocol (IP), which isolates the upper layers from the underlying network and handles the addressing and delivery of data, is usually described as TCP/IP's Network Layer. Data Link Layer The reliable delivery of data across the underlying physical network is handled by the Data Link Layer. TCP/IP rarely creates protocols in the Data Link Layer. Most RFCs that relate to the Data Link Layer discuss how IP can make use of existing data link protocols.

Physical Layer The Physical Layer defines the characteristics of the hardware needed to carry the data transmission signal. Features such as voltage levels, and the number and location of interface pins, are defined in this layer. Examples of standards at the Physical Layer are interface connectors such as RS232C and V.35, and standards for local area network wiring such as IEEE 802.3. TCP/IP does not define physical standards - it makes use of existing standards. The terminology of the OSI reference model helps us describe TCP/IP, but to fully understand it, we must use an architectural model that more closely matches the structure of TCP/IP. The next section introduces the protocol model we'll use to describe TCP/IP.

Data Communication. Networking types:- LAN, WAN, MAN. LAN LAN stands for Local Area Network. It's a group of computers which all belong to the same organisation, and which are linked within a small geographic area using a network, and often the same technology (the most widespread being Ethernet). A local area network is a network in its simplest form. Data transfer speeds over a local area network can reach up to 10 Mbps (such as for an Ethernet network) and 1 Gbps (as with FDDI or Gigabit Ethernet). A local area network can reach as many as 100, or even 1000, users. By expanding the definition of a LAN to the services that it provides, two different operating modes can be defined:

In a "peer-to-peer" network, in which communication is carried out from one computer to another, without a central computer, and where each computer has the same role. in a "client/server" environment, in which a central computer provides network services to users.

MANs MANs (Metropolitan Area Networks) connect multiple geographically nearby LANs to one another (over an area of up to a few dozen kilometres) at high speeds. Thus, a MAN lets two remote nodes communicate as if they were part of the same local area network. A MAN is made from switches or routers connected to one another with high-speed links (usually fibre optic cables).

WANs A WAN (Wide Area Network or extended network) connects multiple LANs to one another over great geographic distances. The speed available on a WAN varies depending on the cost of the connections (which increases with distance) and may be low. WANs operate using routers, which can "choose" the most appropriate path for data to take to reach a network node. The most well-known WAN is the Internet

Types of signals: Analog & Digital.

Analog & Digital Signals

In general, there are two types of telecommunication transmission--Analog transmission and Digital transmission.

Analog Transmission Analog transmission uses signals that are exact replicas of a sound wave or picture being transmitted. Signals of varying frequency or amplitude are added to carrier waves with a given frequency of electromagnetic current to produce a continuous electric wave. The term "analog signal" came about because the variations in the carrier waves are similar, or analogous, to that of the voice itself. For example, in analog transmission, say a telephone system, an electric current or the reproduction of patterned sound waves are transmitted through a wire and into the telephone receiver. Once this is completed, they are then converted back into sound waves.

Digital Transmission In digital transmission the signals are converted into a binary code, which consists of two elementspositive and non-positive. Morse code and the "on and off" flashing of a light are basic examples. Positive is expressed as the number 1, while non-positive is expressed as the number 0. Numbers that are expressed as a string of 0s and 1s are called binary numbers. Every digit in a binary number is referred to as a bit and represents a power of two. For example, in the binary number 101, the 1 at the right represents 1 x 2; the 0 in the middle represents 0 x 2; and the 1 to the far left represents 1 x 2. The decimal equivalent of 101 is (1 x 2) + (0 x 2) + (1 x

2) = 4 + 0 + 1 = 5. In a standard code used by most computers, the letter "A" is expressed in 8 bits as 01000001. As an example of digital transmission, in a type of digital telephone system, coded light signals produced by a rapidly flashing laser travels through optical fibers (thin strands of glass) and are then decoded by the receiver. When transmitting a telephone conversation, the light flashes on and off about 450 million times per second. This high rate enables two optical fibers to carry about 15,000 conversations simultaneously. Digital format is ideal for electronic communication as the string of 1s and 0s can be transmitted by a series of "on/off" signals represented by pulses of electricity or light. A pulse "on" can represent a 1, and the lack of a pulse "off" can represent a 0. Information in this form is very much easier to store electronically. Furthermore, digital transmission is usually faster and involves less noise and disturbances as compared to analog data transmission

Data encoding techniques.

Introduction

In order to transport digital bits of data across carrier waves, encoding techniques have been developed each with their own pros and cons. This document briefly describes some of the more common techniques.

Character Coding Techniques

Baudot

Jean-Maurice-Emile Baudot developed a character set in 1874 that used series of bits to represent characters that could be sent over a telegraph wire or radio signal. A 5-key keyboard was developed to implement this Baudot code that was modified by Donald Murray in 1901 and it became the International Telegraph Alphabet 1 (ITA1) and then developed into ITA2. ITA2 was

the coding that was actually implemented on equipment. Characters such as Line Feed (LF) were given a 5 bit code such as 00010.

The problem with using 5 bits for each character is that there is a limitation on the number of characters that can be generated from them, 25 gives 32 different combinations. This may be fine for 26 letters of the English alphabet but it is not enough to cover punctuation or control characters. Other coding techniques were needed.

Binary Coded Decimal (BCD)

BCD uses a series of 4 bits called a nibble to represent a decimal number, as the following table demonstrates:

Decimal 0 BCD

0000 0001 0010 0011 0100 0101 0110 0111 1000 1001

So for example, the number 1456 would be represented by 0001 0100 0101 0110. This makes it easier to convert numbers and for displays, however the electronics required in calculations is quite complex.

American Standard Code for Information Interchange (ASCII)

Originally published in 1963, ASCII is based on 7 bits to represent English characters and after a number of revisions ASCII now supports 95 printable characters and 33 control characters (a total of 2 7 = 128). ASCII is the americanised vsersion of that defined by CCITT in ISO 646 and is known as the International Alphabet 5 (IA5).

The first 32 characters are control characters and are represented by the 7-bit codes 000 0000 (null character) through to 001 1111 (unit separator). The 128th control character is 'delete' represented by 111 1111. The rest of the characters are printable and the coding caters for both lower and uppercase english letters e.g. the letter 'd' is represented by 110 0100 whereas its upper case equivalent is represented by 100 0100.

Extended Binary Coded Decimal Interchange Code (EBCDIC)

Around the same time that ASCII was developed, in 1964 IBM produced EBCDIC which is an 8-bit coding system designed to replace BCD within its computer systems. An EBCDIC byte is divided in two nibbles. The first four bits is called the zone and this represents the category of the character, the last four bits is called the digit and this identifies the specific character.

Different countries adapted EBCDIC for their own alphabets. The Chinese had a double byte extension that allowed them to display Chinese characters. IBM numbered the different character sets with Coded Character Set Identifier (CCSID) of which there are many around the world.

Unicode

Originally published in 1991 by the Unicode Consortium as Unicode 1.0 (in 2006 Unicode 5.0 was released), Unicode aims to provide a means for the traditional character sets around the world to take part in multilingual computer processing amongst themselves rather than have to translate into a Roman character set first.

The bit patterns of the 95 printable ASCII characters are sufficient to exchange information in modern English, however many languages that use the Latin alphabet need additional symbols not covered by ASCII. ISO/IEC 8859 attempts to address this by utilising the eighth bit in an 8bit byte in order to allow positions for another 128 characters. This bit was previously used for data transmission protocol information, or was left unused. Even more characters were needed than could fit in a single 8-bit character encoding, so several mappings were developed. ISO/IEC 8859 comes in parts and these are given a number e.g. ISO 8859-15.

Unicode creates codes for the characters or basic graphical representation of the character (called a 'grapheme'). The first 256 code points have been reserved for ISO 5589-1 in order to make it straightforward to convert the Roman text. There are two Unicode mapping methods; Unicode Transformation Format (UTF) and Unicode Character Set (UCS). An encoding maps the range of Unicode code points to sequences of values in a fixed-size range of code values. The numbers in the names of the encodings indicate the number of bits in one code value (for UTF encodings) or the number of bytes per code value (for UCS) encodings. UCS assigns a code per character. UCS-2 uses two bytes per character, UCS-4 uses 4 bytes per character.

Some Unicode examples:

UTF-7 a 7-bit encoding, often considered obsolete (not part of Unicode but rather an RFC)

UTF-8 an 8-bit, variable-width encoding, which maximizes compatibility with ASCII. In common use and is in fact a superset of ASCII. The IMC and IETF use UTF-8 when determining standards for supporting email and Internet traffic. UTF-EBCDIC an 8-bit variable-width encoding, which maximizes compatibility with EBCDIC. (not part of Unicode) UTF-16 a 16-bit, variable-width encoding. In common use. UTF-32 a 32-bit, fixed-width encoding

Manchester Phase Encoding (MPE)

802.3 Ethernet uses Manchester Phase Encoding (MPE). A data bit '1' from the level-encoded signal (i.e. that from the digital circuitry in the host machine sending data) is represented by a full cycle of the inverted signal from the master clock which matches with the '0' to '1' rise of the phase-encoded signal (linked to the phase of the carrier signal which goes out on the wire). i.e. V in the first half of the signal and +V in the second half.

The data bit '0' from the level-encoded signal is represented by a full normal cycle of the master clock which gives the '1' to '0' fall of the phase-encoded signal. i.e. +V in the first half of the signal and -V in the second half.

The above diagram shows graphically how MPE operates. The example at the bottom of the diagram indicates how the digital bit stream 10110 is encoded.

A transition in the middle of each bit makes it possible to synchronize the sender and receiver. At any instant the ether can be in one of three states: transmitting a 0 bit (-0.85v), transmitting a 1 bit (0.85v) or idle (0 volts). Having a normal clock signal as well as an inverted clock signal leads to regular transitions which means that synchronisation of clocks is easily achieved even if there are a series of '0's or '1's. This results in highly reliable data transmission. The master clock speed for Manchester encoding always matches the data speed and this determines the carrier signal frequency, so for 10Mbps Ethernet the carrier is 10MHz.

Differential Manchester Encoding (DME)

A '1' bit is indicated by making the first half of the signal, equal to the last half of the previous bit's signal i.e. no transition at the start of the bit-time. A '0' bit is indicated by making the first half of the signal opposite to the last half of the previous bit's signal i.e. a zero bit is indicated by a transition at the beginning of the bit-time. In the middle of the bit-time there is always a transition, whether from high to low, or low to high. Each bit transmitted means a voltage change always occurs in the middle of the bit-time to ensure clock synchronisation. Token Ring uses DME and this is why a preamble is not required in Token Ring, compared to Ethernet which uses Manchester encoding.

Non Return to Zero (NRZ)

NRZ encoding uses 0 volts for a data bit of '0' and a +V volts for a data bit of '1'. The problem with this is that it is difficult to distinguish a series of '1's or '0's due to clock synchronisation issues. Also, the average DC voltage is 1/2V so there is high power output. In addition, the bandwidth is large i.e. from 0Hz to half the data rate because for every full signal wave, two bits of data can be transmitted (remember that with MPE the data rate equals the bit rate which is even more inefficient!) i.e. two bits of information are transmitted for every cycle (or hertz).

After 50m of cable attenuation the signal amplitude may have been reduced to 100mV giving an induced noise tolerance of 100mV.

Return to Zero (RZ)

With RZ a '0' bit is represented by 0 volts whereas a '1' data bit is represented by +V volts for half the cycle and 0 volts for the second half of the cycle. This means that the average DC voltage is reduced to 1/4V plus there is the added benefit of there always being a voltage change even if there are a series of '1's. Unfortunately, the efficiency of bandwidth usage decreases if there are a series of '1's since now a '1' uses a whole cycle.

Non Return to Zero Invertive (NRZ-I)

With NRZ-I a '1' bit is represented by 0 volts or +V volts depending on the previous level. If the previous voltage was 0 volts then the '1' bit will be represented by +V volts, however if the previous voltage was +V volts then the '1' bit will be represented by 0 volts. A '0' bit is represented by whatever voltage level was used previously. This means that only a '1' bit can 'invert' the voltage, a '0' bit has no effect on the voltage, it remains the same as the previous bit whatever that voltage was.

This can be demonstrated in the following examples for the binary patterns 10110 and 11111:

Note how that a '1' inverts the voltage whilst a '0' leaves it where it is. This means that the encoding is different for the same binary pattern depending on the voltage starting point.

The bandwidth usage is minimised with NRZ-I, plus there are frequent voltage changes required for clock synchronisation.

With fibre there are no issues with power output so a higher clock frequency is fine whereas with copper NRZ-I would not be acceptable.

4B/5B

4B/5B encoding is sometimes called 'Block coding'. To get around this problem, an intermediate encoding takes place before the MLT-3 encoding. Each 4-bit 'nibble' of received data has an extra 5th bit added. If input data is dealt with in 4-bit nibbles there are 24 = 16 different bit patterns. With 5-bit 'packets' there are 25 = 32 different bit patterns. As a result, the 5-bit patterns can always have two '1's in them even if the data is all '0's a translation occurs to another of the bit patterns. This enables clock synchronisations required for reliable data transfer.

Notice that the clock frequency is 125MHz. The reason for this is due to the 4B/5B encoding. A 100MHz signal would not have been enough to give us 100Mbps, we need a 125MHz clock.

5B/6B

Same idea as 4B/5B but you can have DC balance (3 zero bits and 3 one bits in each group of 6) to prevent polarisation. 5B/6B Encoding is the process of encoding the scrambled 5-bit data patterns into predetermined 6-bit symbols. This creates a balanced data pattern, containing equal numbers of 0's and 1's, to provide guaranteed clock transitions synchronization for receiver circuitry, as well as an even power value on the line.

5B6B encoding also provides an added error-checking capability. Invalid symbols and invalid data patterns, such as more than three 0's or three 1's in a row, are easily detected

For 100VG-AnyLAN for instance, the clock rate on each wire is 30MHz, therefore 30Mbits per second are transmitted on each pair giving a total data rate of 120Mbits/sec. Since each 6-bits of

data on the line represents 5 bits of real data due to the 5B/6B encoding, the rate of real data being transmitted is 25Mbits/sec on each pair, giving a total rate of real data of 100Mbits/sec. For 2-pair STP and fiber, the data rate is 120Mbits/sec on the transmitting pair, for a real data transmission rate of 100Mbits/sec.

8B/6T

8B/6T means send 8 data bits as six ternary (one of three voltage levels) signals. 3/4 (6/8) wave transitions transitions per bit i.e. the carrier just needs to be running at 3/4 of the speed of the data rate.

The incoming data stream is split into 8-bit patterns. Each 8-bit data pattern with two voltage levels 0 volts and V volts is examined. This 8-bit pattern is then converted into a 6-bit pattern but using three voltage levels -V, 0 and V volts, so each 8-bit pattern has a unique 6T code. For example the bit pattern 0000 0000 (0x00) uses the code +-00+- and 0000 1110 (0x)E) uses the code -+0-0+. There are 36 = 729 possible patterns (symbols). The rules for the symbols are that there must be at least two voltage transitions (to maintain clock synchronisation) and the average DC voltage must be zero (this is called 'DC balance' that is the overall DC voltage is summed up to 0v, the +V and -V transitions are evenly balanced either side of 0V) which stops any polarisation on the cable.

The maximum frequency that the 6T codes could generate on one carrier is 37.5MHz. FCC rules do not allow anything above 30MHz on cables and Category 3 cable does not allow anything above 16MHz (which is what 100BaseT4 was designed for). The 100BaseT4 standard uses 8B/6T encoding on three pairs in a round robin fashion such that the maximum carrier frequency on any single pair is 37.5/3 = 12.5MHz.

8B/10B

Each octet of data is examined and assigned a 10 bit code group. The data octet is split up into the 3 most significant bits and the 5 least significant bits. This is then represented as two decimal numbers with the least significant bits first e.g. for the octet 101 00110 we get the decimal 6.5. 10 bits are used to create this code group and the naming convention follows the format /D6.5/. There are also 12 special code groups which follow the naming convention /Kx.y/.

The 10 bit code groups must either contain five ones and five zeros, or four ones and six zeros, or six ones and four zeros. This ensures that not too many consecutive ones and zeros occurs between code groups thereby maintaining clock synchronisation. Two 'commas' are used to aid in bit synchronisation, these 'commas' are the 7 bit patterns 0011111 (+comma)and 1100000 (comma).

In order to maintain a DC balance, a calculation called the Running Disparity calculation is used to try to keep the number of '0's transmitted the same as the number of '1's transmitted.

This uses 10 bits for each 8 bits of data and therefore drops the data rate speed relative to the line speed, for instance in order to gain a data rate of 1Gbps the line peed has to be 10/8 x 1 = 1.25Gbps .

MLT-3

This scheme was specified by ANSI X3T9.5 committee. It is used by FDDI and TP-PMD to obtain 100MB/s out of a 31.25MHz signal.

UTP is low pass in nature, meaning that it hinders high frequency signal (like a low-pass filter). So it is not feasible to merely increase the clock frequency by 10 to 100MHz and use Manchester encoding to give us 100Mbps. In addition, the FCC (Federal Communications Commission) have severely curtailed the power that is allowed to be emitted above 30MHz. We have to use another encoding technique in order to transmit high data rates across UTP.

If you take an averaging spectrum analyser and look at the output signal of the 10Mbps Ethernet phase-encoded signal, you will see a power peak at 10MHz where there is a stream of '1's or '0's, you will see a smaller harmonic at 30MHz and if there is a stream of '1's and '0's, you will see a peak at 5MHz. Now 100BaseT uses a master clock running at 125MHz instead of 10MHz. The equivalent peaks would then be at 125MHz, 375MHz and 62.5MHz. Transmission electronics designed to work within the FCC rules will block the frequencies higher than 30MHz.

To get around this issue we need to concentrate the signal power below 30MHz if possible. To do this the encoding method Multi-Level Transition 3 (MLT-3) is used. This involves using the pattern 1, 0, -1, 0. If the next data signal is a '1' then the output 'transitions' to the next bit in the pattern e.g. if the last output bit was a '-1', and the input bit is a '1', then the next output bit is a '0'. If the next data signal is a '0' then there is no transition which means that the next output bit is the same as last time, in our case a '0'.

The cycle length of the output signal is therefore going to be 1/4 that of the MPE method so that instead of the main signal peak being at 125MHz as measured by the averaging spectrum analyser, it will be at 31.25MHz which is near enough to be OK as far as FCC are concerned. 5

bits are transmitted for every 4 bits of data so that the data bit rate is actually 125Mb/s for 100Mb/s data throughput.

There is an issue with this in that you can end up with a series of '0's or '1's which force the local circuitry to count the bits using its own free running clock rather than have the check of the clock synchronisation from the transmit source.

PAM-5

This employs multi-level amplitude signalling. To encode 8 bits, 28 = 256 codes or symbols, are required since there are 256 possible pattern combinations. A five level signal (e.g. -2v, -1v, 0v, 1v and 2v) called Pulse Amplitude Modulation 5 is used (This works in a similar manner to MLT-3). Bearing in mind that there are 4 separate pairs being used for transmission and reception of data, this gives us a possibility of 54 = 625 codes to choose from when using all four pairs. Actually only four levels are used for data, the fifth level (0v) is used for the 4-dimensional 8-state Trellis Forward Error Correction used to recover the transmitted signal from the high noise.

If you plot time (nanoseconds) against voltage you will see an 'eye pattern' effect showing the different signal levels. Comparing a plot for MLT-3 against PAM-5 will demonstrate how that the separate levels for PAM-5 are less discreet. This is why extra convolution coding is used called Trellis coding, which uses Viterbi decoding for error detection and correction.

2 bits are represented per symbol and the symbol rate is 125Mbps in each direction on a pair because the clock rate is set at 125MHz. This gives 250Mbps data per pair and therefore 1000Mbps for the whole cable.

This type of encoding is used by Gigabit Ethernet. The data signals have distinct and measurable amplitude and phases relative to a 'marker signal'. Using this two way matrix allows more data bits per cycle, in the case of Gigabit Ethernet 1000Mbps is squeezed into 125MHz signals. The electronics are more complex and the technology is more susceptible to noise. Bandwidth concepts.

Bandwidth is the difference between the upper and lower frequencies in a continuous set of frequencies. It is typically measured in hertz, and may sometimes refer to passband bandwidth, sometimes to baseband bandwidth, depending on context. Passband bandwidth is the difference between the upper and lower cutoff frequencies of, for example, an bandpass filter, a

communication channel, or a signal spectrum. In case of a low-pass filter or baseband signal, the bandwidth is equal to its upper cutoff frequency. Bandwidth in hertz is a central concept in many fields, including electronics, information theory, digital communications, radio communications, signal processing, and spectroscopy. A key characteristic of bandwidth is that a band of a given width can carry the same amount of information, regardless of where that band is located in the frequency spectrum.[note 1] For example, a 3 kHz band can carry a telephone conversation whether that band is at baseband (as in your POTS telephone line) or modulated to some higher frequency Bandwidth is a key concept in many telephony applications. In radio communications, for example, bandwidth is the frequency range occupied by a modulated carrier wave, whereas in optics it is the width of an individual spectral line or the entire spectral range. In many signal processing contexts, bandwidth is a valuable and limited resource. For example, an FM radio receiver's tuner spans a limited range of frequencies. A government agency (such as the Federal Communications Commission in the United States) may apportion the regionally available bandwidth to broadcast license holders so that their signals do not mutually interfere. Each transmitter owns a slice of bandwidth, a valuable (if intangible) commodity. For different applications there are different precise definitions. For example, one definition of bandwidth could be the range of frequencies beyond which the frequency function is zero. This would correspond to the mathematical notion of the support of a function (i.e., the total "length" of values for which the function is nonzero). A less strict and more practically useful definition will refer to the frequencies where the frequency function is small. Small could mean less than 3 dB below (i.e., power output < 1/2 or voltage output < 0.707 of) the maximum value, or more rarely 10 dB below, or it could mean below a certain absolute value. As with any definition of the width of a function, many definitions are suitable for different purposes. Bandwidth typically refers to baseband bandwidth in the context of, for example, sampling theorem and Nyquist sampling rate, while it refers to passband bandwidth in the context of Nyquist symbol rate or Shannon-Hartley channel capacity for communication systems X-dB bandwidth

A graph of a bandpass filter's gain magnitude, illustrating the concept of 3 dB bandwidth at a gain of 0.707. The frequency axis of this symbolic diagram can be linear or logarithmically scaled. In some contexts, the signal bandwidth in hertz refers to the frequency range in which the signal's spectral density is nonzero or above a small threshold value. That definition is used in calculations of the lowest sampling rate that will satisfy the sampling theorem. Because this range of non-zero amplitude may be very broad or infinite, this definition is typically relaxed so that the bandwidth is defined as the range of frequencies in which the signal's spectral density is above a certain threshold relative to its maximum. Most commonly, bandwidth refers to the 3-dB bandwidth, that is, the frequency range within which the spectral density (in W/Hz or V2/Hz) is above half its maximum value (or the spectral amplitude, in V or V/Hz, is more than 70.7% of its maximum); that is, above 3 dB relative to the peak.[1] The word bandwidth applies to signals as described above, but it could also apply to systems, for example filters or communication channels. To say that a system has a certain bandwidth means that the system can process signals of that bandwidth, or that the system reduces the bandwidth of a white noise input to that bandwidth. The 3 dB bandwidth of an electronic filter or communication channel is the part of the system's frequency response that lies within 3 dB of the response at its peak, which in the passband filter case is typically at or near its center frequency, and in the lowpass filter is near 0 hertz. If the maximum gain is 0 dB, the 3 dB gain is the range where the gain is more than -3dB, or the attenuation is less than + 3dB. This is also the range of frequencies where the amplitude gain is above 70.7% of the maximum amplitude gain, and above half the maximum power gain. This same "half power gain" convention is also used in spectral width, and more generally for extent of functions as full width at half maximum (FWHM). In electronic filter design, a filter specification may require that within the filter passband, the gain is nominally 0 dB +/- a small number of dB, for example within the +/- 1 dB interval. In the stopband(s), the required attenuation in dB is above a certain level, for example >100 dB. In a transition band the gain is not specified. In this case, the filter bandwidth corresponds to the passband width, which in this example is the 1dB-bandwidth. If the filter shows amplitude ripple within the passband, the x dB point refers to the point where the gain is x dB below the nominal passband gain rather than x dB below the maximum gain. A commonly used quantity is fractional bandwidth. This is the bandwidth of a device divided by its center frequency. E.g., a passband filter that has a bandwidth of 2 MHz with center frequency 10 MHz will have a fractional bandwidth of 2/10, or 20%. In communication systems, in calculations of the ShannonHartley channel capacity, bandwidth refers to the 3dB-bandwidth. In calculations of the maximum symbol rate, the Nyquist sampling rate, and maximum bit rate according to the Hartley formula, the bandwidth refers to the frequency range within which the gain is non-zero, or the gain in dB is below a very large value.

The fact that in equivalent baseband models of communication systems, the signal spectrum consists of both negative and positive frequencies, can lead to confusion about bandwidth, since they are sometimes referred to only by the positive half, and one will occasionally see expressions such as , where is the total bandwidth (i.e. the maximum passband bandwidth of the carrier-modulated RF signal and the minimum passband bandwidth of the physical passband channel), and is the positive bandwidth (the baseband bandwidth of the equivalent channel model). For instance, the baseband model of the signal would require a lowpass filter with cutoff frequency of at least to stay intact, and the physical passband channel would require a passband filter of at least to stay intact. In signal processing and control theory the bandwidth is the frequency at which the closed-loop system gain drops 3 dB below peak. In basic electric circuit theory, when studying band-pass and band-reject filters, the bandwidth represents the distance between the two points in the frequency domain where the signal is of the maximum signal amplitude (half power). [edit] Antenna systems In the field of antennas, two different methods of expressing relative bandwidth are used for narrowband and wideband antennas.[2] For either, a set of criteria is established to define the extents of the bandwidth, such as input impedance, pattern, or polarization. Percent bandwidth, usually used for narrowband antennas, is used defined as . The theoretical limit to percent bandwidth is 200%, which occurs for .

Fractional bandwidth or Ratio bandwidth, usually used for wideband antennas, is defined as and is typically presented in the form of . Fractional bandwidth is used for wideband antennas because of the compression of the percent bandwidth that occurs mathematically with percent bandwidths above 100%, which corresponds to a fractional bandwidth of 3:1.

Channel capacity.

In electrical engineering, computer science and information theory, channel capacity is the tightest upper bound on the amount of information that can be reliably transmitted over a communications channel. By the noisy-channel coding theorem, the channel capacity of a given channel is the limiting information rate (in units of information per unit time) that can be achieved with arbitrarily small error probability. Information theory, developed by Claude E. Shannon during World War II, defines the notion of channel capacity and provides a mathematical model by which one can compute it. The key result states that the capacity of the channel, as defined above, is given by the maximum of the mutual information between the input and output of the channel, where the maximization is with respect to the input distribution Formal definition

Let X represent the space of signals that can be transmitted, and Y the space of signals received, during a block of time over the channel. Let

be the conditional distribution function of Y given X. Treating the channel as a known statistic system, is an inherent fixed property of the communications channel (representing the nature of the noise in it). Then the joint distribution

of X and Y is completely determined by the channel and by the choice of

the marginal distribution of signals we choose to send over the channel. The joint distribution can be recovered by using the identity

Under these constraints, next maximize the amount of information, or the message, that one can communicate over the channel. The appropriate measure for this is the mutual information , and this maximum mutual information is called the channel capacity and is given by

[edit] Noisy-channel coding theorem The noisy-channel coding theorem states that for any > 0 and for any rate R less than the channel capacity C, there is an encoding and decoding scheme that can be used to ensure that the probability of block error is less than for a sufficiently long code. Also, for any rate greater than the channel capacity, the probability of block error at the receiver goes to one as the block length goes to infinity. [edit] Example application An application of the channel capacity concept to an additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN) channel with B Hz bandwidth and signal-to-noise ratio S/N is the ShannonHartley theorem:

C is measured in bits per second if the logarithm is taken in base 2, or nats per second if the natural logarithm is used, assuming B is in hertz; the signal and noise powers S and N are measured in watts or volts2, so the signal-to-noise ratio here is expressed as a power ratio, not in decibels (dB); since figures are often cited in dB, a conversion may be needed. For example, 30 dB is a power ratio of .

[edit] Channel capacity in wireless communications This section[4] focuses on the single-antenna, point-to-point scenario. For channel capacity in systems with multiple antennas, see the article on MIMO. [edit] AWGN channel If the average received power is AWGN channel capacity is [W] and the noise power spectral density is [W/Hz], the

[bits/Hz],

where

is the received signal-to-noise ratio (SNR).

When the SNR is large (SNR >> 0 dB), the capacity is logarithmic in power and approximately linear in bandwidth. This is called the bandwidth-limited regime.

When the SNR is small (SNR << 0 dB), the capacity insensitive to bandwidth. This is called the power-limited regime.

is linear in power but

The bandwidth-limited regime and power-limited regime are illustrated in the figure.

AWGN channel capacity with the power-limited regime and bandwidth-limited regime indicated. Here, .

[edit] Frequency-selective channel The capacity of the frequency-selective channel is given by so-called waterfilling power allocation,

where to meet the power constraint. [edit] Slow-fading channel

and

is the gain of subchannel

, with chosen

In a slow-fading channel, where the coherence time is greater than the latency requirement, there is no definite capacity as the maximum rate of reliable communications supported by the channel, , depends on the random channel gain . If the transmitter

encodes data at rate [bits/s/Hz], there is a certain probability that the decoding error probability cannot be made arbitrarily small, , in which case the system is said to be in outage. With a non-zero probability that the channel is in deep fade, the capacity of the slow-fading channel in strict sense is zero. However, it is possible to determine the largest value of such that the outage probability is less than . This value is known as the -outage capacity.

Synchronous and asynchronous transmission.

Synchronous and asynchronous transmissions are two different methods of transmission synchronization. Synchronous transmissions are synchronized by an external clock, while asynchronous transmissions are synchronized by special signals along the transmission medium.

The need for synchronization Whenever an electronic device transmits digital (and sometimes analogue) data to another electronic device, there must be a certain rhythm established between the two devices, i.e., the receiving device must have some way of knowing, within the context of the fluctuating signal that it's receiving, where each unit of data begins and where it ends. For example, a television transmitter produces a continuous stream of data in which each horizontal line of image must be distinguishable from the preceding and succeeding lines, so that a TV will be able to distinguish between them upon reception. Or, a serial data signal between two PCs must have individual bits and bytes that the receiving PC can distinguish. If it doesn't, then the receiving PC can't tell where one byte or bit ends and the next one begins. So the signal must be synchronized in a way that the receiver can distinguish the bits and bytes as the transmitter intends them to be distinguished. Methods of synchronization There are two ways to synchronize the two ends of the communication. The synchronous signalling methods use 2 different signals. A pulse on one signal indicates when another bit of information is ready on the other signal.

The asynchronous signalling methods use only 1 signal. The receiver uses transitions on that signal to figure out the transmitter bit rate ("autobaud") and timing, and set a local clock to the proper timing, typically using a phase-locked loop (PLL) to synchronize with the transmission rate. A pulse from the local clock indicates when another bit is ready. Data/strobe synchronous transmission In synchronous transmission, the stream of data to be transferred is encoded as fluctuating voltages on one wire, and a periodic pulse of voltage is put on another wire (often called the "clock" or "strobe") that tells the receiver "here's where one bit/byte ends and the next one begins". Practically all parallel communications protocols use such synchronous transmission. For example, in a computer, address information is transmitted synchronouslythe address bits over the address bus, and the read strobe in the control bus.

Single-wire synchronous signalling Synchronization can also be embedded into a signal on a single wire. In differential Manchester encoding, used on broadcast quality video tape systems[citation needed], each transition from a low to high or high to low represents a logical zero. A logical one is indicated when there are two transitions in the same time frame as a zero. Another example is the Manchester code where a transition from low to high indicates a one and a transition from high to low indicates a zero. When there are successive ones or zeros, an opposite transition is required on the edge of the time frame to prepare for the next transition. Asynchronous transmission Main article: Asynchronous communication In one form of asynchronous transmission, there is only one wire/signal carrying the transmission. The transmitter sends a stream of data and periodically inserts a certain signal element into the stream which can be "seen" and distinguished by the receiver as a sync signal. That sync signal might be a single pulse (a "start bit" in asynchronous start/stop communication), or it may be a more complicated syncword or self-synchronizing code such as HDLC or 8B/10B encoding.

Other forms of asynchronous communication use two wires for each data bit (dual-rail encoding) or one wire for each data bit and a separate timing wire (bundled data). Both of these require a separate acknowledge wire. Obviously, the term "asynchronous" is misleading in its literal interpretation considering that the resynchronization problem can be easily rectified... Advantages and disadvantages Advantages

Disadvantages

Asynchronous transmission

Simple, doesn't require synchronization of both communication sides Cheap, timing is not as critical as for synchronous transmission, therefore hardware can be made cheaper Set-up is faster than other transmissions, so well suited for applications where messages are generated at irregular intervals, for example data entry from the keyboard Lower overhead and thus, greater throughput

Large relative overhead, a high proportion of the transmitted bits are uniquely for control purposes and thus carry no useful information

Synchronous transmission

Slightly more complex Hardware is more expensive

2. Transmission Media and Network Topology Magnetic media. Magnetic storage and magnetic recording are terms from engineering referring to the storage of data on a magnetized medium. Magnetic storage uses different patterns of magnetization in a magnetizable material to store data and is a form of non-volatile memory. The information is accessed using one or more read/write heads. As of 2011, magnetic storage media, primarily hard disks, are widely used to store computer data as well as audio and video signals. In the field of computing, the term magnetic storage is preferred and in the field of audio and video production, the term magnetic recording is more commonly used. The distinction is less technical and more a matter of preference. Other examples of magnetic storage media include floppy disks, magnetic recording tape, and magnetic stripes on credit cards Twisted Pair. Twisted pair cabling is a type of wiring in which two conductors of a single circuit are twisted together for the purposes of canceling out electromagnetic interference (EMI) from external

sources; for instance, electromagnetic radiation from unshielded twisted pair (UTP) cables, and crosstalk between neighboring pairs. It was invented by Alexander Graham Bell.

Twisted pair is the ordinary copper wire that connects home and many business computers to the telephone company. To reduce crosstalk or electromagnetic induction between pairs of wires, two insulated copper wires are twisted around each other. Each connection on twisted pair requires both wires. Since some telephone sets or desktop locations require multiple connections, twisted pair is sometimes installed in two or more pairs, all within a single cable. For some business locations, twisted pair is enclosed in a shield that functions as a ground. This is known as shielded twisted pair (STP). Ordinary wire to the home is unshielded twisted pair (UTP). Twisted pair is now frequently installed with two pairs to the home, with the extra pair making it possible for you to add another line (perhaps for modem use) when you need it. Twisted pair comes with each pair uniquely color coded when it is packaged in multiple pairs. Different uses such as analog, digital, and Ethernet require different pair multiples. Although twisted pair is often associated with home use, a higher grade of twisted pair is often used for horizontal wiring in LAN installations because it is less expensive than coaxial cable. The wire you buy at a local hardware store for extensions from your phone or computer modem to a wall jack is not twisted pair. It is a side-by-side wire known as silver satin. The wall jack can have as many five kinds of hole arrangements or pinouts, depending on the kinds of wire the installation expects will be plugged in (for example, digital, analog, or LAN) . (That's why you may sometimes find when you carry your notebook computer to another location that the wall jack connections won't match your plug.)

Advantages

It is a thin, flexible cable that is easy to string between walls. More lines can be run through the same wiring ducts. UTP costs less per meter/foot than any other type of LAN cable. Electrical noise going into or coming from the cable can be prevented.[7] Cross-talk is minimized.[7]

Disadvantages

Twisted pairs susceptibility to electromagnetic interference greatly depends on the pair twisting schemes (usually patented by the manufacturers) staying intact during the installation. As a result, twisted pair cables usually have stringent requirements for maximum pulling tension as well as minimum bend radius. This relative fragility of

twisted pair cables makes the installation practices an important part of ensuring the cables performance.[citation needed]

In video applications that send information across multiple parallel signal wires, twisted pair cabling can introduce signaling delays known as skew which results in subtle color defects and ghosting due to the image components not aligning correctly when recombined in the display device. The skew occurs because twisted pairs within the same cable often use a different number of twists per meter so as to prevent crosstalk between pairs with identical numbers of twists. The skew can be compensated by varying the length of pairs in the termination box, so as to introduce delay lines that take up the slack between shorter and longer pairs, though the precise lengths required are difficult to calculate and vary depending on the overall cable length

Coaxial cable. Coaxial cable, or coax, has an inner conductor surrounded by a flexible, tubular insulating layer, surrounded by a tubular conducting shield. The term coaxial comes from the inner conductor and the outer shield sharing a geometric axis. Coaxial cable was invented by English engineer and mathematician Oliver Heaviside, who patented the design in 1880.[1] Coaxial cable differs from other shielded cable used for carrying lower-frequency signals, such as audio signals, in that the dimensions of the cable are controlled to give a precise, constant conductor spacing, which is needed for it to function efficiently as a radio frequency transmission line. Coaxial cable conducts electrical signal using an inner conductor (usually a flexible solid or stranded copper wire) surrounded by an insulating layer and all enclosed by a shield layer, typically a woven metallic braid; the cable is often protected by an outer insulating jacket. Normally, the shield is kept at ground potential and a voltage is applied to the center conductor to carry electrical signals. The advantage of coaxial design is that the electric and magnetic fields are confined to the dielectric with little leakage outside the shield. On the converse, electric and magnetic fields outside the cable are largely kept from causing interference to signals inside the cable. This property makes coaxial cable a good choice for carrying weak signals that cannot tolerate interference from the environment or for higher electrical signals that must not be allowed to radiate or couple into adjacent structures or circuits. Common applications of coaxial cable include video and CATV distribution, RF and microwave transmission, and computer and instrumentation data connections. The characteristic impedance of the cable ( ) is determined by the dielectric constant of the inner insulator and the radii of the inner and outer conductors. A controlled cable characteristic impedance is important because the source and load impedance should be matched to ensure maximum power transfer and minimum Standing Wave Ratio. Other important properties of coaxial cable include attenuation as a function of frequency, voltage handling capability, and shield quality.

Fiber optics.

Fiber-optic communication is a method of transmitting information from one place to another by sending pulses of light through an optical fiber. The light forms an electromagnetic carrier wave that is modulated to carry information. First developed in the 1970s, fiber-optic communication systems have revolutionized the telecommunications industry and have played a major role in the advent of the Information Age. Because of its advantages over electrical transmission, optical fibers have largely replaced copper wire communications in core networks in the developed world. The process of communicating using fiber-optics involves the following basic steps: Creating the optical signal involving the use of a transmitter, relaying the signal along the fiber, ensuring that the signal does not become too distorted or weak, receiving the optical signal, and converting it into an electrical signal A technology that uses glass (or plastic) threads (fibers) to transmit data. A fiber optic cable consists of a bundle of glass threads, each of which is capable of transmitting messages modulated onto light waves. Fiber optics has several advantages over traditional metal communications lines: bandwidth than metal cables. This means that they can carry more data.

Fiber optic cables are less susceptible than metal cables to interference.

Data can be transmitted digitally (the natural form for computer data) rather than analogically.

The main disadvantage of fiber optics is that the cables are expensive to install. In addition, they are more fragile than wire and are difficult to splice. Fiber optics is a particularly popular technology for local-area networks. In addition, telephone companies are steadily replacing traditional telephone lines with fiber optic cables. In the future, almost all communications will employ fiber optics.

Infrared

InfraRed is a energy radiation with a frequency below our eyes sensitivity, so we can not see it Even that we can not "see" sound frequencies, we know that it exist, we can listen them. Even that we can not see or hear infrared, we can feel it at our skin temperature sensors. When you approach your hand to fire or warm element, you will "feel" the heat, but you can't see it. You can see the fire because it emits other types of radiation, visible to your eyes, but it also emits lots of infrared that you can only feel in your skin. Microwave.

Microwaves are radio waves with wavelengths ranging from as long as one kilometer to as short as one millimetre, or equivalently, with frequencies between 300 MHz (0.3 GHz) and 300 GHz.[1] This broad definition includes both UHF and EHF (millimeter waves), and various sources use different boundaries.[2] In all cases, microwave includes the entire SHF band (3 to 30 GHz, or 10 to 1 cm) at minimum, with RF engineering often putting the lower boundary at 1 GHz (30 cm), and the upper around 100 GHz (3 mm). Apparatus and techniques may be described qualitatively as "microwave" when the wavelengths of signals are roughly the same as the dimensions of the equipment, so that lumped-element circuit theory is inaccurate. As a consequence, practical microwave technique tends to move away from the discrete resistors, capacitors, and inductors used with lower-frequency radio waves. Instead, distributed circuit elements and transmission-line theory are more useful methods for design and analysis. Open-wire and coaxial transmission lines give way to waveguides and stripline, and lumped-element tuned circuits are replaced by cavity resonators or resonant lines. Effects of reflection, polarization, scattering, diffraction, and atmospheric absorption usually associated with visible light are of practical significance in the study of microwave propagation. The same equations of electromagnetic theory apply at all frequencies. The prefix "micro-" in "microwave" is not meant to suggest a wavelength in the micrometer range. It indicates that microwaves are "small" compared to waves used in typical radio broadcasting, in that they have shorter wavelengths. The boundaries between far infrared light, terahertz radiation, microwaves, and ultra-high-frequency radio waves are fairly arbitrary and are used variously between different fields of study. Above 300 GHz, the absorption of electromagnetic radiation by Earth's atmosphere is so great that it is in effect opaque, until the atmosphere becomes transparent again in the so-called infrared and optical window frequency ranges.

Topologies with advantages & disadvantages:-Bus, Ring, Star, Tree ,Mesh.

Definition:

The term physical topology refers to the way in which a network is laid out physically. It refers to the configuration of cables, computers, and other peripherals. The topology of a network is the geometric representation of the relationship of all the links and linking devices (usually called nodes) to one another. There are six types of topologies: i. Mesh topology. ii. Star topology. iii. Ring topology. iv. Tree topology. v. Bus topology. vi. Hybrid topology. Mesh Topology: In a mesh topology, every device has a dedicated point-to-point link to every other device. The term dedicated means that the link carries traffic only between the two devices it connects. Here, if we have n nodes, then we need to connect to n-1 nodes and n(n-1) physical links. However, if each physical link allows communication in both directions (duplex mode), we need n(n-1)/2 links. Advantages of a Mesh Topology

Eliminates traffic problems in links sharing. If one link becomes unusable, it does not incapacitate the entire system. Thus, act as robust. It has privacy and security. Point-to-point link make fault identification and fault isolation easy.

Disadvantages of a Mesh Topology

Installation and reconnection are difficult. The hardware required to connect each link (I/O ports and cable) is expensive. It is generally too costly and complex for practical networks.

Star Topology: In local area networks where the star topology is used, each machine is connected to a central hub. The star topology allows each machine on the network to have a point to point connection to the central hub. All of the traffic which transverses the network passes through the central hub.

The hub acts as a signal booster or repeater which in turn allows the signal to travel greater distances. Advantages of a Star Topology

Easy to install and reconfigure. No disruptions to the network when connecting or removing devices. Easy to detect faults and to remove parts. Less expensive. Includes robustness, that is, if one link fails, only that link is affected, other links remain active.

Disadvantages of a Star Topology

If the hub fails, the whole system is dead. If the hub, switch, or concentrator fails, nodes attached are disabled. Requires more cable length than a bus topology. More expensive than bus topologies because of the cost of the hubs, etc.

Ring Topology: In local area networks where the ring topology is used, each computer is connected to the network in a closed loop or ring. The signal passes through each machine or computer connected to the ring in one direction, from device to device, until it reaches its destination. Each machines or computers connected to the ring act as signal boosters or repeaters. When a device receives a signal intended for another device, its repeater regenerates the bits and passes them along. Advantages of a Ring Topology It is relatively easy to install and reconfigure.

Easy to identify the problem if the entire network shuts down.

Disadvantages of a Ring Topology Only one machine can transmit on the network at a time. The failure of one machine will cause the entire network to fail. Tree Topology: The type of network topology in which a central 'root' node (the top level of the hierarchy) is connected to one or more other nodes that are one level lower in the hierarchy (i.e., the second level) with a point-to-point link between each of the second level nodes and the top level central 'root' node, while each of the second level nodes that are connected to the top level central 'root' node will also have one or more other nodes that are one level lower in the hierarchy (i.e., the

third level) connected to it, also with a point-to-point link, the top level central 'root' node being the only node that has no other node above it in the hierarchy Advantages of a Tree Topology

Point-to-point wiring for individual segments. Supported by several hardware and software venders.

Disadvantages of a Tree Topology

Overall length of each segment is limited by the type of cabling used. If the backbone line breaks, the entire segment goes down. More difficult to configure and wire than other topologies.

Bus Topology: In local area networks where bus technology is used, each machine is connected to a long, single cable. The cable acts as a backbone to link all the devices in a network. Each computer or server is connected to the single bus cable through drop lines and some kind of connector. A terminator is required at each end of the bus cable to prevent the signal from bouncing back and forth on the bus cable. Advantages of Bus Topology

Easy to connect a computer or peripheral to a linear bus. Requires less cable length than mesh or star topologies. It is cheaper than any other topologies.

Disadvantages of Bus Topology

If the network cable breaks, the entire network will be down. Terminators are required at both ends of the backbone cable. Difficult to identify the problem if the entire network shuts down. Not meant to be used as a stand-alone solution in a large building. Include difficult reconnection and fault isolation. The managing cost of network is too high. Addition of new devices requires modification or replacement of the backbone.

Hybrid Topology: Hybrid networks use a combination of any two or more topologies in such a way that the resulting network does not exhibit one of the standard topologies (e.g., bus, star, ring, etc.). A hybrid topology is always produced when two different basic network topologies are connected. Advantages of a Hybrid Topology

 It provides a better result by it. It can be designed in many ways for various purposes. Disadvantages of Hybrid Topology It is costly.

Difficult to identify the problem if the entire network shuts down.

3. Connection, Interfacing and Devices Connection oriented and connectionless services

Two distinct techniques are used in data communications to transfer data. Each has its own advantages and disadvantages. They are the connection-oriented method and the connectionless method: Connection-oriented Requires a session connection (analogous to a phone call) be established before any data can be sent. This method is often called a "reliable" network service. It can guarantee that data will arrive in the same order. Connection-oriented services set up virtual links between end systems through a network, as shown in Figure 1. Note that the packet on the left is assigned the virtual circuit number 01. As it moves through the network, routers quickly send it through virtual circuit 01. Connectionless Does not require a session connection between sender and receiver. The sender simply starts sending packets (called datagrams) to the destination. This service does not have the reliability of the connection-oriented method, but it is useful for periodic burst transfers. Neither system must maintain state information for the systems that they send transmission to or receive transmission from. A connectionless network provides minimal services. Connection-oriented methods may be implemented in the data link layers of the protocol stack and/or in the transport layers of the protocol stack, depending on the physical connections in place and the services required by the systems that are communicating. TCP (Transmission Control Protocol) is a connection-oriented transport protocol, while UDP (User Datagram Protocol) is a connectionless network protocol. Both operate over IP. The physical, data link, and network layer protocols have been used to implement guaranteed data delivery. For example, X.25 packet-switching networks perform extensive error checking and packet acknowledgment because the services were originally implemented on poor-quality telephone connections. Today, networks are more reliable. It is generally believed that the underlying network should do what it does best, which is deliver data bits as quickly as possible. Therefore, connectionoriented services are now primarily handled in the transport layer by end systems, not the network. This allows lower-layer networks to be optimized for speed.

LANs operate as connectionless systems. A computer attached to a network can start transmitting frames as soon as it has access to the network. It does not need to set up a connection with the destination system ahead of time. However, a transportlevel protocol such as TCP may set up a connection-oriented session when necessary. The Internet is one big connectionless packet network in which all packet deliveries are handled by IP. However, TCP adds connection-oriented services on top of IP. TCP provides all the upper-level connection-oriented session requirements to ensure that data is delivered properly. MPLS is a relatively new connection-oriented networking scheme for IP networks that sets up fast label-switched paths across routed or layer 2 networks. A WAN service that uses the connection-oriented model is frame relay. The service provider sets up PVCs (permanent virtual circuits) through the network as required or requested by the customer. ATM is another networking technology that uses the connection-oriented virtual circuit approach.

Feature How is data sent?

Connectionless one packet at a time

Connection-oriented as continuous stream of packets virtual circuit: yes without virtual circuit: no virtual circuit: yes without virtual circuit: no yes yes yes virtual circuit: yes without virtual circuit: no all virtual circuits through node fail virtual circuit: a virtual circuit number without virtual circuit: full source and destination address virtual circuit: easy if sufficient buffers allocated without virtual circuit: harder to do

Do packets follow same route? no Are resources reserved in network? Are resources reserved in communicating hosts? Can data sent can experience variable latency? Is connection establishment done? Is state information stored at network nodes? What is impact of node/switch crash? no no yes no no only packets at node are lost

What addressing information is full source and needed on each packet? destination address

Is it possible to adapt sending rate to network congestion?

hard to do

Serial and Parallel connections: Half and Full Duplex operations

Simplex, half-duplex and full-duplex connections

There are 3 different transmission modes characterised according to the direction of the exchanges:

A simplex connection is a connection in which the data flows in only one direction, from the transmitter to the receiver. This type of connection is useful if the data do not need to flow in both directions (for example, from your computer to the printer or from the mouse to your computer...).

A half-duplex connection (sometimes called an alternating connection or semi-duplex) is a connection in which the data flows in one direction or the other, but not both at the same time. With this type of connection, each end of the connection transmits in turn. This type of connection makes it possible to have bidirectional communications using the full capacity of the line.

A full-duplex connection is a connection in which the data flow in both directions simultaneously. Each end of the line can thus transmit and receive at the same time, which means that the bandwidth is divided in two for each direction of data transmission if the same transmission medium is used for both directions of transmission.

Serial and parallel transmission

The transmission mode refers to the number of elementary units of information (bits) that can be simultaneously translated by the communications channel. In fact, processors (and therefore computers in general) never process (in the case of recent processors) a single bit at a time; generally they are able to process several (most of the time it is 8: one byte), and for this reason the basic connections on a computer are parallel connections.
Parallel connection

Parallel connection means simultaneous transmission of N bits. These bits are sent simultaneously over N different channels (a channel being, for example, a wire, a cable or any other physical medium). The parallel connection on PC-type computers generally requires 10 wires.

These channels may be:

N physical lines: in which case each bit is sent on a physical line (which is why parallel cables are made up of several wires in a ribbon cable) one physical line divided into several sub-channels by dividing up the bandwidth. In this case, each bit is sent at a different frequency...

Since the conductive wires are close to each other in the ribbon cable, interference can occur (particularly at high speeds) and degrade the signal quality...
Serial connection

In a serial connection, the data are sent one bit at a time over the transmission channel. However, since most processors process data in parallel, the transmitter needs to transform incoming parallel data into serial data and the receiver needs to do the opposite.

These operations are performed by a communications controller (normally a UART (Universal Asynchronous Receiver Transmitter) chip). The communications controller works in the following manner:

The parallel-serial transformation is performed using a shift register. The shift register, working together with a clock, will shift the register (containing all of the data presented in parallel) by one position to the left, and then transmit the most significant bit (the leftmost one) and so on:

The serial-parallel transformation is done in almost the same way using a shift register. The shift register shifts the register by one position to the left each time a bit is received, and then transmits the entire register in parallel when it is full:

Modern connection and signaling

Multiplexing:- TDM, FDM Time-Division Multiplexing Time-Division Multiplexing (TDM) is a type of digital or analog multiplexing in which two or more signals or bit streams are transferred apparently simultaneously as sub-channels in one communication channel, but are physically taking turns on the channel. The time domain is divided into several recurrent timeslots of fixed length, one for each sub-channel. Time-division multiplexing (TDM) is a method of putting multiple data streams in a single signal by separating the signal into many segments, each having a very short duration. Each individual data stream is reassembled at the receiving end based on the timing. Time division multiplexing (TDM) and has many applications, including wireline telephone systems and some cellular telephone systems. The main reason to use TDM is to take advantage of existing transmission lines. TIME DIVISION MULTIPLEXING (TDM) allows multiple conversations to take place by the sharing of medium or channel in time. A channel is allocated a the whole of the line bandwidth for a specific period of time. This means that each subscriber is allocated a time slot. Frequency-Division Multiplexing Frequency-division multiplexing (FDM) is a form of signal multiplexing where multiple baseband signals are modulated on different frequency carrier waves and added together to create a composite signal In many communication systems, a single, large frequency band is assigned to the system and is shared among a group of users. Examples of this type of system include: 1. A microwave transmission line connecting two sites over a long distance. 2. AM or FM radio broadcast bands, which are divided among many channels or stations. The stations are selected with the radio dial. The deriving of two or more simultaneous, continuous channels from a transmission medium by assigning a separate portion of the available frequency spectrum to each of the individual channels. (188) The simultaneous transmission of multiple separate signals through a shared medium at the transmitter, the separate signals into separable frequency bands, and adding those results linearly either before transmission or within the medium. All the signals may be amplified, conducted, translated in frequency and routed toward a destination as a single signal, resulting in economies which are the motivation for multiplexing. TDM VS FDM Difference No. 1 TDM: Total available time is divided into several user FDM: total frequency bands are divided into several users

Difference No. 2 FDM:A multiplex system for transmitting two or more signals over a common path by using a different frequency band for each signal. TDM: Transmission of two or more signals on the same path, but at different times. Difference No. 3 TDM:TDM imply partitioning the bandwidth ofthe channel connecting two nodes into finite set of time slots FDM:The signals multiplexed come from different sources/transmitters. 4. Network standards Introduction Protocol Hierarchies To reduce their design complexity, most networks are organized as a series of layers or levels, each one built upon the on below it. The number of layers, the name of each layer, the contents of each layer, and the function of each layer differ from network to network. However, in all networks, the purpose of each layer is to offer certain services to the higher layers, shielding those layers from the details of how the offered services are actually implemented. Layer n on one machine carries on a conversation with layer n on another machine. The rules and conventions used in this conversation are collectively known as the layer n protocol. Basically, a protocol is an agreement between the communicating parties on how communication is to proceed. As an analogy, when a woman is introduce to a man, she may choose to stick our her hand. He, in turn, may decide to shake it or kiss it, depending, for example, on whether she is an American lawyer at a business meeting or a European princess at a formal ball. Violating the protocol will make communication more difficult, if not impossible. Below the bottommost layer is the physical layer through which actual communication occurs. Between each pair of adjacent layers there is an interface. And finally, a set of layers and protocols is called a network architecture.

OSI reference Model TCP/IP reference model

The TCP/IP Reference Model

The TCP/IP reference model is the network model used in the current Internet architecture [19]. It has its origins back in the 1960's with the grandfather of the Internet, the ARPANET. This was a research network sponsored by the Department of Defense in the United States. The following were seen as major design goals:

ability to connect multiple networks together seamlessly ability for connections to remain intact as long as the source and destination machines were functioning to be built on flexible architecture

The reference model was named after two of its main protocols, TCP (Transmission Control Protocol) [12] and IP (Internet Protocol).

They choose to build a packet-switched network based on a connectionless internetwork layer.

Figure 2.1: TCP/IP Network Protocol A detailed description of the reference model is beyond the scope of this document and project. The basic idea of the networking system is to allow one application on a host computer to talk to another application on a different host computer. The application forms its request, then passes the packet down to the lower layers, which add their own control information, either a header or a footer, onto the packet. Finally the packet reaches the physical layer and is transmitted through the cable onto the destination host. The packet then travels up through the different layers, with each layer reading, deciphering, and removing the header or footer that was attached by its counterpart on the originating computer. Finally the packet arrives at the application it was destined for. Even though technically each layer communicates with the layer above or below it, the process can be viewed as one layer talking to its partner on the host,

5. Networking basics Networking devices:-Repeaters, Bridges, Routers, Gateways, Hub and Switch Repeaters network device used to regenerate or replicate a signal. Repeaters are used in transmission systems to regenerate analog or digital signals distorted by transmission loss. Analog repeaters

frequently can only amplify the signal while digital repeaters can reconstruct a signal to near its original quality. In a data network, a repeater can relay messages between subnetworks that use different protocols or cable types. Hubs can operate as repeaters by relaying messages to all connected computers. A repeater cannot do the intelligent routing performed by bridges and routers Bridges In telecommunication networks, a bridge is a product that connects a local area network (LAN) to another local area network that uses the same protocol (for example, Ethernet or token ring). You can envision a bridge as being a device that decides whether a message from you to someone else is going to the local area network in your building or to someone on the local area network in the building across the street. A bridge examines each message on a LAN, "passing" those known to be within the same LAN, and forwarding those known to be on the other interconnected LAN (or LANs). In bridging networks, computer or node addresses have no specific relationship to location. For this reason, messages are sent out to every address on the network and accepted only by the intended destination node. Bridges learn which addresses are on which network and develop a learning table so that subsequent messages can be forwarded to the right network. Bridging networks are generally always interconnected local area networks since broadcasting every message to all possible destinations would flood a larger network with unnecessary traffic. For this reason, router networks such as the Internet use a scheme that assigns addresses to nodes so that a message or packet can be forwarded only in one general direction rather than forwarded in all directions. A bridge works at the data-link (physical network) level of a network, copying a data frame from one network to the next network along the communications path. A bridge is sometimes combined with a router in a product called a brouter. Routers A router is a device that forwards data packets between computer networks, creating an overlay internetwork. A router is connected to two or more data lines from different networks. When a data packet comes in one of the lines, the router reads the address information in the packet to determine its ultimate destination. Then, using information in its routing table or routing policy, it directs the packet to the next network on its journey. Routers perform the "traffic directing" functions on the Internet. A data packet is typically forwarded from one router to another through the networks that constitute the internetwork until it gets to its destination node. The most familiar type of routers are home and small office routers that simply pass data, such as web pages and email, between the home computers and the owner's cable or DSL modem, which connects to the Internet through an ISP. More sophisticated routers, such as enterprise routers,

connect large business or ISP networks up to the powerful core routers that forward data at high speed along the optical fiber lines of the Internet backbone. Gateways The term gateway has the following meaning:

In a communications network, a network node equipped for interfacing with another network that uses different protocols. o A gateway may contain devices such as protocol translators, impedance matching devices, rate converters, fault isolators, or signal translators as necessary to provide system interoperability. It also requires the establishment of mutually acceptable administrative procedures between both networks. o A protocol translation/mapping gateway interconnects networks with different network protocol technologies by performing the required protocol conversions. Loosely, a computer or computer program configured to perform the tasks of a gateway. For a specific case, see default gateway.

Gateways, also called protocol converters, can operate at any network layer. The activities of a gateway are more complex than that of the router or switch as it communicates using more than one protocol. Hub A common connection point for devices in a network. Hubs are commonly used to connect segments of a LAN. A hub contains multiple ports. When a packet arrives at one port, it is copied to the other ports so that all segments of the LAN can see all packets. A passive hub serves simply as a conduit for the data, enabling it to go from one device (or segment) to another. So-called intelligent hubs include additional features that enables an administrator to monitor the traffic passing through the hub and to configure each port in the hub. Intelligent hubs are also called manageable hubs. A third type of hub, called a switching hub, actually reads the destination address of each packet and then forwards the packet to the correct port. Switch Switch is a computer networking device that connects network segments or network devices. The term commonly refers to a multi-port network bridge that processes and routes data at the data link layer (layer 2) of the OSI model. Switches that additionally process data at the network layer (layer 3) and above are often referred to as layer-3 switches or multilayer switches. A switch is a telecommunication device which receives a message from any device connected to it and then transmits the message only to the device for which the message was meant. This

makes the switch a more intelligent device than a hub (which receives a message and then transmits it to all the other devices on its network). The network switch plays an integral part in most modern Ethernet local area networks (LANs). Mid-to-large sized LANs contain a number of linked managed switches. Small office/home office (SOHO) applications typically use a single switch, or an all-purpose converged device such as a residential gateway to access small office/home broadband services such as DSL or cable Internet. In most of these cases, the enduser device contains a router and components that interface to the particular physical broadband technology. User devices may also include a telephone interface for VoIP. An Ethernet switch operates at the data link layer of the OSI model to create a separate collision domain for each switch port. With 4 computers (e.g., A, B, C, and D) on 4 switch ports, any pair (e.g. A and B) can transfer data back and forth while the other pair (e.g. C and D) also do so simultaneously, and the two conversations will not interfere with one another. In full duplex mode, these pairs can also overlap (e.g. A transmits to B, simultaneously B to C, and so on). In the case of a repeater hub, they would all share the bandwidth and run in half duplex, resulting in collisions, which would then necessitate retransmissions.

Protocols: - SMTP, PPP, FTP, HTTP. protocol is a system of digital message formats and rules for exchanging those messages in or between computing systems and in telecommunications. A protocol may have a formal description. Protocols may include signaling, authentication and error detection and correction capabilities. SMTP

SMTP (Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) is a TCP/IP protocol used in sending and receiving email. However, since it is limited in its ability to queue messages at the receiving end, it is usually used with one of two other protocols, POP3 or IMAP, that let the user save messages in a server mailbox and download them periodically from the server. In other words, users typically use a program that uses SMTP for sending e-mail and either POP3 or IMAP for receiving e-mail. On Unix-based systems, sendmail is the most widely-used SMTP server for e-mail. A commercial package, Sendmail, includes a POP3 server. Microsoft Exchange includes an SMTP server and can also be set up to include POP3 support. SMTP usually is implemented to operate over Internet port 25. An alternative to SMTP that is widely used in Europe is X.400. Many mail servers now support Extended Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (ESMTP), which allows multimedia files to be delivered as e-mail. PPP

PPP (Point-to-Point Protocol) is a protocol for communication between two computers using a serial interface, typically a personal computer connected by phone line to a server. For example, your Internet server provider may provide you with a PPP connection so that the provider's server can respond to your requests, pass them on to the Internet, and forward your requested Internet responses back to you. PPP uses the Internet protocol (IP) (and is designed to handle others). It is sometimes considered a member of the TCP/IP suite of protocols. Relative to the Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) reference model, PPP provides layer 2 (data-link layer) service. Essentially, it packages your computer's TCP/IP packets and forwards them to the server where they can actually be put on the Internet. PPP is a full-duplex protocol that can be used on various physical media, including twisted pair or fiber optic lines or satellite transmission. It uses a variation of High Speed Data Link Control (HDLC) for packet encapsulation. PPP is usually preferred over the earlier de facto standard Serial Line Internet Protocol (SLIP) because it can handle synchronous as well as asynchronous communication. PPP can share a line with other users and it has error detection that SLIP lacks. Where a choice is possible, PPP is preferred. FTP

File Transfer Protocol (FTP) is a standard Internet protocol for transmitting files between computers on the Internet. Like the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP), which transfers displayable Web pages and related files, and the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP), which transfers e-mail, FTP is an application protocol that uses the Internet's TCP/IP protocols. FTP is commonly used to transfer Web page files from their creator to the computer that acts as their server for everyone on the Internet. It's also commonly used to download programs and other files to your computer from other servers. As a user, you can use FTP with a simple command line interface (for example, from the Windows MS-DOS Prompt window) or with a commercial program that offers a graphical user interface. Your Web browser can also make FTP requests to download programs you select from a Web page. Using FTP, you can also update (delete, rename, move, and copy) files at a server. You need to logon to an FTP server. However, publicly available files are easily accessed using anonymous FTP. Basic FTP support is usually provided as part of a suite of programs that come with TCP/IP. However, any FTP client program with a graphical user interface usually must be downloaded from the company that makes it. HTTP

Short for HyperText Transfer Protocol, the underlying protocol used by the World Wide Web. HTTP defines how messages are formatted and transmitted, and what actions Web servers and

browsers should take in response to various commands. For example, when you enter a URL in your browser, this actually sends an HTTP command to the Web server directing it to fetch and transmit the requested Web page. The other main standard that controls how the World Wide Web works is HTML, which covers how Web pages are formatted and displayed. HTTP is called a stateless protocol because each command is executed independently, without any knowledge of the commands that came before it. This is the main reason that it is difficult to implement Web sites that react intelligently to user input. This shortcoming of HTTP is being addressed in a number of new technologies, including ActiveX, Java, JavaScript and cookies.

Internet, Intranet, Internet service providers Internet

The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite (often called TCP/IP, although not all applications use TCP) to serve billions of users worldwide. It is a network of networks that consists of millions of private, public, academic, business, and government networks, of local to global scope, that are linked by a broad array of electronic, wireless and optical networking technologies. The Internet carries an extensive range of information resources and services, such as the inter-linked hypertext documents of the World Wide Web (WWW) and the infrastructure to support email. Most traditional communications media including telephone, music, film, and television are reshaped or redefined by the Internet, giving birth to new services such as Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) and Internet Protocol Television (IPTV). Newspaper, book and other print publishing are adapting to Web site technology, or are reshaped into blogging and web feeds. The Internet has enabled and accelerated new forms of human interactions through instant messaging, Internet forums, and social networking. Online shopping has boomed both for major retail outlets and small artisans and traders. Business-to-business and financial services on the Internet affect supply chains across entire industries. The origins of the Internet reach back to research of the 1960s, commissioned by the United States government in collaboration with private commercial interests to build robust, faulttolerant, and distributed computer networks. The funding of a new U.S. backbone by the National Science Foundation in the 1980s, as well as private funding for other commercial backbones, led to worldwide participation in the development of new networking technologies, and the merger of many networks. The commercialization of what was by the 1990s an international network resulted in its popularization and incorporation into virtually every aspect of modern human life. As of 2011, more than 2.2 billion people nearly a third of Earth's population use the services of the Internet

Intranet
An intranet is a private network that is contained within an enterprise. It may consist of many interlinked local area networks and also use leased lines in the wide area network. Typically, an intranet includes connections through one or more gateway computers to the outside Internet. The main purpose of an intranet is to share company information and computing resources among employees. An intranet can also be used to facilitate working in groups and for teleconferences. An intranet uses TCP/IP, HTTP, and other Internet protocols and in general looks like a private version of the Internet. With tunneling, companies can send private messages through the public network, using the public network with special encryption/decryption and other security safeguards to connect one part of their intranet to another. Typically, larger enterprises allow users within their intranet to access the public Internet through firewall servers that have the ability to screen messages in both directions so that company security is maintained. When part of an intranet is made accessible to customers, partners, suppliers, or others outside the company, that part becomes part of an extranet.

Internet service providers An Internet service provider (ISP) is an organization that provides access to the Internet. Internet service providers can be either community-owned and non-profit, or privately owned and for-profit. Access ISPs directly connect clients to the Internet using copper wires, wireless or fiber-optic connections.[1] Hosting ISPs lease server space for smaller businesses and other people (colocation). Transit ISPs provide large amounts of bandwidth for connecting hosting ISPs to access ISPs Internet browsers, URL and URI

Internet browsers browser is a software application for retrieving, presenting and traversing information resources on the World Wide Web. An information resource is identified by a Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) and may be a web page, image, video or other piece of content.[1] Hyperlinks present in resources enable users easily to navigate their browsers to related resources. A web browser can also be defined as an application software or program designed to enable users to access, retrieve and view documents and other resources on the Internet.

Although browsers are primarily intended to use the World Wide Web, they can also be used to access information provided by web servers in private networks or files in file systems. The major web browsers are Chrome, Firefox, Internet Explorer, Opera, and Safari URL A uniform resource locator (URL) is a specific character string that constitutes a reference to an Internet resource A URL is technically a type of uniform resource identifier (URI) but in many technical documents and verbal discussions URL is often used as a synonym for URI A URL (Uniform Resource Locator, previously Universal Resource Locator) - usually pronounced by sounding out each letter but, in some quarters, pronounced "Earl" - is the unique address for a file that is accessible on the Internet. A common way to get to a Web site is to enter the URL of its home page file in your Web browser's address line. However, any file within that Web site can also be specified with a URL. Such a file might be any Web (HTML) page other than the home page, an image file, or a program such as a common gateway interface application or Java applet. The URL contains the name of the protocol to be used to access the file resource, a domain name that identifies a specific computer on the Internet, and a pathname, a hierarchical description that specifies the location of a file in that computer. URI In computing, a uniform resource identifier (URI) is a string of characters used to identify a name or a resource. Such identification enables interaction with representations of the resource over a network (typically the World Wide Web) using specific protocols. Schemes specifying a concrete syntax and associated protocols define each URI. E-mail, Search engines E-mail

Electronic mail, also known as email or e-mail, is a method of exchanging digital messages from an author to one or more recipients. Modern email operates across the Internet or other computer networks. Some early email systems required that the author and the recipient both be online at the same time, in common with instant messaging. Today's email systems are based on a storeand-forward model. Email servers accept, forward, deliver and store messages. Neither the users nor their computers are required to be online simultaneously; they need connect only briefly, typically to an email server, for as long as it takes to send or receive messages. It should be noted that, historically, the term electronic mail was used generically for any electronic document transmission. For example, several writers in the early 1970s used the term to describe fax document transmission.[2][3] As a result, it is difficult to find the first citation for the use of the term with the more specific meaning it has today.

An Internet email message[NB 1] consists of three components, the message envelope, the message header, and the message body. The message header contains control information, including, minimally, an originator's email address and one or more recipient addresses. Usually descriptive information is also added, such as a subject header field and a message submission date/time stamp. Originally a text-only (7-bit ASCII and others) communications medium, email was extended to carry multi-media content attachments, a process standardized in RFC 2045 through 2049. Collectively, these RFCs have come to be called Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (MIME). Electronic mail predates the inception of the Internet, and was in fact a crucial tool in creating it,[4] but the history of modern, global Internet email services reaches back to the early ARPANET. Standards for encoding email messages were proposed as early as 1973 (RFC 561). Conversion from ARPANET to the Internet in the early 1980s produced the core of the current services. An email sent in the early 1970s looks quite similar to a basic text message sent on the Internet today. Network-based email was initially exchanged on the ARPANET in extensions to the File Transfer Protocol (FTP), but is now carried by the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP), first published as Internet standard 10 (RFC 821) in 1982. In the process of transporting email messages between systems, SMTP communicates delivery parameters using a message envelope separate from the message (header and body) itself.

Search engines A search engine is designed to search for information on the World Wide Web. The search results are generally presented in a line of results often referred to as search engine results pages (SERPs). The information may be a specialist in web pages, images, information and other types of files. Some search engines also mine data available in databases or open directories. Unlike web directories, which are maintained only by human editors, search engines also maintain realtime information by running an algorithm on a web crawler. Uploading and downloading

Uploading The most common type of uploading is when a user uploads a digital file to an Internet site. For example, a user might upload vacation photos to a social networking website or a home video to a video sharing site. The uploaded files are then stored on the website's servers and can be seen by anyone who has Internet access and, if necessary, the right software for viewing it. Other websites allow users to upload digital files for storage. This can allow users to store more files or larger files than would be possible to store on their own computer or device because of its

limited storage capacity. Uploading files to storage websites also allows other users or other devices to have access to them. Permission to access the files can be granted to only certain people, or the files could be made public for anyone to access. Another type of uploading takes place within a closed computer system, such as one within a single office building or one that connects a group of businesses. These types of systems typically have servers to store information that needs to be shared among multiple computers or devices. Digital files can be uploaded from any computer or device that is connected to the system, then can be downloaded or accessed by any other user in the system. Downloading Whenever electronic files or information are transferred from a central system to a computer or device that is connected to that system, it is considered downloading. Files can be downloaded temporarily and then deleted after they have been used once, or they can be downloaded on a more permanent basis and used for a long period of time. For example, a funny video file might be downloaded from the Internet and soon deleted after it has been watched, but a helpful application might be downloaded and used for months or years. Downloaded files are sometimes automatically stored in a particular location on the computer or device, and they are automatically accessed from that location when needed. An example of this is an application that is downloaded to a smartphone the user typically cannot control where the app is stored on the phone, it is simply stored where the phone stores all of its apps. In other cases, the user can choose where the downloaded files will be stored. For example, a laptop user might download a music file to a specific folder for music or another type of file to the computer's desktop, where it can be found quickly. Speed The time that it takes to upload or download a file depends on several factors. The main factor is the digital size of the file, which is measured in bytes. The larger the file, the longer it takes to transfer the information in it. The quality of the connection from the Internet or central server to the smaller computer or device also makes a difference in the transfer speed. A computer that has high-speed Internet connection will be able to download or upload a file much more quickly than a computer that has a low-speed connection would. In addition, the speed of the server on which the file is stored can affect upload times or download times. Background Operations Uploading and downloading occur frequently, often without the user being aware that he or she is doing it. For example, incoming email is downloaded from a server, and outgoing emails are uploaded to be sent out. The source code of a web page is downloaded to the users computer so that he or she can view the content. Whenever a computer or device is connected to the Internet

or another larger system, files are frequently transferred back and forth uploaded and downloaded throughout the normal course of use.