Daystar University ACS 351 A COMPUTER NETWORKS 1

Submitted by: Marilene Mercy 08-1483 Assignment: Network Communication Modes Submitted to: Mr. Fred Ogore Computer Science Department

29th September 2011 Athi River Campus

Marilene Mercy 08-1483

ACS 351 A

ASSIGNMENT 1

Table of Contents
TABLE OF CONTENTS...............................................................................................................................2 1.0 SIMPLEX, HALF DUPLEX AND FULL DUPLEX MODES.............................................................3 1.3 FULL-DUPLEX............................................................................................................................................4 2.0 NETWORK PROTOCOLS.....................................................................................................................5 3.0 PACKET SWITCHING VS. CIRCUIT SWITCHING........................................................................9 3.1 CIRCUIT SWITCHING ...................................................................................................................................9 3.2 PACKET SWITCHING..................................................................................................................................10 3.3 PACKET VS. CIRCUIT.................................................................................................................................11 REFERENCES:............................................................................................................................................12

Marilene Mercy 08-1483

ACS 351 A

ASSIGNMENT 1

1.0 Simplex, Half Duplex and Full Duplex Modes

1.1 Simplex

Simplex is one direction. A good example would be your keyboard to your CPU. The CPU never needs to send characters to the keyboard, but the keyboard always sends characters to the CPU. In many cases, Computers almost always send characters to printers, but printers usually never send characters to computers (there are exceptions, some printers do talk back). Simplex requires only one lane (in the case of serial). 1.2 Half-Duplex

Half-Duplex is like the dreaded "one lane" road you may have run into at construction sites. Only one direction will be allowed through at a time. Railroads have to deal with this scenario more often since it's cheaper to lay a single track. A dispatcher will hold a train up at one end of the single track until a train going the other direction goes through. An example of Half-Duplex is actually a Parallel interface. Although the parallel interface is eight lanes, data travels through the lanes in the same direction at the same time but never in both directions at the same time. The IEEE-1284 allows printers to send messages to the computer. The printer cannot send these messages while the computer is sending characters but when the computer stops sending characters, then the printer can send messages back. The advantage of Half-Duplex, is the single lane or single track is cheaper then the double lane or double track.

Marilene Mercy 08-1483

ACS 351 A

ASSIGNMENT 1

1.3 Full-Duplex

Full-Duplex is like the ordinary two-lane highway. In some cases, where traffic is heavy enough, a railroad will decide to lay a double track to allow trains to pass in both directions. In communications, this is most common with networking. Our fiber optic hubs have two connectors on each port, one for each lane of a two-lane roadway. FullDuplex fiber is two cables bundled or tied together to form the two-lane roadway. In 100Base-TX, the two lanes are housed in the same jacket. RS232 was also designed to handle Full-Duplex but some of our short haul modems and converters give the user the option to go Half-Duplex or Simplex to reduce the number of conductors needed to connect between them.

Marilene Mercy 08-1483

ACS 351 A

ASSIGNMENT 1

2.0 Network Protocols

Marilene Mercy 08-1483

ACS 351 A

ASSIGNMENT 1

Name(layer) Hardware(link)

Importance Names of protocols Essential

What it does

Ethernet, SLIP, PPP, Allows messages to be packaged and Token Ring, ARC net sent between physical locations. Manages movement of messages and

Package management(network)

Essential

IP, ICMP

reports errors. It uses message protocols and software to manage this process. (includes routing) Communicates between layers to allow

Inter layer communication

Essential

ARP

one layer to get information to support another layer. This includes broadcasting Controls the management of service

Service control(transport)

Critical

TCP, UDP

between computers. Based on values in TCP and UDP messages a server knows what service is being requested. DNS provides address to name

Application and user support Important DNS, RPC

translation for locations and network cards. RPC allows remote computer to perform functions on other computers.

RARP, Network Management Advanced DHCP, SNMP,RIP, BGP, CIDR

BOOTP, IGMP, Enhances network management and OSPF, increases functionality

FTP, TFTP, SMTP, Utility(Application) Useful Telnet, Rlogin 6 NFS, ping, Provides direct services to the user.

Marilene Mercy 08-1483

ACS 351 A

ASSIGNMENT 1

The list below gives a brief description of each protocol Ethernet - Provides for transport of information between physical locations on Ethernet cable. Data is passed in Ethernet packets SLIP - Serial line IP (SLIP), a form of data encapsulation for serial lines. PPP - Point to point protocol (PPP). IP - Internet Protocol (IP). Except for ARP and RARP all protocols' data packets will be packaged into an IP data packet. Provides the mechanism to use software to address and manage data packets being sent to computers. ICMP - Internet control message protocol (ICMP) provides management and error reporting to help manage the process of sending data between computers. ARP - Address resolution protocol (ARP) enables the packaging of IP data into Ethernet packages. It is the system and messaging protocol that is used to find the Ethernet (hardware) address from a specific IP number. Without this protocol, the Ethernet package could not be generated from the IP package, because the Ethernet address could not be determined. TCP - A reliable connection oriented protocol used to control the management of application level services between computers. UDP - An unreliable connection less protocol used to control the management of application level services between computers. DNS - Domain Name Service allows the network to determine IP addresses from names and vice versa. RARP - Reverse address resolution protocol (RARP) is used to allow a computer without a local permanent data storage media to determine its IP address from its Ethernet address. BOOTP - Bootstrap protocol is used to assign an IP address to diskless computers and tell it what server and file to load which will provide it with an operating system. 7

Marilene Mercy 08-1483

ACS 351 A

ASSIGNMENT 1

DHCP - Dynamic host configuration protocol (DHCP) is a method of assigning and controlling the IP addresses of computers on a given network. It is a server based service that automatically assigns IP numbers when a computer boots. This way the IP address of a computer does not need to be assigned manually. This makes changing networks easier to manage. DHCP can perform all the functions of BOOTP. IGMP - Internet Group Management Protocol used to support multicasting. SNMP - Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP). It used to manage all types of network elements based on various data sent and received. RIP - Routing Information Protocol (RIP), used to dynamically update router tables on WANs or the internet. OSPF - Open Shortest Path First (OSPF) dynamic routing protocol. BGP - Border Gateway Protocol (BGP). Is a dynamic router protocol to communicate between routers on different systems. CIDR - Classless Inter-domain Routing (CIDR). FTP - File Transfer Protocol (FTP). Allows file transfer between two computers with login required. TFTP - Trivial File Transfer Protocol (TFTP). Allows file transfer between two computers with no login required. It is limited, and is intended for diskless stations. SMTP - Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP). NFS - Network File System (NFS). A protocol that allows UNIX and Linux systems remotely mount each other's file systems. Telnet - A method of opening a user session on a remote host. Ping - A program that uses ICMP to send diagnostic messages to other computers to tell if they are reachable over the network. Rlogin - Remote login between UNIX hosts. This is outdated and is replaced by Telnet. 8

Marilene Mercy 08-1483

ACS 351 A

ASSIGNMENT 1

Each protocol ultimately has its data packets wrapped in an Ethernet, SLIP, or PPP packet (at the link level) in order to be sent over the Ethernet cable. Some protocol data packets are wrapped sequentially multiple times before being sent. For example FTP data is wrapped in a TCP packet which is wrapped in an IP packet which is wrapped in a link packet (normally Ethernet). The diagram below shows the relationship between the protocols' sequential wrapping of data packets.

3.0 Packet Switching vs. Circuit Switching

3.1 Circuit Switching In this networking method, a connection called a circuit is set up between two devices, which are used for the whole communication. Information about the nature of the circuit is maintained by the network. The circuit may either be a fixed one that is always present, or it may be a circuit that is created on an as-needed basis. Even if many potential paths through intermediate devices may exist between the two devices communicating, only one will be used for any given dialog. Figure 1 below illustrates this. 9

Marilene Mercy 08-1483

ACS 351 A

ASSIGNMENT 1

Figure 1: Circuit Switching In a circuit-switched network, before communication can occur between two devices, a circuit is established between them. This is shown as a thick blue line for the conduit of data from Device A to Device B, and a matching purple line from B back to A. Once set up, all communication between these devices takes place over this circuit, even though there are other possible ways that data could conceivably be passed over the network of devices between them. Contrast this diagram to Figure 2 The classic example of a circuit-switched network is the telephone system. When you call someone and they answer, you establish a circuit connection and can pass data between you, in a steady stream if desired. That circuit functions the same way regardless of how many intermediate devices are used to carry your voice. You use it for as long as you need it, and then terminate the circuit. The next time you call, you get a new circuit, which may (probably will) use different hardware than the first circuit did, depending on what's available at that time in the network. 3.2 Packet Switching In this network type, no specific path is used for data transfer. Instead, the data is chopped up into small pieces called packets and sent over the network. The packets can be routed, combined or fragmented, as required to get them to their eventual destination. On the receiving end, the process is reversedthe data is read from the packets and reassembled into the form of the original data. A packet-switched network is more analogous to the postal system than it is to the telephone system. 10

Marilene Mercy 08-1483

ACS 351 A

ASSIGNMENT 1

Figure 2: Packet Switching In a packet-switched network, no circuit is set up prior to sending data between devices. Blocks of data, even from the same file or communication, may take any number of paths as it journeys from one device to another. 3.3 Packet vs. Circuit One important issue in selecting a switching method is whether the network medium is shared or dedicated. However, this doesn't work well in LANs, which typically use a single shared medium. If two devices were to establish a connection, they would lock out all the other devices for a long period of time. It makes more sense to chop the data into small pieces and send them one at a time. Then, if two other devices want to communicate, their packets can be interspersed and everyone can share the network. The ability to have many devices communicate simultaneously without dedicated data paths is one reason why packet switching is becoming predominant today. However, there are some disadvantages of packet switching compared to circuit switching. One is that since all data does not take the same, predictable path between devices, it is possible that some pieces of data may get lost in transit, or show up in the incorrect order. In some situations this does not matter, while in others it is very important indeed.

11

Marilene Mercy 08-1483

ACS 351 A

ASSIGNMENT 1

References:
Books: Local Area Networks 4th Ed by Peter Hodson Communication Networks; a First Course 5th Ed by Jean Walrand Computer Networking with Internet Protocols and Technology 4th Ed by William Stallings Websites: voip.about.com/od/voipbasics/a/switchingtypes.htm www.computerworld.com/s/article/41904/Packet_Switched_vs._Circuit_Switche d_Networks

12