COMPUTER NETWORKS

OBJECTIVES
After successful completion of this module, the students should be able to
• Describes various network topology
• Evaluates network services
• Designs network topology
• Manipulates internet services
• Displays awareness in the utilization of internet services
• Basic Networking Concepts
Home and Office Networks

• The network you have at home uses the same networking technologies,
protocols and services that are used in large corporate networks and on
the Internet.

• The only real difference between an home network and a large

corporate network is the size.
 Networking Types and Structures
• Networks can be wired or wireless with most networks being a mixture
of both

• Wired vs Wireless Networks

• Early (pre 2008) networks were predominately wired. Today however

most networks will use a mixture of wired and wireless network. Wired
networks use Ethernet as the data link protocol. This is unlikely to
change with the IOT, as IOT devices will be predominantly wireless.
 Wired Networks- Advantages
• Wired networks have the following advantages/disadvantages:

• Advantages:
• Ethernet ports are found on almost all laptops/PCs and netbooks even
on those 8 years old.
• Wired networks are faster than Wireless. Data rates were periodically
increased from the original 10 megabits per second, to 1gigabits per
second. Most home networks use 10- 100Mbps.
• More secure than Wireless
Disadvantages

• Need to Use cable which can be unsightly, difficult to run and

expensive.
• Can’t be used easily between buildings (planning etc).
• Note a new technology that uses mains cable overcomes many of these
disadvantages. powerline networking is common on home/small office
network
• Not supported on Mobile phones and tablets.
 Wireless Networks – Advantages and Disadvantages
Wireless networks use Wi-fi as the data link protocol. However other
wireless options are being developed for the IOT (Internet of things).
Wireless Networks have the following advantages/disadvantages:

Advantages

• Generally easier to set up.

• Can be used both on home and public networks
• No cables required.
• Can be used with mobile phones and tablets.
 Wireless Networks Disadvantages
Wireless Networks Disadvantages

• Generally Slower than wired networks.

• Limited by range.
• Open to eavesdropping
• Not as secure depending on set up.
 Networking Topologies and Layout

• There are many different ways network

nodes can be connected together. This
isn’t normally a consideration in small
networks but has networks get larger it
becomes more important.
There are many ways network nodes can be connected
together. Common connecti on technologies like wi-fi ,
bluetooth etc are designed to work using a parti cular
network topology. When designing networks and choosing
connecti on protocols having an understanding of these
topologies is important.

Common are:

• BUS
• RING
• MESH
• STAR
• HYBRID
 BUS
BUS TOPOLOGY IS A TYPE OF NETWORK TOPOLOGY IN WHICH
ALL DEVICES ARE CONNECTED TO A SINGLE CABLE CALLED A
"BUS." THIS CABLE SERVES AS A SHARED COMMUNICATION
MEDIUM, ALLOWING ALL DEVICES ON THE NETWORK TO
RECEIVE THE SAME SIGNAL SIMULTANEOUSLY.
 RING
A RING TOPOLOGY IS A NETWORK ARCHITECTURE IN WHICH
DEVICES ARE CONNECTED IN A RING STRUCTURE AND SEND
INFORMATION TO EACH OTHER BASED ON THEIR RING
NODE'S NEIGHBOURING NODE.
 MESH
A MESH NETWORK IS A NETWORK IN WHICH DEVICES -- OR
NODES -- ARE LINKED TOGETHER, BRANCHING OFF OTHER
DEVICES OR NODES. THESE NETWORKS ARE SET UP TO
EFFICIENTLY ROUTE DATA BETWEEN DEVICES AND CLIENTS.
THEY HELP ORGANIZATIONS PROVIDE A CONSISTENT
CONNECTION THROUGHOUT A PHYSICAL SPACE.
 STAR
A STAR TOPOLOGY IS A TOPOLOGY FOR A LOCAL
AREA NETWORK (LAN) IN WHICH ALL NODES ARE
INDIVIDUALLY CONNECTED TO A CENTRAL
CONNECTION POINT, LIKE A HUB OR A SWITCH . A
STAR TAKES MORE CABLE THAN E.G. A BUS, BUT
THE BENEFIT IS THAT IF A CABLE FAILS, ONLY ONE
NODE WILL BE BROUGHT DOWN.
 HYBRID
IN LAYMAN'S TERMS, HYBRID TOPOLOGY IS THE
COMBINATION OF TWO OR MORE NETWORKS . THE
NETWORK TYPE COULD BE STAR, RING, BUS, OR
MESH. HOWEVER, IN MOST CASES, ONLY THE STAR
AND RING TOPOLOGIES ARE USED TO CREATE A
HYBRID NETWORK.
 Networking Topology- Physical vs Logical
How the nodes on a network communicate with each other can be very
different to how they are physically interconnected.

Most Home and small office networks use a physical bus topology. Common
logical typologies are Peer to Peer and Client Server. The web (WWW) is a
client server network at the logical level.
 Peer to Peer and Client Server Networking
in a peer to peer network all nodes are equal and any node can talk to any
other node. No node has any special role. This was the original networking
model of windows networking. (windows for Workgroups)- Diagram
below:
Advantages and Disadvantages

Advantages:

• Easier to setup
• Not dependent on a single node
• More resilient
• Better distribution of network traffic
• No central administrator required
• Less expensive hardware required
Disadvantages:

• Less secure and more difficult to secure

• More difficult to administer
• More difficult to backup
• More difficult to locate information.

• This was the original networking model used in early Windows

networks (windows for Workgroups). A Modern example of Peer to
Peer networking is BitTorrent.
Client Server

In a Client Server network a server has a special role e.g file server, domain
controller, web server etc. A client connects to a server to use the
appropriate services. This is the networking model used on the web and the
Internet and on modern large Windows networks.-Diagram below:
Advantages and Disadvantages

Advantages:

• Easy to find resources as they are on a dedicated node i.e. A

server
• Easy to secure
• Easy to administer
• Easy to backup

Disadvantages:

• Servers are a single point of failure

• Expensive hardware required
• Network traffic get concentrated
Network Size
Networks vary considerably in size.The following are commonly used terms:

PAN -Personal Area Network – Linking local devices e,g, PC to printer

LAN – Local Area network- links devices in an office or offices
MAN – Metropolitan Area network – links devices across multiple buildings
like a campus
WAN – Wide area network – links devices across a country/countries
Networking Levels and Layers and Protocols

A protocol defines a set of rules that govern how computers talk to each
other. Ethernet and Wi-Fi are Data link protocols that are responsible for
framing data on the media (cable or wireless). They can be used for
carrying higher level protocols (IP etc)..

Ethernet and Wi-Fi use a physical level address know as the MAC address
which is 48 bits. EUI 64 addresses are MAC addresses with 64 bits will
replace MAC addresses on IPV6, 6LoWPAN, ZigBee and other new network
protocols. See this Wiki for details.
 NETWORK ADDRESSING
rapid growth of the Internet, all IPv4 addresses have been allocated (as of
2013). TEvery device attached to a network, and the Internet has an IP
address.

There are two versions of IP, they are IPv4 and IPv6. IPv4 has been in use
since the start of the Internet, and is deployed across the Internet, and
home/corporate networks. IPv4 uses 32 bits for addressing, however due
to the rapid growth of the Internet, all IPv4 addresses have been allocated
(as of 2013).
PUBLIC AND PRIVATE IP ADDRESSES
Both IPv4 and IPV6 have both public and private address ranges. The
private addresses are used for home/business networks and the
addresses aren’t routeable on the Internet i.e. they don’t travel across
the internet.
For IP4 the private addresses starts with 10.x.x.x or 192.168.x.x or
172.16.x.x
Public addresses are reachable from anywhere on the internet and are
routeable
 IP ADDRESS ASSIGNMENT
Most modern networks use automatic IP address assignment via DHCP
with manual assignment only being done in special cases. For home
networks the Internet router or hub usually provides DHCP services for
the network. For larger networks a dedicated DHCP server is normally
used. Most windows machines will auto assign their own address if they
fail to find a DHCP server. This can cause problems see troubleshooting
Internet connections.