Introduction to Networks

Unit 1
• A computer network is a system of interconnected devices
that can share data and resources with each other.
• Computer networks can be made up of two or more
devices, such as laptops, desktops, servers, smartphones,
tablets, and more.
• These devices can be connected by wires or wireless
signals.
• Need to understand the following terminologies
– Link
– Nodes
– Point-to-point
– Multiple access

(a) Point-to-point
(b) Multiple access
• Terminologies
(contd.)
– Cloud
– Hosts
– Switches
– internetwork
– Router/gateway
• Terminologies
(contd.)
– Cloud
– Hosts
– Switches
– internetwork
– Router/gateway
 USES OF COMPUTER NETWORKS

• Business Applications
• Home Applications
• Mobile users
• Social Issues
 USES OF COMPUTER NETWORKS
1. Business Applications
• Most companies have a substantial number of computers.
• Company may have a computer for each worker and use them to
design products, write brochures, and do the payroll.
 USES OF COMPUTER NETWORKS
1. Business Applications
 USES OF COMPUTER NETWORKS
2 Home Applications
Some of the more popular uses of the Internet for Home users
are as follows:
1. Access to remote information.
2. Person to person communication
3. Interactive Entertainment
4. Electronic Commerce
 USES OF COMPUTER NETWORKS
2 Home Applications
 USES OF COMPUTER NETWORKS
3. Mobile Users

• Mobile Computers , such as notebook computers and personal

digital assistants(PDA’s) , are one of the fastest growing segments of
the computer industry.
• Many owners of these computers have desktop machines back at
the office and want to be connected to their home base even when
away from home.
 USES OF COMPUTER NETWORKS
4. Social Issues
• The widespread introduction of networking has introduced new
social ,ethical, and political problems.
• A lot of these problems could be solved if the computer industry
took computer security seriously. If all message were encrypted
and authenticated , it would be harder to commit mischief.
 NETWORK HARDWARE
• There are two types of transmission technology that are in
widespread use: broadcast links and point-to-point links.
• Point-to-point links connect individual pairs of machines. To go
from the source to the destination on a network made up of point-
to-point links, short messages, called packets.
• Point-to-point transmission with exactly one sender and exactly one
receiver is sometimes called unicasting.
• Broadcast network, the communication channel is shared by
all the machines on the network; packets sent by any machine are
received by all the others.
• Some broadcast systems also support transmission to a subset of
the machines, which known as Multicasting.
 NETWORK HARDWARE

• Personal Area Networks

• Local Area Networks
• Metropolitan Area Networks
• Wide Area Networks
• Internetworks
 NETWORK HARDWARE
Personal Area Networks
• PANs (Personal Area Networks) let devices communicate over the
range of a person.
• A common example is a wireless network that connects a computer
with its peripherals (Bluetooth).
• Bluetooth can be used in other settings, too. It is often used to
connect a headset to a mobile phone without cords and it can allow
your digital music player
 NETWORK HARDWARE
Personal Area Networks
 NETWORK HARDWARE
Local Area Networks
• A LAN is a privately owned network that operates within and
nearby a single building like a home, office or factory.
• LANs are widely used to connect personal computers and consumer
electronics to let them share resources (e.g., printers) and exchange
information.
• When LANs are used by companies, they are called enterprise
networks.
 NETWORK HARDWARE
Local Area Networks
 NETWORK HARDWARE
Metropolitan Area Networks
• A MAN (Metropolitan Area Network) covers a city.
• The best-known examples of MANs are the cable television
networks available in many cities.
• High speed wireless Internet access have resulted in another MAN,
which has been standardized as IEEE 802.16 and is popularly known
as WiMAX
 NETWORK HARDWARE
Metropolitan Area Networks
 NETWORK HARDWARE
Wide Area Networks
• A WAN (Wide Area Network) spans a large geographical area, often
a country or continent.
 NETWORK HARDWARE
Wide Area Networks
• In most WANs, the subnet consists of two distinct components:
transmission lines and switching elements. Transmission lines
move bits between machines.
• They can be made of copper wire, optical fiber, or even radio links.
• Most companies do not have transmission lines lying about, so
instead they lease the lines from a telecommunications company.
• Switching elements, or just switches, are specialized computers
that connect two or more transmission lines.
• When data arrive on an incoming line, the switching element must
choose an outgoing line on which to forward them.
• These switching computers have been called by various names in
the past; the name router is now most commonly used.
 NETWORK HARDWARE
Internetworks
• A collection of interconnected networks is called an internetwork
or internet.
• The Internet uses ISP networks to connect enterprise networks,
home networks, and many other networks
 NETWORK SOFTWARE
Protocol Hierarchies
• To reduce their design complexity, most networks are organized as
a stack of layers or levels.
• 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.
• The purpose of each layer is to offer certain services to the higher
layers
• Protocol provides a communication service that higher-level
objects (such as application processes ) use to exchange messages.
 NETWORK SOFTWARE
Protocol Hierarchies
 NETWORK SOFTWARE
Protocol Hierarchies
• The entities comprising the corresponding layers on different
machines are called peers.
• The peers may be software processes, hardware devices, or even
human beings.
• In other words, it is the peers that communicate by using the
protocol to talk to each other.
• Between each pair of adjacent layers is an interface.
• The interface defines which primitive operations and services the
lower layer makes available to the upper one.
• A set of layers and protocols is called a network architecture.
• A list of the protocols used by a certain system, one protocol per
layer, is called a protocol stack.
 NETWORK SOFTWARE
Protocol Hierarchies
 NETWORK SOFTWARE
Design Issues for the Layers
• Reliability is the design issue of making a network that operates
correctly even though it is made up of a collection of components that
are themselves unreliable.
• One mechanism for finding errors in received information uses codes for
error detection. Information that is incorrectly received can then be
retransmitteduntil it is received correctly.
• More powerful codes allow for error correction, where the correct
message is recovered from the possibly incorrect bits that were
originally received.
• Both of these mechanisms work by adding redundant information.
• They are used at low layers, to protect packets sent over individual links,
and high layers, to check that the right contents were received.
 NETWORK SOFTWARE
Design Issues for the Layers
• A second design issue concerns the evolution of the network.
• Since there are many computers on the network, every layer needs a
mechanism for identifying the senders and receivers that are involved in
a particular message. This mechanism is called addressing or naming.
• A third design issue is resource allocation. Networks provide a service to
hosts from their underlying resources, such as the capacity of
transmission lines.
• An allocation problem that occurs at every level is how to keep a fast
sender from swamping a slow receiver with data. Feedback from the
receiver to the sender is often used. This subject is called flow control.
• Sometimes the problem is that the network is oversubscribed because
too many computers want to send too much traffic, and the network
cannot deliver it all. This overloading of the network is called
congestion.
• The last major design issue is to secure the network by defending it
 NETWORK SOFTWARE
Connection-Oriented Versus Connectionless Service
• Layers can offer two different types of service to the layers above them:
connection- oriented and connectionless.
• Connection-oriented network service, the service user first establishes a
connection, uses the connection, and then releases the connection.
• In contrast to connection-oriented service, connectionless service is
modeled after the postal system.
• Each message (letter) carries the full destination address and each one is
routed through the intermediate nodes inside the system independent of
all the subsequent messages.
• There are different names for messages in different contexts; a packet is a
message at the network layer.
• When the intermediate nodes receive a message in full before sending it
on to the next node, this is called store-and-forward switching.
• The alternative, in which the onward transmission of a message at a node
starts before it is completely received by the node, is called cut-through
switching.
 NETWORK SOFTWARE
Service Primitives
• A service is formally specified by a set of primitives (operations)
available to user processes to access the service.
• The set of primitives available depends on the nature of the service
being provided.
• The primitives for connection-oriented service are different from
those of connectionless service
 NETWORK SOFTWARE
Service Primitives
 NETWORK SOFTWARE
Service Primitives
• First, the server executes LISTEN to indicate that it is prepared to accept
incoming connections.
• After executing the primitive, the server process is blocked until
a request for connection appears.
• Next, the client process executes CONNECT to establish a connection
with the server.
• The CONNECT call needs to specify who to connect to, so it might have a
parameter giving the server’s address.
• When the packet arrives at the server, the operating system sees that
the packet is requesting a connection. It checks to see if there is a
listener, and if so it unblocks the listener.
• The server process can then establish the connection with the ACCEPT
call.
 NETWORK SOFTWARE
Service Primitives
• First, the server executes LISTEN to indicate that it is prepared to accept
incoming connections.
• After executing the primitive, the server process is blocked until
a request for connection appears.
• Next, the client process executes CONNECT to establish a connection
with the server.
• The CONNECT call needs to specify who to connect to, so it might have a
parameter giving the server’s address.
• When the packet arrives at the server, the operating system sees that
the packet is requesting a connection. It checks to see if there is a
listener, and if so it unblocks the listener.
• The server process can then establish the connection with the ACCEPT
call.
 NETWORK SOFTWARE
Service Primitives
• This sends a response (2) back to the client process to accept the
connection.
• The arrival of this response then releases the client. At this point the
client and server are both running and they have a connection
established.
• The next step is for the server to execute RECEIVE to prepare to accept
the first request.
• The server does this immediately upon being released from the
LISTEN, before the acknowledgement can get back to the client. The
RECEIVE call blocks the server.
 NETWORK SOFTWARE
Service Primitives
• Then the client executes SEND to transmit its request (3) followed by the
execution of RECEIVE to get the reply.
• The arrival of the request packet at the server machine unblocks the
server so it can handle the request.
• After it has done the work, the server uses SEND to return the answer to
the client (4).
• The arrival of this packet unblocks the client.
• When the client is done, it executes DISCONNECT to terminate the
connection
• When the server gets the packet, it also issues a DISCONNECT of its own,
acknowledging the client and releasing the connection (6).
 NETWORK SOFTWARE
The Relationship of Services to Protocols
• Services and protocols are distinct concepts.
• A service is a set of primitives (operations) that a layer provides to the
layer above it.
• A service relates to an interface between two layers, with the lower
layer being the service provider and the upper layer being the service
user.
• A protocol, in contrast, is a set of rules governing the format and
meaning of the packets, or messages that are exchanged by the peer
entities within a layer.
• Entities use protocols to implement their service definitions.
 NETWORK SOFTWARE
The Relationship of Services to Protocols
 REFERENCE MODELS
• The OSI reference model
• The TCP/IP reference model.
1. The OSI Reference Model
• This model is based on a proposal developed by the International
Standards Organization (ISO).
• The model is called the ISO OSI (Open Systems Interconnection)
Reference Model because it deals with connecting open systems.
REFERENCE MODELS
 REFERENCE MODELS
1. The OSI Reference Model
The Physical Layer:
• The physical layer is concerned with transmitting raw bits over a
communication channel.
• The design issues have to do with making sure that when one side
sends a 1 bit it is received by the other side as a 1 bit, not as a 0 bit.

The Data Link Layer

• The main task of the data link layer is to transform a raw transmission
facility into a line that appears free of undetected transmission errors.
• The sender break up the input data into data frames and transmit the
frames sequentially.
• If the service is reliable, the receiver confirms correct receipt of each
frame by sending back an acknowledgement frame.
 REFERENCE MODELS
1. The OSI Reference Model
The Network Layer :
• The network layer controls the operation of the subnet.
• A key design issue is determining how packets are routed from source to
destination.
• When a packet has to travel from one network to another to get to its
destination, many problems can arise.
• The addressing used by the second network may be different from that
used by the first one.
• The second one may not accept the packet at all because it is too large.
 REFERENCE MODELS
1. The OSI Reference Model
The Transport Layer
• The basic function of the transport layer is to accept data from above
it, split it up into smaller units if need be, pass these to the network
layer and ensure that the pieces all arrive correctly at the other end.
• The transport layer also determines what type of service to provide to
the session layer, and, ultimately, to the users of the network.
• The transport layer is a true end-to-end layer; it carries data all the way
from the source to the destination.
 REFERENCE MODELS
The OSI Reference Model
The Session Layer
• The session layer allows users on different machines to establish
sessions between them.
• Sessions offer various services, including dialog control (keeping track of
whose turn it is to transmit), token management (preventing two
parties from attempting the same critical operation simultaneously),
and synchronization.
The Presentation Layer :
• The presentation layer is concerned with the syntax and semantics of
the information transmitted.
• In order to make it possible for computers with different internal
data representations to communicate, the data structures to be
exchanged can be defined in an abstract way
 REFERENCE MODELS
The OSI Reference Model
The Application Layer
• The application layer contains a variety of protocols that are commonly
needed by users. One widely used application protocol is HTTP
(HyperText Transfer Protocol), which is the basis for the World Wide
Web.
• Other application protocols are used for file transfer, electronic mail, and
network news.
 REFERENCE MODELS
The TCP/IP Reference Model
 REFERENCE MODELS
The TCP/IP Reference Model
The Link Layer
• The lowest layer in the model, the link layer describes what links such
as serial lines and classic Ethernet must do to meet the needs of this
connectionless internet layer.

The Internet Layer

• The internet layer is the linchpin that holds the whole architecture
together.
• Its job is to permit hosts to inject packets into any network and have
them travel independently to the destination.
• The internet layer defines an official packet format and protocol called
IP(Internet Protocol), plus a companion protocol called ICMP (Internet
Control Message Protocol) that helps it function. The job of the internet
layer is to deliver IP packets where they are supposed to go.
 REFERENCE MODELS
The TCP/IP Reference Model
The Transport Layer
• The layer above the internet layer in the TCP/IP model is now usually
called the transport layer.
• Two end-to-end transport protocols have been defined here. The first
one, TCP(Transmission Control Protocol), is a reliable connection-
oriented protocol that allows a byte stream originating on one machine
to be delivered without error on any other machine in the internet.
• It segments the incoming byte stream into discrete messages and passes
each one on to the internet layer.
• At the destination, the receiving TCP process reassembles the received
messages into the output stream.
• The second protocol in this layer, UDP (User Datagram Protocol), is an
unreliable, connectionless protocol for applications.
• It is also widely used for one-shot, client-server-type request-reply
queries and applications
 REFERENCE MODELS
The TCP/IP Reference Model
The Application Layer
• The TCP/IP model does not have session or presentation layers.
• Instead, applications simply include any session and presentation
functions that they require.
• On top of the transport layer is the application layer.
• It contains all the higher- level protocols. The early ones included virtual
terminal (TELNET), file transfer (FTP), and electronic mail (SMTP).
 REFERENCE MODELS
The TCP/IP Reference Model
The Application Layer
 THE PHYSICAL LAYER
Guided Transmission Media
• The purpose of the physical layer is to transport bits from one machine
to another.
• Various physical media can be used for the actual transmission
1. Magnetic Media
• One of the most common ways to transport data from one computer to
another is to write them onto magnetic tape or removable media (e.g.,
recordable DVDs), physically transport the tape or disks to the
destination machine, and read them back in again.
 THE PHYSICAL LAYER
Guided Transmission Media
2. Twisted Pairs
• One of the oldest and still most common transmission media is twisted
pair.
• A twisted pair consists of two insulated copper wires, typically about 1
mm thick.
• Twisting is done because two parallel wires constitute a fine antenna.
• When the wires are twisted, the waves from different twists cancel out,
so the wire radiates less effectively.
• Signal is usually carried as the difference in voltage between the two
wires in the pair.
• Twisted pairs can be used for transmitting either analog or digital
information.
 THE PHYSICAL LAYER
Guided Transmission Media
2. Twisted Pairs
 THE PHYSICAL LAYER
Guided Transmission Media
2. Twisted Pairs
• Links that can be used in both directions at the same time, like a two-
lane road, are called full-duplex links.
• In contrast, links that can be used in either direction, but only one way
at a time, like a single-track railroad line. are called half-duplex links.
• A third category consists of links that allow traffic in only one direction,
like a one-way street. They are called simplex links.
 THE PHYSICAL LAYER
Guided Transmission Media
3. Coaxial Cable
• Another common transmission medium is the coaxial cable.
• It has better shielding and greater bandwidth than unshielded twisted
pairs, so it can span longer distances at higher speeds.
• Two kinds of coaxial cable are widely used. One kind, 50-ohm cable, is
commonly used when it is intended for digital transmission from the
start.
• The other kind, 75-ohm cable, is commonly used for analog transmission
and cable television
 THE PHYSICAL LAYER
Guided Transmission Media
3. Coaxial Cable

• A coaxial cable consists of a stiff copper wire as the core, surrounded by

an insulating material.
• The insulator is encased by a cylindrical conductor, often as a closely
woven braided mesh.
• The outer conductor is covered in a protective plastic sheath.
 THE PHYSICAL LAYER
Guided Transmission Media
4. Power Lines
• The telephone and cable television networks are not the only sources of
wiring that can be reused for data communication.
• Power lines deliver electrical power to houses, and electrical wiring
within houses distributes the power to electrical outlets.
• Power lines have been used by electricity companies for low-rate
communication such as remote metering for many years, as well in the
home to control devices.
 THE PHYSICAL LAYER
Guided Transmission Media
5. Fiber Optics
• Fiber optics are used for long-haul transmission in network backbones,
high speed LANs (although so far, copper has always managed catch up
eventually), and high-speed Internet access such as FttH (Fiber to the
Home).
• An optical transmission system has three key components: the light
source, the transmission medium, and the detector.
• The detector generates an electrical pulse when light falls on it.
• By attaching a light source to one end of an optical fiber and a detector
to the other, we have a unidirectional data transmission system that
accepts an electrical signal, converts and transmits it by light pulses, and
then reconverts the output to an electrical signal at the receiving end.
 THE PHYSICAL LAYER
Guided Transmission Media
6. Fiber Cables
• Fiber optic cables are similar to coax, except without the braid.
 THE PHYSICAL LAYER
Guided Transmission Media
6. Fiber Cables
• At the center is the glass core through which the light propagates.
• In multimode fibers, the core is typically 50 microns in diameter, about
the thickness of a human hair. In single-mode fibers, the core is 8 to 10
microns.
• The core is surrounded by a glass cladding with a lower index of
refraction than the core, to keep all the light in the core.
• Next comes a thin plastic jacket to protect the cladding.
• Fibers can be connected in three different ways.
• First, they can terminate in connectors and be plugged into fiber
sockets.
• Second, they can be spliced mechanically.
• Third, two pieces of fiber can be fused (melted) to form a solid
connection.
 THE PHYSICAL LAYER
WIRELESS TRANSMISSION
1. The Electromagnetic Spectrum
• When electrons move, they create electromagnetic waves that can
propagate through space (even in a vacuum).
• The number of oscillations per second of a wave is called its frequency, f,
and is measured in Hz (in honor of Heinrich Hertz).
• The distance between two consecutive maxima (or minima) is called the
wavelength, which is universally designated by the Greek letter λ
(lambda).
• When an antenna of the appropriate size is attached to an electrical
circuit, the electromagnetic waves can be broadcast efficiently and
received by a receiver some distance away.
 THE PHYSICAL LAYER
WIRELESS TRANSMISSION
2. Radio Transmission
• Radio frequency (RF) waves are easy to generate, can travel long
distances, and can penetrate buildings easily, so they are widely used for
communication, both indoors and outdoors.
• Radio waves also are omnidirectional, meaning that they travel in all
directions from the source, so the transmitter and receiver do not have
to be carefully aligned physically.

3. Microwave Transmission
• Microwaves travel in a straight line.
• so if the towers are too far apart, the earth will get in the way (think
about a Seattle-to-Amsterdam link). Thus, repeaters are needed
periodically.
• The higher the towers are, the farther apart they can be.
 THE PHYSICAL LAYER
WIRELESS TRANSMISSION
4. Infrared Transmission
• Unguided infrared waves are widely used for short-range
communication.
• The remote controls used for televisions, VCRs, and stereos all use
infrared communication.
• They are relatively directional, cheap, and easy to build
• have a major drawback: they do not pass through solid objects.
5. Light Transmission
• Unguided optical signaling or free-space optics has been in use for
centuries.
• Optical signaling using lasers is inherently unidirectional, so each end
needs its own laser and its own photo detector.