CIT 852:
DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

 
 

NATIONAL OPEN UNIVERSITY OF NIGERIA

 
CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

COURSE
GUIDE
CIT 852
DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

Course Adapter Afolorunso, A. A.

National Open University of Nigeria

Course Coordinator Afolorunso, A. A.

National Open University of Nigeria

NATIONAL OPEN UNIVERSITY OF NIGERIA

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

National Open University of Nigeria

Headquarters
14/16 Ahmadu Bello Way
Victoria Island
Lagos

Abuja Office
5, Dar Es Salaam Street
Off Aminu Kano Crescent
Wuse II, Abuja
Nigeria.

e-mail: [email protected]
URL: www.nou.edu.ng

Published by
National Open University of Nigeria

Printed 2008

ISBN: 978-058-378-5

All Rights Reserved

iii
CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

CONTENTS PAGE

Introduction…………………………………………………….. 1
What You Will Learn in this Course …………………….……. 1
Course Aims …………………………………………………… 1
Course Objectives ……………………………………………... 1
Working through this Course ………………………………….. 2
Course Materials ………………………………………………. 2
Study Units …………………………………………………….. 2
Textbooks and References …………………………………….. 3
Assignment File ……………………………………………….. 4
Presentation Schedule …………………………………………. 4
Assessment …………………………………………………….. 4
Tutor-Marked Assignment ……………………………………... 5
Final Examination and .Grading ………………………………... 5
Course Marking Scheme ……………………………………….. 6
Course Overview ……………………………………………….. 6
How to Get the Best from this Course ………………………… 7
Facilitators/Tutors and Tutorials ………………………………. 8
Summary ……………………………………………………….. 9
Introduction

CIT 852 -Data Communication and Networks is a three [3] credit unit
course of 16 units. The main objective of the course is to deal with
fundamental issues in Computer Networks. It starts with the philosophy
of data communication covering different modulation and multiplexing
techniques. Then, it proceeds to cover MAC layer protocols, several
routing techniques protocols, congestion techniques and several network
layer protocol. The final module of the course takes up issues related to
the transport layer mechanism, such as, addressing, connection,
establishment, flow control and multiplexing issues. It also covers the
transport layer protocol in details. The module ends with the security
issue, which is an important topic today.

This Course Guide gives you a brief overview of the course content,
course duration, and course materials.

What You Will Learn in this course

The main purpose of this course is to deal with fundamental issues in

Computer Networks. It makes available the steps and tools that will
enable you to make proper and accurate decision about data
transmission and computer systems connectivity whenever the need
arises. This, we intend to achieve through the following:

Course Aims

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

i. Introduce the concepts data communication and computer

networks;
ii. Provide in-depth knowledge of Data Link Layer fundamental
such as, error detection, correction, and flow techniques; as well
as introduce data link layer switching concepts;
iii. Discuss the concept of routing and congestion as well as
highlight the different routing and congestion control algorithms;
and
iv. Introduce internetworking concepts and protocols; v. Discuss
topics like network security which include symmetric key
algorithm, public key algorithm, digital signature, etc. as well as
topics like addressing, multiplexing, connection establishment,
crash recovery and TCPIUDP Protocols.

Course Objectives

Certain objectives have been set out to ensure that the course achieves
its aims. Apart from the course objectives, every unit of this course has
set objectives. In the course of the study, you will need to confirm, at the
end of each unit, if you have met the objectives set at the beginning of
each unit. By the end of this course you should be able to:

i. describe the various components and data communication and

computer networking;
ii. differentiate between different types of computer networks;
iii. compare the different network topologies;
iv. describe the mechanism and techniques of encoding;
v. describe a wireless LAN and Data Link Layer switching, and
operations of bridges;
vi. explain the Routing concept;
vi. explain the basic principle of internetworking and its importance;
vii. describe the whole concept/idea behind network security as well
as the various network/data security algorithms

Working through this Course

In order to have a thorough understanding of the course units, you will

need to read and understand the contents, practise the steps by designing
and implementing a mini LAN for your department, and be committed
to learning and implementing your knowledge.

This course is designed to cover approximately eighteen weeks, and it

will require your devoted attention. You should do the exercises in the
Tutor-Marked Assignments and submit to your tutors.

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

Course Materials

These include:

1. Course Guide
2. Study Units
3. Recommended Texts
4. A file for your assignments and for records to monitor your
progress.

Study Units
There are sixteen study units in this course:

Module 1 Introduction to Data Communication and Computer

Network Concepts

Unit 1 Introduction to Computer Networks

Unit 2 Data Transmission
Unit 3 Data Encoding and Communication Technique
Unit 4 Multiplexing and Switching
Module 2 Media Access Control and Data Link Layer

Unit 1 Data Link Layer Fundamentals

Unit 2 Retransmission Strategies
Unit 3 Contention-Based Media Access Protocols
Unit 4 Wireless LAN and Datalink Layer Switching

Module 3 Network Layer

Unit 1 Introduction to Layer Functionality and Design Issues

Unit 2 Routing Algorithms
Unit 3 Congestion Control in Public Switched Network
Unit 4 Internetworking

Module 4 Transport Layer and Application Layer Services

Unit 1 Transport Services and Mechanism

Unit 2 TCPIUDP
Unit 3 Network Security I
Unit 4 Network Security II

Make use of the course materials, do the exercises to enhance your

learning.

Textbooks and References

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

Computer Networks, Andrew S. Tenenbaum, PHI, New Delhi.

Data and Computer Communication, William Stalling, PHI, New Delhi.

Computer Communications and Networking Technologies, by Michael

A. Gallo and William M. Hancock, Thomson Asia, Second
Reprint, 2002.

Introduction to Data Communications and Networking, by Behrouz

Forouzan, Tata McGraw-Hill, 1999.

Networks, Tirothy S. Ramteke, Second Edition, Pearson Education, New

Delhi.

Communications Networks, Leon Garcia, and Widjaja, Tata McGraw-

Hill, 1999.

Computer Networking, J. F. Kurose & K. W. Ross, A Top Down

Approach Featuring the Internet, Pearson Edition, 2003.

Computer Networks, Andrew S. Tanenbaum 4th Edition Prentice Hall of

India, New Delhi. 2003.

Communication Networks, Fundamental Concepts and Key

Architectures, Leon and Widjaja, 3rd Edition, Tata McGraw-Hill.

Data Network, Dmitri Berteskas and Robert Galleger, Second Edition,

Prentice Hall of India, 1997, New Delhi.

Network Security Essential -Application and Standard, William

Stallings, Pearson Education, New Delhi.

Assignments File

These are of two types: the self-assessment exercises and the Tutor-
Marked Assignments. The self-assessment exercises will enable you
monitor your performance by yourself, while the Tutor-Marked
Assignment is a supervised assignment. The assignments take a certain
percentage of your total score in this course. The Tutor-Marked
Assignments will be assessed by your tutor within a specified period.
The examination at the end of this course will aim at determining the
level of mastery of the subject matter. This course includes twelve
Tutor-Marked Assignments and each must be done and submitted
accordingly. Your best scores however, will be recorded for you. Be
sure to send these assignments to your tutor before the deadline to avoid
loss of marks. .

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

Presentation Schedule

The Presentation Schedule included in your course materials gives you

the important dates for the completion of tutor marked assignments and
attending tutorials. Remember, you are required to submit all your
assignments by the due date. You should guard against lagging behind
in your work.

Assessment

There are two aspects to the assessment of the course. First are the tutor
marked assignments; second, is a written examination.

In tackling the assignments, you are expected to apply information and

knowledge acquired during this course. The assignments must be
submitted to your tutor for formal assessment in accordance with the
deadlines stated in the Assignment File. The work you submit to your
tutor for assessment will count for 30% of your total course mark.

At the end of the course, you will need to sit for a final three-hour
examination. This will also count for 70% of your total course mark.

Tutor Marked Assignment

There are sixteen tutor marked assignments in this course. You need to
submit all the assignments. The total marks for the best four (4)
assignments will be 30% of your total course mark.

Assignment questions for the units in this course are contained in the
Assignment File. You should be able to complete your assignments
from the information and materials contained in your set textbooks,
reading and study units. However, you may wish to use other references
to broaden your viewpoint and provide a deeper understanding of the
subject.

When you have completed each assignment, send it together with form
to your tutor. Make sure that each assignment reaches your tutor on or
before the deadline given. If, however, you cannot complete your work
on time, contact your tutor before the assignment is due to discuss the
possibility of an extension.

Final Examination and Grading

The final examination for the course will carry 70% percentage of the
total marks available for this course. The examination will cover every

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

aspect of the course, so you are advised to revise all your corrected
assignments before the examination.

This course endows you with the status of a teacher and that of a learner.
This means that you teach yourself and that you learn, as your learning
capabilities would allow. It also means that you are in a better position
to determine and to ascertain the what, the how, and the when of your
language learning. No teacher imposes any method of learning on you.

The course units are similarly designed with the introduction following
the table of contents, then a set of objectives and then the dialogue and
so on.

The objectives guide you as you go through the units to ascertain your
knowledge of the required terms and expressions.

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

Course Marking Scheme

This table shows the actual course marking is broken down.

Assessment Marks
Assignment 1-4 Four assignments, best three marks of the
four count at 30% of course marks
Final examination 70% of overall course marks
Total 100% of course marks

Table 1: Course Marking Scheme

Course Overview

Unit Title of Work Weeks Assignment

Activity (End of Unit)
Course Guide Week 1
Module 1
1 Introduction to computer Networks Week 1 Assignment 1
2 Data Transmission Week 2 Assignment 2
3 Data Encoding and Communication Week 3 Assignment 3
Technique
4 Multiplexing and Switching Week 4 Assignment 4
Module 2
1 Data Link Layer Fundamentals Week 5 Assignment 5
2 Retransmission Strategies Week 6 Assignment 6
3 Contention-Based Media Access Week 7 Assignment 7
Protocols
4 Wireless LAN and Datalink Layer Week 8 Assignment 8
Switching
Module 3
1 Introduction to Layer Functionality Week 9 Assignment 9
and Design Issues
2 Routing Algorithms Week 10 Assignment 10
3 Congestion Control in Public Week 11 Assignment 11
Switched Network
4 Internet work Week 12 Assignment 12
Module 4
1 Transport services and Mechanism Week 13 Assignment 13
2 TCP/UDP Week 14 Assignment 14
3 Network Security I Week 15 Assignment 15
4 Network Security II Week 16 Assignment 16
Revision Week 17
Examination Week 18
Total Week 18

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

How to Get the Best from this Course

In distance learning the study units replace the university lecturer. This
is one of the great advantages of distance learning; you can read and
work through specially designed study materials at your own pace, and
at a time and place that suit you best. Think of it as reading the lecture
instead of listening to a lecturer. In the same way that a lecturer might
set you some reading to do, the study units tell you when to read your
set books or other material. Just as a lecturer might give you an in-class
exercise, your study units provide exercises for you to do at appropriate
points.

Each of the study units follows a common format. The first item is an
introduction to the subject matter of the unit and how a particular unit is
integrated with the other units and the course as a whole. Next is a set of
learning objectives. These objectives enable you know what you should
be able to do by the time you have completed the unit. You should use
these objectives to guide your study. When you have finished the units
you must go back and check whether you have achieved the objectives.
If you make a habit of doing this you will significantly improve your
chances of passing the course.

Remember that your tutor's job is to assist you. When you need help,
don't hesitate to call and ask your tutor to provide it.

1. Read this Course Guide thoroughly.

2. Organize a study schedule. Refer to the 'Course Overview' for

more details. Note the time you are expected to spend on each
unit and how the assignments relate to the units. Whatever
method you chose to use, you should decide on it and write in
your own dates for working on each unit.

3. Once you have created your own study schedule, do everything

you can to stick to it. The major reason that students fail is that
they lag behind in their course work.

4. Turn to Unit 1 and read the introduction and the objectives for the
unit.

5. Assemble the study materials. Information about what you need

for a unit is given in the 'Overview' at the beginning of each unit.
You will almost always need both the study unit you are working
on and one of your set of books on your desk at the same time.

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

6. Work through the unit. The content of the unit itself has been
arranged to provide a sequence for you to follow. As you work
through the unit you will be instructed to read sections from your
set books or other articles. Use the unit to guide your reading.

7. Review the objectives for each study unit to confirm that you
have achieved them. If you feel unsure about any of the
objectives, review the study material or consult your tutor.

8. When you are confident that you have achieved a unit's

objectives, you can then start on the next unit. Proceed unit by
unit through the course and try to pace your study so that you
keep yourself on schedule.

9. When you have submitted an assignment to your tutor for

marking, do not wait for its return before starting on the next unit.
Keep to your schedule. When the assignment is returned, pay
particular attention to your tutor's comments, both on the tutor-
marked assignment form and also written on the assignment.
Consult your tutor as soon as possible if you have any questions
or problems.

10. After completing the last unit, review the course and prepare
yourself for the final examination. Check that you have achieved
the unit objectives (listed at the beginning of each unit) and the
course objectives (listed in this Course Guide).

Facilitators/Tutors and Tutorials

There are 15 hours of tutorials provided in support of this course. You

will be notified of the dates, times and location of these tutorials,
together with the name and phone number of your tutor, as soon as you
are allocated a tutorial group.

Your tutor will mark and comment on your assignments, keep a close
watch on your progress and on any difficulties you might encounter and
provide assistance to you during the course. You must mail or submit
your tutor-marked assignments to your tutor well before the due date (at
east two working days are required). They will be marked by your tutor
and returned to you as soon as possible.

Do not hesitate to contact your tutor by telephone, or e-mail if you need

help. The following might be circumstances in which you would find
help necessary. Contact your tutor if:

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

you do not understand any part of the study units or the assigned
readings,
you have difficulty with the self-tests or exercises,
you have a question or problem with an assignment, with your tutor's
comments on an assignment or with the grading of an assignment.

You should try your best to attend the tutorials. This is the only chance
to have face to face contact with your tutor and to ask questions which
are answered instantly. You can raise any problem encountered in the
course of your study. To gain the maximum benefit from course
tutorials, prepare a question list before attending them. You will learn a
lot from participating in discussions actively.

Summary

This is course, Data communication and Networks exposes you to basic

know ledge and skills about data communication and computer
networking you need to acquire as an information technology
professional. The content of the course material was planned and written
to build upon whatever knows you have acquired at undergraduate or
post graduate diploma level and to ensure that you acquire the proper
knowledge and skills for the appropriate situations. Real-life situations
have been created to enable you identify with and create some of your
own. The essence is to get you to acquire the necessary knowledge and
competence, and by equipping you with the necessary tools, we hope to
have achieved that.

I wish you success with the course and hope that you will find it both
interesting and useful.

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

Course Code CIT 852

Course Title Data Communication and Network

Course Adapter Afolorunso, A. A.

National Open University of Nigeria

Course Coordinator Afolorunso, A. A.

National Open University of Nigeria

NATIONAL OPEN UNIVERSITY OF NIGERIA

xiv
CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

National Open University of Nigeria

Headquarters
14/16 Ahmadu Bello Way
Victoria Island
Lagos

Abuja Office
5, Dar Es Salaam Street
Off Aminu Kano Crescent
Wuse II, Abuja
Nigeria.

e-mail: [email protected]
URL: www.nou.edu.ng

Published by
National Open University of Nigeria

Printed 2008

ISBN: 978-058-378-5

All Rights Reserved

xv
CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

CONTENTS PAGE

Module 1 Introduction to Data Communication

and Computer Network Concepts…………. 1

Unit 1 Introduction to Computer Networks………….. 1

Unit 2 Data Transmission……………………………. 49
Unit 3 Data Encoding and Communication Technique 77
Unit 4 Multiplexing and Switching………………….. 97

Module 2 Media Access Control and Data Link Layer 118

Unit 1 Data Link Layer Fundamentals………………. 118

Unit 2 Retransmission Strategies……………………. 141
Unit 3 Contention-Based Media Access Protocols…. 152
Unit 4 Wireless LAN and Datalink Layer Switching.. 166

Module 3 Network Layer………………………………. 185

Unit 1 Introduction to Layer Functionality and Design

Issues………………………………………….. 185
Unit 2 Routing Algorithms…………………………… 207
Unit 3 Congestion Control in Public Switched Network 228
Unit 4 Internetworking……………………………….. 239

Module 4 Transport Layer and Application Layer

Services……………………………………….. 262

Unit 1 Transport Services and Mechanism…………… 262

Unit 2 TCP/UDP……………………………………… 279
Unit 3 Network Security I…………………………….. 302
Unit 4 Network Security II……………………………. 344

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

MODULE 1 INTRODUCTION TO DATA

COMMUNICATION AND COMPUTER
NETWORK CONCEPTS

Unit 1 Introduction to Computer Networks

Unit 2 Data Transmission
Unit 3 Data Encoding and Communication Technique
Unit 4 Multiplexing and Switching

UNIT 1 INTRODUCTION TO COMPUTER NETWORKS

CONTENT

1.0 Introduction
2.0 Objectives
3.0 Main Content
3.1 What is a Computer Network?
3.2 Network Goals and Motivations
3.3 Classification of Networks
3.3.1 Broadcast Networks
3.3.2 Point-to-Point or Switched Networks
3.4 work Topology
3.4.1 Bus Topology
3.4.2 Star Topology
3.4.3 Ring Topology
3.4.4 Tree Topology
3.4.5 Mesh Topology
3.4.6 Cellular Topology
3.5 Applications of Network
3.6 Networking Model
3.6.1 OSI Reference Model
3.6.2 TCP/IP Reference Model
3.7 Network Architecture
3.7.1 Client/Server Architecture
3.7.2 Peer-lo-Peer Architecture
3.8 Example Networks
3.8.1 Novell Netware
3.8.2 ARPANET
3.8.3 Internet
3.8.4 ATM Network
3.9 Types of Computer Networks
3.9.1 Metropolitan Area Network (MAN)
3.9.2 Wide Area Network (WAN)
3.9.3 Comparison between LAN, MAN, WAN and GAN
3.10 Advantages of Networks
4.0 Conclusion

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

5.0 Summary
6.0 Tutor-Marked Assignment
7.0 References/Further Readings

1.0 INTRODUCTION

These days, practically every business, no matter how small uses

computers to handle various transactions and as business grows, they
often need several people to input and process data simultaneously and
in order to achieve this, the earlier model of a single computer serving
all the organisations computational needs has been replaced by a model
in which a number of separate but interconnected computers do the job
and this model is known as a Computer Netw9rk. By linking individual
computers over a network their productivity has been increased
enormously.

A most distinguishing characteristic of a general computer network is

that data can enter or leave at any point and can be processed at any
workstation. For example: A printer can be controlled from any word
processor at any computer on the network. This is an introductory unit
where, you will be learning about the basic concepts regarding
Computer Networks. Here, you will learn about Networks, different
types of Networks, their applications, Network topology, Network
protocols, OSI Reference Mode!, TCP/IP Reference Model. We shall
also examine some of the popular computer networks like Novell
network, ARPANET, Internet, and ATM networks.

Towards t4e end of this unit the concept of Delays in computer networks
is also discussed.

2.0 OBJECTIVES

After going through this unit, you should be able to:

understand the concept of computer networks

differentiate between different types of computer networks
understand the different application of networks
compare the different network topologies
signify the importance of network protocols
know the importance of using networked system
understand the layered organisation and structuring of computer
networks using OSI and TCPIIP reference model
have a broad idea about some of the popular networks like Novell
network, ARPANET, INTERNET, ATM etc., and
understand the concept of delays.
3.0 MAIN CONTENT

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

3.1 What is a computer network?

Figure 1: A computer-networked environment

A Computer network consists of two or more autonomous computers

that are linked (connected) together in order to:

Share resources (files, printers, modems, fax machines).

Share Application software like MS Office.
Allow Electronic communication.
Increase productivity (makes it easier to share data amongst
users).

Figure 1 shows people working in a networked environment. The

Computers on a network may be linked through Cables, telephones
lines, radio waves, satellites etc.

A Computer network includes, the network operating system in the

client and server machines, the cables, which connect different
computers and all supporting hardware ill between such as bridges,
routers and switches. In wireless systems, antennas and towers are also
part of the network.

Computer networks are generally classified according to their structure

and the area they are localised in as:

Local Area Network (LAN): The network that spans a relatively

small area that is, in the single building or campus is known as
LAN.

Metropolitan Area Network (MAN): The type of computer

network that is, designed for a city or town is known as MAN.

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

Wide Area Network (WAN): A network that covers a large

geographical area and covers different cities, states and
sometimes even countries, is known as WAN.

The additional characteristics that are also used to categorise different

types of networks are:

Topology: Topology is the graphical arrangement of computer

systems in a network. Common topologies include a bus, star,
ring, and mesh.

Protocol: The protocol defines a common set of rules which are

used by computers on the network that communicate between
hardware and software entities. One of the most popular
protocols for LANs is the Ethernet. Another popular LAN
protocol for PCs is the token-ring network.

Architecture: Networks can be broadly classified as using either

a peer-to-peer or client/server architecture.

3.2 Network Goals and Motivations

Before designing a computer network we should see that the designed

network fulfils the basic goals. We have seen that a computer network
should satisfy a broad range of purposes and should meet various
requirements. One of the main goals of a computer network is to enable
its users to share resources, to provide low cost facilities and easy
addition of new processing services. The computer network thus, creates
a global environment for its users and computers.

Some of the basic goals that a Computer network should satisfy are:

Cost reduction by sharing hardware and software resources.

Provide high reliability by having multiple sources of supply.

Provide an efficient means of transport for large volumes of data

among various locations (High throughput).

Provide inter-process communication among users and

processors.

Reduction jn del!’y driving data transport.

Increase productivity by making it easier to share data amongst

users.

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

Repairs, upgrades, expansions, and changes to the network

should be performed with minimal impact on the majority of
network users.

Standards and protocols should be supported to allow many types

of equipment from different vendors to share the network
(Interoperatability).

Provide centralised/distributed management and allocation of

network resources like host processors, transmission facilities etc.

3.3 Classification of Networks

Depending on the transmission technology i.e., whether the network

contains switching elements or not, we have two types of networks:

Broadcast networks.

Point-to-point or Switched networks.

3.3.1 Broadcast Networks

Broadcast networks have a single communication channel that is shared

by all the machines on the network. In this type of network, short
messages sent by any machine are received by all the machines on the
network. The packet contains an address field, which specifies for whom
the packet is intended. All the machines, upon receiving a packet check
for the address field, if the packet is intended for itself, it processes it
and if not the packet is just ignored.

Using Broadcast networks, we can generally address a packet to all

destinations (machines) by using a special code in the address field.
Such packets are received and processed by all machines on the
network. This mode of operation is known as “Broadcasting”. Some
Broadcast networks also support transmission to a subset of machines
and this is known as “Multicasting”. One possible way to achieve
Multicasting is to reserve one bit to indicate multicasting and the
remaining (n-l) address bits contain group number. Each machine can
subscribe to any or all of the groups.

Broadcast networks are easily configured for geographically localised

networks. Broadcast networks may be Static or dynamic, depending on
how the channel is allocated.
In Static allocation, time is divided into discrete intervals and using
round robin method, each machine is allowed to broadcast only when its

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

time slot comes up. This method is inefficient because the channel
capacity is wasted when a machine has nothing to broadcast during its
allocated slot.

Dynamic allocation may be centralised or decentralised. In centralised

allocation method, there is a single entity, for example, a bus arbitration
unit which determines who goes next and this is achieved by using some
internal algorithm. In Decentralised channel allocation method, there is
no central entity, here, each machine decides for itself whether or not to
transmit.

The different types of Broadcast networks are:

1) Packet Radio Networks.

2) Satellite Networks.

3) Local Area Networks.

Packet Radio broadcasting differs from satellite network broadcasting

in several ways. In particular stations have limited range introducing the
need for radio repeaters, which in turn affects the routing, and
acknowledges schemes. Also the propagation delay is much less than for
satellite broadcasting.

LAN (Local Area Network)

Local Area Network is a computer network that spans over a relatively

small area. Most LANs are confined to a single building or group of
buildings within a campus. However, one LAN can be connected to
other LANs over any distance via telephone lines and radio waves. A
system of LANs connected in this way is called a wide-area network
(WAN).

Most LANs connect workstations and personal computers. Each node

(individual computer) in a LAN has its own CPU with which it executes
programs, but it is also able to access data and devices anywhere on the
LAN. This means that many users can share data as well as expensive
devices, such as laser printers, fax machines etc. Users can also use the
LAN to communicate with each other, by sending e-mail or engaging in
chat sessions. There are many different types of LANs, Ethernets being
the most common for PCs.

The following characteristics differentiate one LAN from another:

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

Topology

The geometric arrangement of devices on the network. For example,

devices can be arranged in a ring or in a straight line.

Protocols

The rules and encoding specifications for sending data. The protocols
also determine whether the network uses peer-to-peer or client/server
architecture.

Media

Devices can be connected by twisted-pair wire, coaxial cables, or fiber

optic cables. Some networks communicate via radio waves hence, do
not use any connecting media.

LANs are capable of transmitting data at very fast rates, much faster
than data can be transmitted over a telephone line; but the distances are
limited, and there is also a limit on the number of computers that can be
attached to a single LAN.

The typical characteristics of a LAN are:

Confined to small areas i.e., it connects several devices over a

distance of5to 10km.

High speed.

Most inexpensive equipment.

Low error rates.

Data and hardware sharing between users owned by the user.

Operates at speeds ranging from 10Mbps to 100Mbps. Nowadays

1000 Mbps are available.

3.3.2 Point-to-Point or Switched Networks

Point-to-point or switched, networks are those in which there are many

connections between individual pairs of machines. In these networks,
when a packet travels from source to destination it may have to first visit
one or more intermediate machines. Routing algorithms play an
important role in Point-to-point or Switched networks because often
multiple routes of different lengths are available.

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

An example of switched network is the international dial-up telephone

system.

The different types of Point- to-point or Switched networks are:

Circuit Switched Networks.

Packet Switched Networks.

In Switched network, the temporary connection is established from one

point to another for either the duration of the session (circuit switching)
or for the transmission of one or more packets of data (packet
switching).

Circuit Switched Networks

Circuit Switched networks use a networking technology that provides a

temporary, but dedicated connection between two stations no matter
how many switching devices are used in the data transfer route. Circuit
switching was originally developed for the analog based telephone
system in order to guarantee steady and consistent service for two
people engaged in a phone conversation. Analog circuit switching has
given way to digital circuit switching, and the digital counterpart still
maintains the connection until broken (one side hangs up). This means
bandwidth is continuously reserved and “silence is transmitted” just the
same as digital audio in voice conversation.

Packet Switched Networks

Packet switched Networks use a networking technology that breaks up a

message into smaller packets for transmission and switches them to their
required destination. Unlike circuit switching, which requires a constant
point-to-point circuit to be established, each packet in a packet-
switched network contains a destination address. Thus, all packets in a
single message do not have to travel the same path. They can be
dynamically routed over the network as lines become available or
unavailable. The destination computer reassembles the packets back into
their proper sequence.

Packet switching efficiently handles messages of different lengths and

priorities. By accounting for packets sent, a public network can charge
customers for only the data they transmit. Packet switching has been
widely used for data, but not for real-time voice and video. However,
this is beginning to change. IP and ATM technologies are expected to
enable packet switching to be used for everything.

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The first international standard for wide area packet switching networks
was X.25, which was defined when all circuits were digited and
susceptible to noise. Subsequent technologies, such as frame relay and
SMDS were designed for today’s almost-error-free digital lines.

ATM uses a cell-switching technology that provides the bandwidth

sharing efficiency of packet switching with the guaranteed bandwidth of
circuit switching.

Higher-level protocols, such as TCPIIP, IPX/SPX and NetBIOS, are

also packet based and are designed to ride over packet-switched
topologies.

Public packet switching networks may provide value added services,

such as protocol conversion and electronic mail.

SELF ASSESSMENT EXERCISE 1

1) Explain the difference between Client/Server and Peer-to-peer

architecture?
2) List the important aspects that should be kept in mind while
designing a network?
3) Write briefly about the areas where networks are used?
4) Differentiate between Broadcast and point-to-point networks..

3.4 Network Topology

Topology refers to the shape of a network, or the network’s layout. How

different nodes in a network are connected to each other and how they
communicate with each other is determined by the network’s topology.
Topologies are either physical or logical.

Some of the most common network topologies are:

Bus topology
Star topology
Ring topology
Tree topology
Mesh topology
Cellular topology.

The parameters that are to be considered while selecting a physical

topology are:

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Ease of installation. Ease

of reconfiguration. Ease
of troubleshooting.

3.4.1 Bus Topology

Figure 2: Bus topology

In Bus topology, all devices are connected to a central cable, called the
bus or backbone. The bus topology connects workstations using a single
cable. Each workstation is connected to the next workstation in a point-
to-point fashion. All workstations connect to the same cable. Figure 2
shows computers connected using Bus Topology.

In this type of topology, if one workstation goes faulty all workstations

may be affected as all workstations share the same cable for the sending
and receiving of information. The cabling cost of bus systems is the
least of all the different topologies. Each end of the cable is terminated
using a special terminator.

The common implementation of this topology is Ethernet. Here,

message transmitted by one workstation is heard by all the other
workstations.

Advantages of Bus Topology

Installation is easy and cheap when compared to other topologies

Connections are simple and this topology is easy to use.

Less cabling is required.

Disadvantages of Bus Topology

Used only in comparatively small networks.

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As all computers share the same bus, the performance of the

network deteriorates when we increase the number of computers
beyond a certain limit.

Fault identification is difficult.

A single fault in the cable stops all transmission.

3.4.2 Star Topology

Figure 3: Star topology

Start topology uses a central hub through which, all components are
connected. In a Star topology, the central hub is the host computer, and
at the end of each connection is a terminal as shown in Figure 3.

Nodes communicate across the network by passing data through the

hub. A star network uses a significant amount of cable as each terminal
is wired back to the central hub, even if two terminals are side by side
but several hundred meters away from the host. The central hub makes
all routing decisions, and all other workstations can be simple.

An advantage of the star topology is, that failure, in one of the terminals
does not affect any other terminal; however, failure of the central hub
affects all terminals. This type of topology is frequently used to connect
terminals to a large time-sharing host computer.

Advantages of Star Topology

Installation and configuration of network is easy.

Less expensive when compared to mesh topology.

Faults in the network can be easily traced.

Expansion and modification of star network is easy.

Single computer failure does not affect the network.

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Supports multiple cable types like shielded twisted pair cable,

unshielded twisted pair cable, ordinary telephone cable etc.

Disadvantages of Star Topology

Failure in the central hub brings the entire network to a halt.

More cabling is required in comparison to tree or bus topology

because each node is connected to the central hub.

3.4.3 Ring Topology

Figure 4: Ring Topology

In Ring Topology all devices are connected to one another in the shape
of a closed loop, so that each device is connected directly to two other
devices, one on either side of it, i.e., the ring topology connects
workstations in a closed loop, which is depicted in Figure 4 Each
terminal is connected to two other terminals (the next and the previous),
with the last terminal being connected to the first. Data is transmitted
around the ring in one direction only; each station passing on the data to
the next station till it reaches its destination.

Information travels around the ring from one workstation to the next.
Each packet of data sent on the ring is prefixed by the address of the
station to which it is being sent. When a packet of data arrives, the
workstation checks to see if the packet address is the same as its own, if
it is, it grabs the data in the packet. If the packet does not belong to it, it
sends the packet to the next workstation in the ring.

Faulty workstations can be isolated from the ring. When the workstation
is powered on, it connects itself to the ring. When power is off, it
disconnects itself from the ring and allows the information to bypass the
workstation.
The common implementation of this topology is token ring. A break in
the ring causes the entire network to fail. Individual workstations can be
isolated from the ring.

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Advantages of Ring Topology

Easy to install and modify the network.

Fault isolation is simplified.

Unlike Bus topology, there is no signal loss in Ring topology

because the tokens are data packets that are re-generated at each
node.

Disadvantages of Ring Topology

Adding or removing computers disrupts the entire network.

A break in the ring can stop the transmission in the entire

network.

Finding fault is difficult.

Expensive when compared to other topologies.

3.4.4 Tree Topology

Figure 5: Tree Topology

Tree topology is a LAN topology in which only one route exists

between any two nodes on the network. The pattern of connection
resembles a tree in which all branches spring from one root. Figure 5
shows computers connected using Tree Topology.

Tree topology is a hybrid topology, it is similar to the star topology but

the nodes are connected to the secondary hub, which in turn is
connected to the central hub. In this topology groups of star-configured
networks are connected to a linear bus backbone.

Advantages of Tree Topology

Installation and configuration of network is easy.

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Less expensive when compared to mesh topology.

Faults in the network can be detected traced.

The addition of the secondary hub allows more devices to be

attached to the central hub.

Supports multiple cable types like shielded twisted pair cable,

unshielded twisted pair cable, ordinary telephone cable etc.

Disadvantages of Tree Topology

Failure in the central hub brings the entire network to a halt.

More cabling is required when compared to bus topology because
each node is connected to the central hub.

3.4.5 Mesh Topology

Figure 6: Mesh Topology

Devices are connected with many redundant interconnections between

network nodes. In a well-connected topology, every node has a
connection to every other node in the network. The cable requirements
are high, but there are redundant paths built in. Failure in one of the
computers does not cause the network to break down, as they have
alternative paths to other computers.

Mesh topologies are used in critical connection of host computers

(typically telephone exchanges). Alternate paths allow each computer to
balance the load to other computer systems in the network by using
more than one of the connection paths available. A fully connected mesh
network therefore has n (n-1)/2 physical channels to link n devices. To
accommodate these, every device on the network must have (n-l)
input/output ports.
Advantages of Mesh Topology

Use of dedicated links eliminates traffic problems.

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Failure in one of the computers does not affect the entire

network.

Point-to-point link makes fault isolation easy.

It is robust.

Privacy between computers is maintained as messages travel

along dedicated path.

Disadvantages of Mesh Topology

The amount of cabling required is high.

A large number of I/O (input/output) ports are required.

3.4.6 Cellular Topology

Figure 7: Cellular Topology

Cellular topology, divides the area being serviced into cells. In wireless
media each point transmits in a certain geographical area called a cell,
each cell represents a portion of the total network area. Figure 7 shows
computers using Cellular Topology. Devices that are present within the
cell, communicate through a central hub. Hubs in different cells are
interconnected and hubs are responsible for routing data across the
network. They provide a complete network infrastructure. Cellular
topology is applicable only incase of wireless media that does not
require cable connection.

Advantages of Cellular Topology

If the hubs maintain a point-to-point link with devices, trouble

shooting is easy.

Hub-to-hub fault tracking is more complicated, but allows simple

fault isolation.
Disadvantages of Cellular Topology

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When a hub fails, all devices serviced by the hub lose service (are
affected).

SELF ASSESSMENT EXERCISE 2

1) List the importance of using computer networks in Airline and

Railway reservation systems?

2) What are the various types of networks??

3) Compare Tree topology with Star topology.

4) Suppose we have~ to add new nodes to the network, then which

is the best suited topology and why?

3.5 Applications of Network

Computer networks are used as a highly reliable medium for exchange

of information. Using a computer network we can do virtually
everything that a Mainframe or a Minicomputer can do, but at a much
lower cost.

There are numerous applications of computer networks some of them

are:

Share resources and information.

Access to remote information.

Person-to-person communication.

Interactive entertainment.

Share Resources and Information

Using a Computer network we can share expensive resources such as

laser printers, CD-ROM Drives, Fax machines etc. We can share
information and many persons can work together on projects and tasks
that require co-ordination and communication, even though these users
may not be physically close.

Access to Remote Information

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Access to remote information involves interaction between a person and

a remote database. Financial Institutions allow access to their
information so that people can pay their bills, handle their investments
and manage their bank accounts electronically. Online shopping also
allows people, access to product information before purchasing the
product.

These days, many newspapers and digital libraries are available online
and allow users to access news and information which is of interest to
them. Another application is the World Wide Web, which contains
information about a wide variety of subjects like health, sports, science,
recreation, history, government etc.

Person-to-person Communication

Person-to-person communication is mostly carried out using e-mail

(Electronic mail) Electronic mail is a simple, yet potent facility. E-mail
is more valuable and useful than the telephone because by using e-mail
we can convey information that is difficult or impossible to read over
the telephone, like reports, tables, charts, images etc. Using a computer
network, it is also possible to organise virtual meeting among people
who are far away from each other and this is called video conferencing.
Virtual meetings have other applications such as in Distance education,
getting medical opinions from distant specialists (remote diagnosis) etc.
Multimedia communication can also be used for tele training.

Interactive Entertainment

Computer Networks such as Internet offer a wide variety of

entertainment, there are many companies online, which offer video-on-
demand. A large variety of multi-person real-time simulation games,
like hide-and seek in a virtual dungeon and flight simulators with the
players in one team trying to shoot down the players in the opposite
team and many such games are available on-line.

3.6 Networking Model

Most of the networks today are organised as a series of stacked layers

with each layer stacked over another layer below it. This is done in order
to divide the workload and to simplify the systems design. The
architecture is considered scalable if it is able to accommodate a number
of layers in either large or small scales. For example, a computer that
runs an Internet application may require all of the layers that were
defined for the architectural model. Similarly, a computer that acts as a
router may not need all these layers. Systems design is furthermore
simplified because with a layered architecture, the design has to only

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concern the layer in question and not worry about the architecture in a
macro sense.

The depth and functionality of this stack differs from network to

network. However, regardless of the differences among all networks, the
purpose of each layer is to provide certain services (job responsibilities)
to the layer above it, shielding the upper layers from the intricate details
of how the services offered are implemented.

Every computer in a network possesses within it a generic stack. A

logical communication may exist between any two computers through
the layers of the same “level”. Layer-n on one computer may converse
with layer-n on another computer. There are rules and conventions used
in the communication at any given layers, which are known collectively
as the layer-n protocol for the nth layer.

Figure 8: Layered network architecture

Data are not directly transferred from layer-n on one computer to layer-n
on another computer. Rather, each layer passes data and control
information to the layer directly below until the lowest layer is reached.
Below layer-1 (the bottom layer), is the physical medium (the hardware)
through which the actual transaction takes place. In Figure 8 logical
communication is shown by a broken-line arrow and physical
communication by a solid-line arrow.

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Between every pair of adjacent layers is an interface. The interface is a

specification that determines how the data should be passed between the
layers. ]t defines what primitive operations and services the lower layer
should offer to the upper layer. One of the most important
considerations when designing a network is to design clean-cut
interfaces between the layers. To create such an interface between the
layers would require each layer to perform a specific collection of well-
understood functions. A clean-cut interface makes it easier to replace the
implementation of one layer with another implementation because all
that is required of the new implementation is that, it offers, exactly the
same set of services to its neighbouring layer above as the old
implementation did.

3.6.1 OSI References Model

Figure 9: Layers or OSI reference model

The Open System Interconnection (OSI) model is a set of protocols that

attempt to define and standardise the data communications process; we
can say that it is a concept that describes how data communications
should take place.

The OSI model was set by the International Standards Organisation

(ISO) in 1984, and it is now considered the primary architectural model
for inter-computer communications. The OSI model has the support of
most major computer and network vendors, many large customers, and
most governments in different countries.

The Open Systems Interconnection (OS1) reference model describes

how information from a software application in one computer moves
through a network medium to a software application in another
computer. The OSI reference model is a conceptual model composed of
seven layers as shown in Figure 9 each specifying particular network
functions and into these layers are fitted the protocol standards

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developed by the ISO and other standards bodies. The OSI model
divides the tasks involved with moving information between networked
computers into seven smaller, more manageable task groups. A task or
group of tasks is then assigned to each of the seven OSI layers. Each
layer is reasonably self-contained so that the tasks assigned to each layer
can be implemented independently. This enables the solutions offered
by one layer to be updated without affecting the other layers.

The OSI model is modular. Each successive layer of the OSI model
works with the one above and below it.

Although, each layer of the OSI model provides its own set of functions,
it is possible to group the layers into two distinct categories. The first
four layers i.e., physical, data link, network, and transport layer provide
the end-to-end services necessary for the transfer of data between two
systems. These layers pr9.f1de the protocols associated with the
communications network used to link two computers together. Together,
these are communication oriented.

The top three layers i.e., the application, presentation, and session layers
provide the application services required for the exchange of
information. That is, they allow two applications, each running on a
different node of the network to interact with each other through the
services provided by their respective operating systems. Together, these
are data processing oriented.

The following are the seven layers of the Open System Interconnection
(OSI) reference model:

Layer 7 -Application layer

Layer 6 -Presentation layer

Layer 5 -Session layer

Layer 4 -Transport layer

Layer 3 -Network layer

Layer 2 -Data Link layer

Layer I -Physical layer

Application Layer (Layer 7)

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The Application layer is probably the most easily misunderstood layer

of the model. This top layer defines the language and syntax that
programs use to communicate with other programs. The application
layer represents the purpose of communicating in the first place. For
example, a program in a client workstation uses commands to request
data from a program in the server. Common functions at this layer are
opening, closing, reading and writing files, transferring files and e-mail
messages, executing remote jobs and obtaining directory information
about network resources etc.

Presentation Layer (Layer 6)

The Presentation layer performs code conversion and data reformatting

(syntax translation). It is the translator of the network; it makes sure the
data is in the correct form for the receiving application.

When data are transmitted between different types of computer systems,

the presentation layer negotiates and manages the way data are
represented and encoded. For example, it provides a common
denominator between ASCII and EBCDIC machines as well as between
different floating point and binary formats. Sun’s XDR and OSI’s ASN.
1 are two protocols used for this purpose. This layer is also used for
encryption and decryption. It also provides security features through
encryption and decryption.

Session Layer (Layer 5)

The Session layer decides when to turn communication on and off

between two computers. It provides the mechanism that controls the
data-exchange process and coordinates the interaction (communication)
between them in ail orderly manner.

It sets up and clears communication channels between two

communicating components. It determines one-way or two-way
communications and manages the dialogue between both parties; for
example, making sure that the previous request has been fulfilled before
the next one is sent. It also marks significant parts of the transmitted
data with checkpoints to allow for fast recovery in the event of a
connection failure.

Transport Layer (Layer 4)

The transport layer is responsible for overall end-to-end validity and

integrity of the transmission i.e., it ensures that data is successfully sent
and received between two computers. The lower data link layer (layer 2)
is only responsible for delivering packets from one node to another.

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Thus, if a packet gets lost in a router somewhere in the enterprise

Internet, the transport layer will detect that. It ensures that if a 12MB file
is sent, the full 12MB is received.

If data is sent incorrectly, this layer has the responsibility of asking for
retransmission of the data. Specifically, it provides a network-
independent, reliable message-independent, reliable message-
interchange service to the top three application-oriented layers. This
layer acts as an interface between the bottom and top three layers. By
providing the session layer (layer 5) with a reliable message transfer
service, it hides the detailed operation of the underlying network from
the session layer.

Network Layer (Layer 3)

The network layer establishes the route between the sending and
receiving stations. The unit of data at the network layer is called a
packet. It provides network routing and flow and congestion functions
across computer-network interface.

It makes a decision as to where to route the packet based on information

and calculations from other routers, or according to static entries in the
routing table. It examines network addresses in the data instead of
physical addresses seen in the Data Link layer.

The Network layer establishes, maintains, and terminates logical and/or

physical connections.

The network layer is responsible for translating logical addresses, or

names, into physical addresses.

The main device found at the Network layer is a router.

Data link Layer (Layer 2)

The data link layer groups the bits that we see on the Physical layer into
Frames. It is primarily responsible for error-free delivery of data on a
hop. The Data link layer is split into two sub-layers i.e., the Logical
Link Control (LLC) and Media Access Control (MAC).

The Data-Link layer handles the physical transfer, framing (the

assembly of data into a single unit or block), flow control and error-
Control functions (and retransmission in the event of an error) over a
single transmission link; it is responsible for getting the data packaged
and onto the network cable. The data link layer provides the network
layer (layer 3) reliable information-transfer capabilities.

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The main network device found at the Datalink layer is a bridge. This
device works at a higher layer than the repeater and therefore is a more
complex device. It has some understanding of the data it receives and
can make a decision based on the frames it receives as to whether it
needs to let the information pass, or can remove the information from
the network. This means that the amount of traffic on the medium can be
reduced and therefore, the usable bandwidth can be increased.

Physical Layer (Layer 1)

The data units on this layer are called bits. This layer defines the
mechanical and electrical definition of the network medium (cable) and
network hardware. This includes how data is impressed onto the cable
and retrieved from it.

The physical layer is responsible for passing bits onto and receiving
them from the connecting medium. This layer gives the data-link layer
(layer 2) its ability to transport a stream of serial data bits between two
communicating systems; it conveys the bits that moves along the cable.
It is responsible for ensuring that the raw bits get from one place to
another, no matter what shape they are in, and deals with the mechanical
and electrical characteristics of the cable.

This layer has no understanding 01 the meaning of the bits, but deals
with the electrical and mechanical characteristics of the signals and
signalling methods.

The main network device found the Physical layer is a repeater. The
purpose of a repeater (as the name suggests) is simply to receive the
digital signal, reform it, and retransmit the signal. This has the effect of
increasing the maximum length of a network, which would not be
possible due to signal deterioration if, a repeater were not available. The
repeater, simply regenerates cleaner digital signal so it doesn’t have to
understand anything about the information it is transmitting, and
processing on the repeater is non-existent.

An example of the Physical layer is RS-232.

Each layer, with the exception of the physical layer, adds information to
the data as it travels from the Application layer down to the physical
layer. This extra information is called a header. The physical layer does
not append a header to information because it is concerned with sending
and receiving information on the individual bit level.
We see that the data for each layer consists of the header and data of the
next higher layer. Because the data format is different at each layer,

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different terms are commonly used to name the data package at each
level. Figure 10 summarises these terms layer by layer.

Figure 10: Data package names in the OSI reference model

OSI Protocols

The OSI model provides a conceptual framework for communication

between computers, but the model itself is not a method of
communication. Actual communication is made possible by using
communication protocols. In the context of data networking, a protocol
is a formal set of rules and conventions that governs how computers
exchange information over a network medium. A protocol implements
the functions of one or more of the OSI layers. A wide variety of
communication protocols exist, but all tend to fall into one of the
following groups: LAN protocols, WAN protocols, network protocols,
and routing protocols. LAN protocols operate at the network and data
link layers of the OSI model and define communication over the various
LAN media. WAN protocols operate at the lowest three layers of the
OSI model and define communication over the various wide-area media.
Routing protocols are network-layer protocols that are responsible for
path determination and traffic switching. Finally, network protocols are
the various upper-layer protocols that exist in a given protocol suite.

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Figure 11: Working of OSI Reference Model

Information being transferred from a software application in one

computer system to software application in another must pass through
each of the OSI layers. Each layer communicates with three other OSI
layers i.e., the layer directly above it, the layer directly below it, and its
peer layer ill other networked systems. If, for example, in Figure 10, a
software application in System A has information to transmit to a
software application in System B, the application program in System A
will pass its information to the application layer (Layer 7) of System A.
The application layer then passes the information to the presentation
layer (Layer 6); the presentation layer reformats the data if required such
that B can understand it. The formatted data is passed to the session
layer (Layer 5), which in turn requests for connection establishment
between session layers of A and B, it then passes the data to the
transport layer. The transport layer breaks the data into smaller units
called segments and sends them to the Network layer. The Network
layer selects the route for transmission and if, required breaks the data
packets further. These data packets are then sent to the Data link layer
that is responsible for encapsulating the data packets into data frames.
The Data link layer also adds source and destination addresses with
error checks to each frame, for the hop.

The data frames are finally transmitted to the physical layer. In the
physical layer, the data is in the fond of a stream of bits and this is
placed on the physical network medium and is sent across the medium
to System B.

B receives the bits at its physical layer and passes them on to the Data
link layer, which verifies that no error has occurred. The Network layer
ensures that the route selected for transmission is reliable, and passes the

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data to the Transport layer. The function of the Transport layer is to

reassemble the data packets into the file being transferred and then, pass
it on to the session layer. The session layer confirms that the transfer is
complete, and if so, the session is terminated.

The data is then passed to the Presentation layer, which mayor may not
reformat it to suit the environment of B and sends it to the Application
layer. Finally the Application layer of System B passes the information
to the recipient Application program to complete the communication
process.

Interaction between different layers of OSI model

A given layer in the OSI layers generally communicates with three other
OSI layers: the layer directly above it, the layer directly below it, and its
Peer layer in another networked computer system. The data link layer in
System A, for example, communicates with the network layer of System
A, the physical layer of System A, and the data link layer in System B.

Services provided by OSI layers

One OSI layer communicates with another layer to make use of the
services provided by the second layer. The services provided by
adjacent layers help a given OSI layer communicate with its peer layer
in other computer systems. Three basic elements are involved inlayer
services: the service user, the service provider, and the service access
point (SAP).
In this context, the service user is the OSI layer .that requests services
from an adjacent OSI layer. The service provider is the OSI layer that
provides services to service users. OSI layers can provide services to
multiple service users. The SAP is a conceptual location at which one
OSI layer can request the services of another OSI layer.

OSI Model Layers and Information Exchange

The seven OSI layers use various forms of control information to

communicate with their peer layers in other computer systems. This
control information consists of specific requests and instructions that are
exchanged between peer OSI layers.

Control information typically takes one of two forms: headers and

trailers. Headers are prepended to data that has been passed down from
upper layers. Trailers are appended to data that has been passed down
from upper layers.

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Headers, trailers, and data are relative concepts, depending on the layer
that analyses the information unit. At the network layer, an information
unit, for example, consists of a Layer 3 header and data. At the data link
layer, however, all the information passed down by the network layer
(the Layer 3 header and the data) is treated as data. In other words, the
data portion of an information unit at a given OSI layer potentially can
contain headers, trailers, and data from all the higher layers. This is
known as encapsulation.

3.6.2 TCP/IP Reference Model

APPLCIATION LAYER

TRANSPORT LAYER

NETWORK LAYER

LINK/PHYSICAL LAYER

Figure 12: Layers of TCP/IP reference model

TCP/IP stands for Transmission Control Protocol I Internet Protocol. It

is a protocol suite used by most communications software. TCP/IP is a
robust and proven technology that was first tested in the early I 980s on
ARPA Net, the U.S. military’s Advanced Research Projects Agency
network, and the world’s first packet-switched network. TCP/IP was
designed as an open protocol that would enable all types of computers to
transmit data to each other via a common communications language.

TCP/IP is a layered protocol similar to the ones used in all the other
major networking architectures, including IBM’s SNA, Windows’
NetBIOS, Apple’s AppleTalk, Novell’s NetWare and Digital’s DECnet.
The different layers of the TCP/IP reference model are shown in Figure
13. Layering means that after an application initiates the
communications, the message (data) to be transmitted is passed through
a number of stages or layers until it actually moves out onto the wire.
The data are packaged with a different header at each layer. At the
receiving end, the corresponding programs at each protocol layer unpack
the data, moving it “back up the stack” to the receiving application.

TCP/IP is composed of two major parts: TCP (Transmission Control

Protocol) at the transport layer and IP (Internet Protocol) at the network
layer. TCP is a connection-oriented protocol that passes its data to IP,
which is a connectionless one. TCP sets up a connection at both ends
and guarantees reliable delivery of the full message sent. TCP tests for
errors and requests retransmission if necessary, because IP does not.

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

An alternative protocol to TCP within the TCP/IP suite is UDP (User

Datagram Protocol), which does not guarantee delivery. Like IP, it is
also connectionless, but very useful for real-time voice and video, where
it doesn’t matter if a few packets get lost.

Layers of TCP/IP reference model

Application Layer (Layer 4)

The top layer of the protocol stack is the application layer. It refers to
the programs that initiate communication in the first place. TCP/IP
includes several application layer protocols for mail, file transfer, remote
access, authentication and name resolution. These protocols are
embodied in programs that operate at the top layer just as any custom-
made or packaged client/server application would.

There are many Application Layer protocols and new protocols are
always being developed.

The most widely known Application Layer protocols are those used for
the exchange of user information, some of them are:

The HyperText Transfer Protocol (HTTP) is used to transfer

files that make up the Web pages of the World Wide Web.

The File Transfer Protocol (FTP) is used for interactive file

transfer.

The Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) is used for the

transfer of mail messages and attachments.

Telnet, is a terminal emulation protocol, and, is used for remote

login to network hosts.

Other Application Layer protocols that help in the management of

TCP/IP networks are:

The Domain Name System (DNS), which, is used to resolve a

host name to an IP address.

The Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) which is

used between network management consoles and network
devices (routers, bridges, and intelligent hubs) to collect and
exchange network management information.

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

Examples of Application Layer interfaces for TCP/IP applications are

Windows Sockets and NetBIOS. Windows Sockets provides a standard
application-programming interface (API) under the Microsoft Windows
operating system. NetBIOS is an industry standard interface for
accessing protocol services such as sessions, datagrams, and name
resolution.

Transport Layer (Layer 3)

The Transport Layer (also known as the Host-to-Host Transport Layer)

is responsible for providing the Application Layer with session and
datagram communication services.

TCP/IP does not contain Presentation and Session layers, the services
are performed if required, but they are not part of the formal TCP/IP
stack. For example, Layer 6 (Presentation Layer) is where data
conversion (ASCII to EBCDIC, floating point to binary, etc,) and
encryption/decryption is performed, Layer 5 is the Session Layer, which
is performed in layer 4 in TCP/IP, Thus, we jump from layer 7 of OS I
down to layer 4 of TCP/IP.

From Application to Transport Layer, the application delivers its data to

the communications system by passing a Stream of data bytes to the
transport layer along with the socket of the destination machine.

The core protocols of the Transport Layer are TCP and the User
Datagram Protocol (UDP).

TCP: TCP provides a one-to-one, connection-oriented, reliable

communications service. TCP is responsible for the establishment
of a TCP connection, the sequencing and acknowledgment of
packets sent, and the recovery of packets lost during
transmission.

UDP: UDP provides a one-to-one or one-to-many,

connectionless, unreliable communications service. UDP is used
when the amount of data to be transferred is small (such as the
data that would fit into a single packet), when the overhead of
establishing a TCP connection is not desired, or when the
applications or upper layer protocols provide reliable delivery.

The transport Layer encompasses the responsibilities of the OSI

Transport Layer and some of the responsibilities of the OSI Session
Layer.

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

Internet Layer (Layer 2)

The internet layer handles the transfer of information across multiple

networks through the use of gateways and routers. The internet layer
corresponds to the part of the ORI network layer that is concerned with
the transfer of packets between machines that are connected to different
networks. It deals with the routing of packets across these networks as
well as with the control of congestion. A key aspect of the internet layer
is the definition of globally unique addresses for machines that are
attached to the Internet.

The Internet layer provides a single service namely, best-effort

connectionless packet transfer. IP packets are exchanged between
routers without a connection setup; the packets are ‘touted
independently and so they may traverse different paths. For this reason,
IP packets are also called datagrams. The connectionless approach
makes the system robust; that is, if failures occur in the network, the
packets are routed around the points of failure; hence, there is no need to
set up connections, The gateways that interconnect the intermediate
networks may discard packets when congestion occurs. The
responsibility for recovery from these losses is I>assed on to the
Transport Layer, The core protocols of the Internet Layer are IP. ARP,
ICMP, and IGMP.

The Internet Protocol (IP) is a routable protocol responsible for

IP addressing and the fragmentation and reassembly of packets.

The Address Resolution Protocol (ARP) is responsible for the

resolution of the Internet Layer address to the Network Interface
Layer address, such as a hardware address.

The Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP) is responsible

for providing diagnostic functions and reporting errors or
conditions regarding the delivery of IP packets.

The Internet Group Management Protocol (IGMP) is

responsible for the management of IP multicast groups.

The Internet Layer is analogous to the Network layer of the OSI model.

Link/Physical Layer (Layer I)

The Link/Physical Layer (also called the Network Access Layer) is

responsible for placing TCP/IP packets on the network medium and
receiving TCP/IP packets of the network medium. TCP/IP was designed
to be independent of the network access method, frame format, and

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

medium. In this way, TCP/IP can be used to connect differing network

types. This includes LAN technologies such as Ethernet or Token Ring
and WAN technologies such as X.25 or Frame Relay. Independence
from any specific network technology gives TCP/IP the ability to be
adapted to new technologies such as Asynchronous Transfer Mode
(ATM).

The Network Interface Layer encompasses the Data Link and Physical
layers of the OSI Model. Note, that the Internet Layer does not take
advantage of sequencing and acknowledgement services that may be
present in the Data Link Layer. An unreliable Network Interface Layer
is assumed, and reliable communications through session establishment
and the sequencing and acknowledgement of packets is the
responsibility of the Transport Layer.

Comparison between OSI and TCP/IP reference model

Both OSI and TCP/IP reference models are based on the concept of a
stack of protocols. The functionality of the layers is almost similar. In
both models the layers are there to provide an end-to-end network-
independent transport service to processes wishing to communicate with
each other.

The Two models have many differences. An obvious difference between

the two models is the number of layers: the OSI model has seven layers
and the TCP/IP has .four layers. Both have (inter) network, transport,
and application layers, but the other layers are different. OSI uses strict
layering, resulting in vertical layers whereas TCP/IP uses loose layering
resulting in horizontal layers. The OSI model supports both connection

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

less and connection-oriented communication in the network layer, but

only connection-oriented communication at the transport layer. The
TCP/IP model has only one mode in network layer (connectionless), but
supports both modes in the transport layer. With the TCP/IP model,
replacing IP by a substantially different protocol would be virtually
impossible, thus, defeating one of the main purposes of having layered
protocols in the first place.

The OSI reference model was devised before the OSI protocols were
designed. The OSI model was not biased toward one particular set of
protocols, which made it quite general. The drawback of this ordering is
that the designers did not have much experience with the subject, and
did not have a good idea of the type of functionality to put in a layer.
With TCP/IP the reverse was true: the protocols carne first and the
model was really just a description of the existing protocols. There was
no problem with the protocols fitting the model. The only drawback was
that the model did not fit any other protocol stacks.

Figure 14 summarises the basic differences between OSI and TCP/IP

reference models.

Some of the drawbacks of OS I reference model are:

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

All layers are not roughly, of equal size and complexity. In

practise, the session layer and presentation layer are absent from
many existing architectures.

Some functions like addressing, flow control, retransmission are

duplicated at each layer, resulting in deteriorated performance.

The initial specification of the OSI model ignored the

connectionless model, thus, leaving much of the LANs behind.

Some of the drawbacks of TCP/IP model are:

TCP/IP model does not clearly distinguish between the concepts

of service, interface, and protocol.

TCP/IP model is not a general model and therefore it cannot be

used to describe any protocol other than TCP/IP.

TCP/IP model does not distinguish or even mention the Physical

or the Data link layer. A proper model should include both these
layers as separate.

SELF ASSESSMENT EXERCISE 3

1) Give two reasons for using layered protocols.

2) Explain the OSI reference model in detail.
3) Explain the TCP/IP reference mode! in detail.
4) Bring out the differences between TCP and UDP.

3.7 Network Architecture

Depending on the architecture used Networks can be classified as

Client/Server or Peer-to-Peer Networks.

1.8.1 Client/Server Architecture

Figure 15: Client/Server Architecture

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

Client/Server Architecture is one in which the client (personal computer

or workstation) is the requesting machine and the server is the supplying
machine, both of which are connected via a local area network (LAN) or
wide area network (WAN). Since the early 1990s, client/server has been
the buzzword for building applications on LANs in contrast to
centralised minis and mainframes with dedicated terminals. A
client/server network is called Centralised or Server based network.
Figure 15 shows the arrangement of computers in the client/server
environment.

The client contains the user interface and may perform some or all of the
application processing. Servers can be high-speed microcomputers,
minicomputers or even mainframes. A database server maintains the
databases and processes requests from the client to extract data from or
update the database. An application server provides additional business
processing for the clients.

The term client/server is sometimes used to contrast a peer-to-peer

network, in which any client can also act as a server. In that case, a
client/server entails having a dedicated server.
However, client/server architecture means more than dedicated servers.
Simply downloading files from or sharing programs and databases on a
server is not true client/server either. True client/server implies that the
application was originally designed to run on a network and that the
network infrastructure provides the same quality of service as traditional
mini and mainframe information systems. Figure 15 shows the
arrangement of computers in the Client/Server system.

The network operating system (NOS) together with the database

management system (DBMS) and transaction monitor (TP monitor) are
responsible for integrity and security of these types of networks. Some
of these products have gone through many client/server versions by now
and have finally reached industrial strength.

Non-client/server

In non-client/server architecture, the server is nothing more than a

remote disk drive. The user’s machine does all the processing. If, many
users routinely perform lengthy searches, this can bog down the
network, because each client has to pass the entire database over the net.
At 1,000 bytes per record, a 10,000 record database requires 10MB of
data be transmitted.

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

Two-tier client/server

Two-tier client/server is really the foundation of client/server. The

database processing is done in the server. An SQL request is generated
in the client and transmitted to the server. The DBMS searches locally
and returns only matching records. If 50 records met the criteria only
50K would be transmitted. This reduces traffic in the LAN.

Three-tier client/server

Many applications lend themselves to centralised processing. If, they

contain proprietary algorithms, security is improved. Upgrading is also
simpler. Sometimes, programs are just too demanding to be placed into
every client PC. In three-tier client/server, application processing is
performed in one or more servers.

3.7.2 Peer-to-Peer Architecture

Figure 16: Peer-to-peer architecture

A type of network in which each workstation h$ equal capabilities and

responsibilities is called peer-to-peer network. Figure 16 shows the
arrangement of computers in a peer-to-peer environment. Here etch
workstation acts as both a client and a server. There is no central
repository for information and there is no central server to maintain.
Data and resources are distributed throughout the network, and each
user is responsible for sharing data and resources connected to their
system. This differs from client/server architectures, in which some
computers are dedicated to serving the others. Peer-to-peer networks are
genenlly simpler and less expensive, but they usually do not offer the
same performance under heavy loads. A peer-to-peer network is also
known as a Distributed network.

3.8 Example Networks

Nowadays, as computers are extensively used in almost every field, we

have many different types of networks. Some of them are public
networks, research networks, and co-operative networks, commercial or
corporate networks. We can distinguish between different networks on
the basis of their history, administration, facilities offered, technical

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

design and the people who use them user communities). Here we shall
discuss some of the popular networks, such as, Novell NetWare,
ARPANET, Internet, ATM network etc.

3.8.1 Novell Netware

Novell NetWare is the most popular network system in the PC world.

Novell NetWare contains the protocols that are necessary to allow
communication between different types of PC’s and devices. There are
several versions of NetWare. The earlier versions NetWare 286 version
2.X was written to run on 286 machines. NetWare 386 versions 3.X
were written to run on 386 and 486 machines. The most recent version
NetWare 4.X can probably run on almost any type of machine.

Novell Networks are based on the client/server model in which at least

one computer functions as a network file server, which runs all of the
NetWare protocols and maintains the networks shared data on one or
more disk drives. File servers generally allow users on other PC’s to
access application software or data files i.e., it provides services to other
network computers called clients.

There are two types of file servers:

Dedicated file servers.

Non-dedicated file servers.

Dedicated File Servers

Dedicated file server runs only NetWare and do not run any other
software, such as Windows application. Dedicated file servers are
mostly used in large networks, because, in large networks, one extra
client is less significant and a dedicated server can handle a larger
number of requests more efficiently. In large networks security is one of
the major concerns 3J1d providing a clear distinction between client and
server hardware provides greater security.
Non-dedicated File Server

Non-dedicated file server can run both applications and NetWare. It is

useful in small networks because it allows the server to also act as a
client and thus, increase the number of clients in the network by one.

There are many other servers within a Novell NetWare such as, Print
server, Message server, Database server etc.

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

Print server

The job of the Print server is to allow users to access shared printers. A
Print server manages both requests and printers.

Message server: The job of the Message server is to transfer email

messages between a client’s PC and a user’s mailbox.

Database server: A database server manages database files i.e., it adds,

deletes and modifies records in the database; queries the database and
generates the result required by the client; and transmits the results back
to the client.

Figure 17: The Novell NetWare reference model

NetWare uses a proprietary protocol stack as shown in Figure 17. This

model is based on the old Xerox Network System, XNSTM but with a
lot of modifications.

The Physical and Data link layers CI m be chosen from various

standards that are available, such as, the Ethernet, IBM Token ring,
ARCnet.

The Network layer runs an unreliable connectionless internet work

protocol called Internet Packet eXchange (IPX). The IPX passes packets
transparently from the source to the destination, even if the source and
destination are on different networks. The functioning of IPX is similar
to IP, except that IPX usesl2 byte addresses instead of 4 byte addresses.

The Transport layer contains a connection oriented transport protocol

called NCP (Network Core Protocol). NCP is the heart of Net Ware and
provides various other services besides user data transport. It defines the
type of requests that can be made and how the server responds to the
request it eventually receives. The other protocol that is available in the
transport layer is SPX (Sequenced Packet eXchange); which provides
only transport. TCP is another option. Applications can choose anyone
of them, for example, Lotus notes use SPX and File systems uses NCP.

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

Here, the Session and Presentation layers do not exist. The Application
layer contains various application protocols like SAP, File server etc.

3.8.2 Arpanet

ARPANET stands for Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA)

Network. The network was developed in 1969 by ARPA and funded by
the Department of Defence (000). In the mid-1960s at the height of the
cold war, the DoD wanted a command and control network, which could
survive the nuclear war. The traditional circuit switched telephone
networks were considered too vulnerable, since the loss of one line
would certainly terminate all conversations using them and might even
partition the network.

The network (ARPANET) was chiefly experimental, and was used to

research, develop and test networking technologies. The original
network connected four host computers at four separate universities
throughout the United States, enabling users to share resources and
information. By 1972, there were 37 host computers connected to
ARPANET. Also in that year, ARPA’s name was changed to DARPA
(Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency). In 1973, ARPANET
went beyond the boundaries of the United States by making its first
international connection to England and Norway. One goal of
ARPANET was to devise a network that would still be operational, even
if, part of the network failed. The research in this area resulted in a set of
networking rules or protocols, called TCP/IP (Transmission Control
Protocol/Internet Protocol).

TCP/IP is a set of protocols that govern how data is transmitted across

networks. It also enables different types of computer operating systems
such as DOS and UNIX to share data across a network.

ARPANET functioned as a “backbone” network allowing smaller local

networks to connect to the backbone.

Once these smaller networks were connected to the backbone, they were
in effect connected to each other.

In 1983, DARPA decided that TCP/IP would be the standard set of

protocols used by computers connecting to ARPANET. This meant that
any smaller networks (for example, a university network) that wanted to
connect to ARPANET also had to use TCP/IP. TCP/IP was available for
free and was increasingly used by networks. The spread of TCP/IP
helped create the Internet, as we know it today, which is the network of
networks that either use the TCP/IP protocols, or can interact with
TCP/IP networks.

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

ARPANET continued to grow, encompassing many networks from

universities and government institutions. To help manage this rapidly
growing “network of networks”, ARPANET was split into two networks
in 1983:

ARPANET continued to be a research and development network.

MILNET an unclassified network reserved only for military sites.

MILNET continues to serve this function.

In 1986, a faster backbone network called the NSFNET (National

Science Foundation Network) was created. By 1989, there were over
10,000 host computers connected to the Internet.

Because of the success of the NSFNET, plans were made to phase out
ARPANET. Many of the sites connected to ARPANET were absorbed
by the NSFNE’t and in 1990 ARPANET was officially dissolved.

3.8.3 Internet

When ARPANET and NSFNET were interconnected the number of

networks, machines and users grew exponentially, many regional
networks joined up and connections were made across many countries.

The internet is said to have been “officially” born around 1982 when the
different networks (BITNET, EARN, etc.) agreed on using the TCP/IP
protocol as a standard for their interconnections making it a network of
networks and overcoming some of the previous cacophony of standards,
protocols and increasing its coverage.

The word Internet was coined from the words “interconnection” and
“network”, Now Internet is the world’s largest computer network. It is
considered to be the network of networks, and is scattered allover the
world. The computers connected to the Internet may communicate with
each other using fiber optic cables, telephone lines, satellite links and
other media.

The development of Internet is coordinated by a non-profit organisation

called the Internet Society (ISOC). Its aim is to spread the use of
Internet, keep statistics of its use, helpless developed countries in
building their infrastructure and Internet-technology. The Internet
Architecture Board (lAB), plans long term trends and keeps a record of
the RFC (Request for Comments) documents on various technical
solutions and protocols used in Internet. The development is also steered
by the IETF (Internet Engineering Task Force), which has several sub-
groups for handling various problems and planning new standards etc.

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The rapid growth of Internet may also be due to several important

factors:

1) Easy-to-use software -graphical browsers

2) Improved telecommunications connections
3) Rapid spread of automatic data processing, including electronic
mail, bank transfers, etc.
4) The Information Superhighway projects.

The Internet Society maintains a list of Internet service providers

providing connections allover the world. There is one “universal” aspect
of all computers connect to the Internet i.e., they all run the TCP/IP
family of protocols.

The Internet Protocol (IP) gives the physical 32-bit address, which
uniquely identifies an individual computer connected to the Internet,
while Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) is a connection-oriented
protocol, which takes care of the delivery and order of the packages.
TCP also provides the port numbers for individual services within a
computer.

The major information services provided by the Internet are (with the
protocol in parentheses): electronic mail (SMTP), remote file copying
(FTP), remote login, terminal connections (TELNET), menu-based file
access (GOPHER), wide area information servers (W AIS, Z39.50), the
World Wide Web (HlTP), and the Packet Internet Groper (PING).

There are three major ways to connect your computer to the Internet:

dial up modem access to a computer connected to Internet,

dial-up networking, and
leased lines (usually from a local telephone company).

Switched Dial-Up Lines

The most common circuit provided by public communication carriers

are dial-up telephone circuits. Subscribers send routing information i.e.,
the dialled number to the network, which connects them to the receiver,
then follow this with the information (speech).

Switched circuits are not permanent. They exist only for the duration of
the connection and are switched by the public network (it connects the
circuits). Switched dial-up lines are not generally suited to data
transmission, but are used heavily for some types of services (e.g.,
Bulletin Boards). Using a modem, a user can use their phone line to dial
up a network provider via the phone line and connect to the Internet. At
present speeds upto 56Kbps are possible over standard dial up telephone
circuits.

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

Leased Lines

A leased line is a permanent non-switched end-to-end connection. Data

is sent from one end to the other. It is not required to send routing
information along with the data. Leased lines provide an instant
guaranteed method of delivery. They are suited to high volume, high
speed data requirements. The cost of the line (which is leased per
month), is offset against that of toll or other rental charges. In addition,
the leased line offers a significantly higher data transmission rate than
the datel circuit.
Very high speeds can be achieved on leased lines. The cost varies, and
goes up according to the capacity (speed in bits per second) that the
customer requires.

Working of the Web

Figure 18: Working of internet

The Web physically consists of your personal computer, web browser

software, a connection to an Internet service provider, computers called
servers that host digital data and routers and switches to direct the flow
of information.

The Web is known as a client-server system. Here, the Users computer

is the client, and the remote computer that stores electronic files is the
server.

The working of the Web can be explained by the following example:

Let’s say you want to pay a visit to the IGNOU’s website. First, you
enter the address or URL of the website in your web browser (more
about this in a while). Then your browser requests the web page from
the web server. The IGNOU’s server sends the data over the Internet to
your computer. Your web browser interprets the data and displays it on
your computer screen.

The glue that holds the Web together is called hypertext and hyperlinks.
This feature allows electronic files on the Web to be linked so that you
can easily jump between them. On the Web you can navigate through

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pages of information based on what interests you at that particular

moment. This is commonly known as browsing or surfing the Net.

To access the Web you need software such as Netscape Navigator or

Microsoft Internet Explorer. These are known as web browsers. Web
pages are written in a computer language called HTML, which stands
for Hypertext Markup Language.

3.8.4 ATM Network

Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) is a network technology adopted

by the telecommunication sector. It is a high-performance, cell-oriented
switching and multiplexing technology that utilises fixed-length packets
to carry different types of traffic. The data transfer takes place in the
form of cells or packets of a fixed size (53 bytes). The cell used with
ATM is relatively small compared to units used with older technologies.
The small constant cell size allows ATM equipment to transmit video,
audio, and computer data over the same network, and assures that no
single type of data hogs the line.

ATM technology is used for both local and wide area networks (LANs
and WANs) that support real-time voice and video as well as data. The
topology uses switches that establish a logical circuit from end to end,
which guarantees quality of service (QoS). However, unlike telephone
switches that dedicate circuits end-to-end, unused bandwidth in ATM’s
logical circuits can be utilised when needed. For example, idle
bandwidth in a videoconference circuit can be used to transfer data.

ATM is widely used as a backbone technology in carrier networks and

large enterprises, but never became popular as a local network (LAN)
topology. A TM is highly scalable and supports transmission speeds of
1.5, 25, 100, 155, 622, 2488 and 9953 Mbps. ATM is also running as
slow as 9.6 Kbps between ships at sea. An ATM switch can be added
into the middle of a switch fabric to enhance total capacity, and the new
switch is automatically updated using ATM’s PNNI routing protocol.

One of the important features of ATM is its ability to specify Quality of

Service (QoS), allowing video and voice to be transmitted smoothly. It
provides the following levels of service:

Constant Bit Rate (CBR) guarantees bandwidth for realtime voice

and video.
Realtime variable Bit Rate (rt-VBR) supports interactive
multimedia that requires minimal delays.
Non-realtime variable bit rate (nrt- VBR) is used for bursty
transaction traffic.

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

Available Bit Rate (ABR) adjusts bandwidth according to

congestion levels for LAN traffic.
Unspecified Bit Rate (UBR) provides the best effort for non-
critical data such as file transfers.

Advantages of ATM

Flexible bandwidth allocation.

Simple routing due to connection oriented technology.
High bandwidth utilisation due to statistical multiplexing.
Potential QOS (Quality Of Service) guarantees.

Disadvantages of ATM

Overhead of cell header (5 bytes per cell).

Complex mechanisms for achieving Quality of Service.
Congestion may cause cell losses.
It is costly compared to IP.

3.9 Types of Computer Networks

Computer Networks are mostly classified on the basis of the

geographical area that the network covers, the topology used, the
transmission media used and the computing model used.

Based on the geographical area covered the networks may be LAN,

MAN, WAN.

1.9.1 Metropolitan Area Network (MAN)

Figure 19: Metropolitan .re. network

MAN (Metropolitan Area Network)

Metropolitan Area Network is a Computer network designed for a town

or city as shown in Figure /9. In terms of geographic area MAN’s are

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CIT 852 DATA COMMUNICATION AND NETWORK

larger than local-area networks (LANs), but smaller than wide-area

networks (WANs). MAN’s are usually characterised by very high-speed
connections using fiber optical cable or other digital media.

The Typical Characteristics of a MAN are:

Confined to a larger area than a LAN and can range from 10km
to a few 100km in length.
Slower than a LAN but faster than a WAN.
Operates at a speed of 1.5 to 150 Mbps.
Expensive equipment.
Moderate error rates.

3.9.2 Wide Area Network (WAN)

Figure 20: Wide area network

WAN (Wide Area Network)

Wide Area Network is a computer network that spans a relatively large

geographical area. Typically, a WAN consists of two or more local-area
networks (LANs), which are depicted, in Figure 20. They can connect
networks across cities, states or even countries.

Computers connected to a wide-area network are often connected

through public networks, such as the telephone system. They can also be
connected through leased lines or satellites.

The Typical characteristics of a WAN are:

A WAN can range from 100krn to 1000krn and the speed

between cities can vary forml.5 Mbps to 2.4 Gbps.

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WAN supports large number of computers and multiple host

machines.
Various segments of network are interconnected using
sophisticated support devices like routers and gateways.
Usually the speed is much slower than LAN speed.
Highest possible error rate compared to LAN & MAN.

3.9.3 Comparison between LAN, MAN, WAN and GAN

NETWORK SIZE TRANSMISSION MAXIMUM

MEDIA DISTANCE
Local Area Confined to Cable used Covers up to
Network building or 10km
campus
Metropolitan Network Different hardware Covers the area
Area Network confined to & transmission of a city or
city or town media are used town
Wide Area Larger than Telephone lines, Covers a
Network MAN radio waves, number of
leased lines or cities or
satellites. countries

Figure 21: Comparison between different types of networks.

3.10 Advantages of Networks

Computers in a networked environment provide numerous advantages

when compared to computers in a stand alone environment. The
immense benefits that the computer networks provide are in the form of
excellent sharing of computational resources, computational load,
increased level of reliability, economy and efficient person-to-person
communication.

Following are some of the major advantages of using computer

networks.

Resource Sharing

The main aim of a computer network is to make all programs,

equipment, and data available to anyone on the network without regard
to the physical location of the resource and the user. Users need to share
resources other than files, as well. A common example being printers.
Printers are utilised only a small percentage of the time; therefore,
companies don’t want to invest in a printer for each computer. Networks
can be used in this situation to allow all the users to have access to any
of the available printers.

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High Reliability

Computer networks provide high reliability by having alternative

sources of supply. For example, all files could be replicated on two or
three machines, so, if one of them is unavailable (due to hardware
failure), the other copies could be used. In addition, the presence of
multiple CPUs means that if one goes down, the others may be able to
take over its work, although at reduced performance. For military,
banking, air traffic control, nuclear reactor safety, and many other
applications, the ability to continue operating in the face of hardware
problems is of utmost importance.

Saving Money

Small computers have a much better price/performance ratio than larger

ones. Mainframes are roughly a factor of ton faster than personal
computers but they cost much more. This imbalance has caused many
systems designers to build systems consisting of personal computers,
one per user, with data kept on one or more shared file server machines.
In this model, the users are called clients, and the whole arrangement is
called the client-server model.

Scalability

The ability to increase the system performance gradually as the

workload grows just by adding more processors. With centralised
mainframes, when a system is full, it must be replaced by a larger one,
usually at great expense and even greater disruption to the users. With
client-server model, new clients and new servers can be added when
needed.

Communication Medium

A computer network can provide a powerful communication medium

among widely separated users. Using a computer network it is easy for
two pr more people who are working on the same project and who live
far apart to write a report together. When one worker, makes a change to
an on-line document, the others can see the change immediately, instead
of waiting several days for a letter. Such a speedup makes cooperation
among far-flung groups of people easy whereas previously it was
impossible.

Increased Productivity

Networks increase productivity as several people can enter data at the

same time, but they can also evaluate and process the shared data. So,

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one person can handle accounts receivable, and someone else processes
the profit-and-loss statements.

1) Briefly describe about NCP and IPX of Novell NetWare

reference model.
2) List the basic components (equipments) in order to connect a
computer to the Internet. I
3) What are advantages of having~ma11 fixed size cells in A TM?

4.0 CONCLUSION

In this introductory unit, you have learnt about the basic concepts of
Computer Networks. You have not only learnt about Networks, but also
about the different types of Networks, their applications, Network
Topology Network protocols, OST reference mode and the TCP/IP
reference model which is the most commonly used on the Internet today.
Also, the importance of the network protocols and the importance of
using networked system have been extensively discussed.

5.0 SUMMARY

In this unit we have learnt about the basic concepts of Networking. Here
we discussed the different types of networks and the difference between
them. Computer networks are basically classified as LAN, MAN, WAN
depending on the geographical distance covered and depending on the
various ways of interconnecting computers in a network (network
topology) like Star, Bus, Ring, Tree, Mesh and cellular topologies.

We have seen the immense benefits that the computer networks provide
in the form of excellent sharing of computational resources,
computational load, increased level of reliability, economy and efficient
person-to-person communication. Here we have briefly explained some
of the network protocols which define a common set of rules and signals
that computers on the network use to communicate with each other.

Standard network architecture is required for meaningful

communication between end systems. We have discussed the two most
widely used reference models i.e., the OSI reference model and the
TCP/IP reference model. Nowadays, we come across different types of
networks like Public networks, Research networks, Co-operative
networks, Commercial networks etc. and we have learnt about some of
the popular networks such as Novell NetWare, ARPANET, Internet,
ATM network. Towards the end of this unit the concept of delays was
also introduced.

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6.0 TUTOR-MARKED ASSIGNMENT

1) Briefly describe about NCP and IPX of Novell NetWare

reference model.
2) List the basic components (equipments) in order to connect a
computer to the Internet.
3) What are advantages of having small fixed size cells in ATM?

7.0 REFERENCE/FURTHER READINGS

Andrew S. Tenenbaum, Computer Networks, PHI, New Delhi.

William Stalling, Data and Computer Communication, PHI, New Delhi

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UNIT 2 DATA TRANSMISSION

CONTENTS

1.0 Introduction
2.0 Objectives
3.0 Main Content
3.1 Data Communication Terminology
3.1.1 Channel
3.1.2 Baud
3.1.3 Bandwidth
3.1.4 Frequency
3.2 Modes of Data Transmission
3.2.1 Serial and Parallel Communication
3.2.2 Synchronous, Asynchronous and Isochronous
Communication
3.2.3 Simplex, Half Duplex and Full Duplex
Communication
3.3 Analog and Digital Data Transmission
3.4 Transmission Impairments
3.4.1 Attenuation
3.4.2 Delay Distortion
3.4.3 Noise
3.4.4 Concept of Delays
3.5 Transmission Media and its Characteristics
3.5.1 Magnetic media
3.5.2 Twisted Pair
3.5.3 Baseband Coaxial Cable
3.5.4 Broadband Coaxial Cable
3.5.5 Optical Fiber
3.5.6 Comparison between Optical Fiber and Copper
wire
3.6 Wireless Transmission
3.6.2 Microwave Transmission
3.6.2 Radio Transmission
3.6.3 Infrared and Millimeter Waves
3.7 Wireless LAN
4.0 Conclusion
5.0 Summary
6.0 Tutor-Marked Assignment
7.0 References/Further Readings

1.0 INTRODUCTION

Communication from a source to a destination, that is, from one

computer to another or from one device to another, involves the transfer

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of information from the sender to the receiver. The transfer of data from
one machine to another machine such that, the sender and the receiver
both interpret the data correctly is known as Data Communication.

All communication between devices requires that the devices agree on

the format of the data. The set of rules defining a format is known as a
protocol. At the very least, a communications protocol must define the
following:

1. Transmission media used.

2. Rate of transmission (in baud or bps).
3. Whether transmission is to be synchronous or asynchronous.
4. Whether data is to be transmitted in half-duplex or full-duplex mode.

In order to understand this we need to learn about some of the basic

concepts and terminologies related to data transmission, which we will
be doing in this unit.

2.0 OBJECTIVES

After going through this unit, you should be able to:

understand the concept of Transmission terminology

differentiate between Serial and Parallel communication
differentiate between Analog and Digital Data Transmission
have a broad idea about the different Transmission Impairments
compare the different Transmission Media and their characteristics
understand Wireless Transmission and realise its importance.

3.0 MAIN CONTENT

3.1 Data Communication Terminology

The transfer of data from one machine to another machine such that, the
sender and the receiver both interpret the data correctly is known as
Data Communication.

3.1.1 Channel

In communications, the term channel refers to a path of communications

between two computers or devices. A communication channel provides
everything that is needed for the transfer of electronic information from
one location to another. It may refer to the physical medium, such as
coaxial cable, or to a specific carrier frequency (sub-channel) within a
larger channel or a wireless medium.

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The channel capacity of a transmission system is the maximum rate at

which information can be transferred reliably over a given period of
time. Two basic types of channels that are used in voice and data
communication are Analog and Digital.

The Analog type of channel transmits signals generally using sinusoidal

waves as shown in Figure 6. Non-sinusoidal waves can also be used for
transmission. The commercial radio station and Public telephone system
are examples of this type. The Digital type of channel transmits pulsed
wave signals, such as, those shown in Figure 7.

3.1.2 Baud

Pronounced bawd, Baud is the number of signaling elements that occur

each second. The term is named after J.M.E. Baudot, the inventor of
the Baudot telegraph code.

At slow speeds, only one bit of information (signaling element) is

encoded in each electrical change. The baud, therefore, indicates the
number of bits per second that are transmitted. For example, 300 baud
means that 300 bits are transmitted each second (abbreviated 300 bps).
Assuming asynchronous communication, which requires 10 bits per
character, this translates in to 30 characters per second (cps). For slow
rates (below 1,200 baud), you can divide the baud by 10 to see how
many characters per second are sent.

At higher speeds, it is possible to encode more than one bit in each

electrical change. 4,800 baud may allow 9,600 bits to be sent each
second. At high data transfer speeds; therefore, data transmission rates
are usually expressed in bits per second (bps) rather than baud. For
example, a 9,600 bps modem may operate at only 2,400 baud.

3.1.3 Bandwidth

The amount of data or signals that the transmission media can carry in a
fixed amount of time is called Bandwidth. The Bandwidth depends upon
the length, media and signaling technique used. A high bandwidth
allows increased throughput and better performance. A medium that has
a high capacity has a high bandwidth. A medium that has limited
capacity has a low bandwidth. It is calculated using the difference
between the highest and the lowest frequencies that the medium can
carry. For digital devices, the bandwidth is usually expressed in bits per
second (bps) or bytes per second. For analog devices, the bandwidth is
expressed in cycles per second, or Hertz (Hz).

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Bandwidth is particularly important for 1/0 devices. For example, a fast

disk drive can be hampered by a bus with a low bandwidth.

3.1.4 Frequency

Frequency is the number of cycles or periods a signal completes within

one second. The unit of measuring frequency is called Hertz named after
a German mathematician Heinrich Hertz. One Hz is one cycle/second.
We use one Kilohertz or one kHz to mean 1000Hz and one Mega hertz
or one MHz to mean 1000 kHz or 1000000Hz.

3.2 Modes of Data Transmission

Data can be transmitted from Source to Destination in a number of

ways. The different modes of data transmission will be outlined as
follows:

Parallel and Serial Communication.

Asynchronous, Synchronous and Isochronous Communication.
Simplex, Half duplex and Full duplex Communication.

3.2.1 Serial and Parallel Communication

There is always a need to exchange commands, data and other control

information between two communicating devices. There are mainly two
options for transmitting data, commands and other control information
from the sender to the receiver. These are:

Serial communication.
Parallel communication.

Serial Communication

In Serial data transmission, bits are transmitted serially, one after the
other, as shown in Figure J. The least significant bit (LSB) is usually
transmitted first. While sending data serially, characters or bytes have to

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be separated and sent bit by bit. Thus, some hardware is required to

convert the data from parallel to serial. At the destination, all the bits are
collected, measured and put together as bytes in the memory of the
destination. This requires conversion from serial to parallel.

As compared to parallel transmission, serial transmission requires only

one circuit interconnecting the two devices. Therefore, serial
transmission is suitable for transmission over long distances.

Parallel Communication

Figure 2: Parallel Data Transmission

In Parallel transmission, all the bits of a byte are transmitted

simultaneously on separate wires as shown in the Figure 2. Here,
multiple connections between the two devices are therefore, required.
This is a very fast method of transmitting data from one place to
another.

The disadvantage of Parallel transmission is that it is very expensive, as

it requires several wires for both sending, as well as receiving
equipment. Secondly, it demands extraordinary accuracy that cannot be
guaranteed over long distances.

3.2.2 Asynchronous, Synchronous and Isochronous

Communication

One of the major difficulties in data transmission is that of

synchronising the receiver (destination) with the sender (source). This is
the main problem with serial communication. The receiver must be able
to detect the beginning of each new character in the bit stream that is
being presented to it and if it is not able to achieve this, it will not be
able to interpret the incoming bit stream correctly.

The three mechanisms used for synchronisation are:

Asynchronous Communication

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Synchronous Communication
Isochronous Communication

Asynchronous Communication

Asynchronous communication sends individual characters one at a time

framed by a start bit and I or 2 stop bits. Each frame begins with a start
bit that enables the receiving device to adjust to the timing of the
transmitted signal. The message can begin at any time. Here, messages
are kept as short as possible because, the sending and receiving devices
should not draft out of synchronisation, when the message is being
transferred. Asynchronous communication is most frequently used to
transmit character data and is ideally suited for characters that are
transmitted at irregular intervals, such as, when users are typing in
character data from the keyboard.

A typical frame used to transmit a character data has four components:

1) A start bit: Signals the starting a frame and enables the receiving
device to synchronise itself with the message.

2) Data Bits: Consists of 7 or 8 bits when character data is being

transmitted.

3) Parity Bits: Optionally used as a crude method for detecting

transmission errors.

4) A stop bit or bits: Signals the end of the data frame.

Error detection in asynchronous transmission makes use of the parity bit

Parity techniques can detect errors that affect only one bit and if two or
more bits are affected by errors, the parity techniques may not be able to
detect them.

Advantages of Asynchronous Communication

Asynchronous transmission is simple, inexpensive and is ideally

suited for transmitting small frames at irregular intervals (e.g.,
Data entry from a keyboard).

As each individual character is complete in itself, if a character is

corrupted during transmission, its successor and predecessor will
not be affected.
Disadvantages of Asynchronous Communication

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As start, stop and parity bits must be added to each character that
is to be transmitted, this adds a high overhead to transmission.
This wastes the bandwidth; as a result, asynchronous
transmission is undesirable for transmitting large amounts of
data.

Successful transmission inevitably depends on the recognition of

the start bits, hence, as these bits can be easily missed or
occasionally spurious, as start bits can be generated by line
interference, the transmission may be unsuccessful.

Due to the effects of distortion the speed of asynchronous

transmission is limited.

Synchronous Communication

In synchronous communication the whole block of data bits is

transferred at once, instead of one character at a time. Here, transmission
begins at a predetermined regular time instant. A sync signal is used to
tell the receiving station that a new frame is arriving and to synchronise
the receiving station.

Sync signals, generally utilise a bit pattern that cannot appear elsewhere
in the messages, ensuring that they will always be distinct and easy for
the receiver to recognise. As the transmitter and receiver remain in
synchronisation for the duration of the transmission, frames can be of
longer length.

As frames are longer the parity method of error detection is not suitable
because, if multiple bits are affected, then, the parity technique will not
report error accurately. Hence, the technique used with synchronous
transmission is the Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC).

The transmitter uses an algorithm to calculate a CRC value that

summarises the entire value of data bits. This CRC value is appended to
the data frame. The receiver uses the same algorithm, recalculates the
CRC and compares the CRC in the frame to the value that it has
calculated. If these values match then, it is sure that the frame was
transmitted without error.

An end bit pattern indicates the end of the frame. Like sync the bit
pattern for end is such that, it will not appear elsewhere in the messages,
ensuring that they will always be distinct and easy for the receiver to
recognise at the end of the frame.

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Serial synchronous transmission is used for high-speed communication

between computers. It is used when high volull1es of data are to be
transmitted.

Advantages of Synchronous Communication

Synchronous transmission is more efficient because, only 4

additional bytes (for start and end frames).are required to transmit
up to 64 k bits.
Synchronous transmission is not really prone to distortion, as a
result, it can be used at high- speeds.

Disadvantages of Synchronous Communication

Synchronous transmission is expensive as complex circuitry is

required and it is difficult to implement.
If an error occurs during transmission, rather than just a single
character the whole block of data is lost.
The sender cannot transmit characters simply, as they occur, but
has to store them until it has built up a block. Thus, this is not
suitable where characters are generated at irregular intervals.

Isochronous Communication

This method combines the approaches of asynchronous and synchronous

cornrnunications. As in the asynchronous method, each character has
both the start and stop bits. The idle period (where no transmission takes
place) between the two characters is not random but an exact multiple of
one character time interval. If, the time to transmit a character (Including
its parity, start, stop bits) is t, the time interval between characters
cannot be random as in the asynchronous method. It is also not 0 as in
the synchronous method. It has to be t, 2t, 3t……….nt where n is any
positive integer. Here, the signal is expected to be received within
certain delay bounds say Tmin to Tmax.

Advantages of Isochronous Communication

Isochronous transmission guarantees transmission rates, and it is

almost deterministic.
It has low overheads.
It has high speed.

Disadvantages of Isochronous Communication

In isochronous transmission its necessary to ensure that the

clocking device is fault tolerant.

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3.2.3 Simplex, Half Duplex and Full Duplex Communication

This classification of data transmission is based on the question of,

communication can send data and at what point of time.

The three basic ways in which this can be done are:

Simplex.
Half Duplex
Full Duplex, sometimes called Duplex.

Simplex

Figure 3: Simplex connection

The simplest signal flow technique is the simplex configuration. In

Simplex transmission, one of the communicating devices can only send
data, whereas the other can only receive it. Here, communication is only
in one direction (unidirectional) where one party is the transmitter and
the other is the receiver as shown in the Figure 3. Examples of simplex
communication are the simple radio, and Public broadcast television
where, you can receive data from stations but can’t transmit data back.
The television station sends out electromagnetic signals. The station
does not expect and does not monitor for a return signal from the
television set. This type of channel design is easy and inexpensive to set
up.

Half Duplex

Figure 4: Half duplex connection

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Half duplex refers to two-way communication where, only one party can
transmit data at a time. Unlike, the Simplex mode here, both devices can
transmit data though, not at the same time, that is Half duplex provides
Simplex communication in both directions in a single channel as shown
in Figure 4. When one device is sending data, the other device must
only receive it and vice versa. Thus, both sides take turns at sending
data. This requires a definite turn around time during which, the device
changes from the receiving mode to the transmitting mode. Due to this
delay, half duplex communication is slower than simplex
communication. However, it is more convenient than simplex
communication as both the devices can send and receive data.

Note, the difference between simplex and half-duplex. Half-duplex

refers to two-way communication where, only one party can transmit
data at a time. Simplex refers to one-way communication where, one
party is the transmitter and the other is the receiver For example, a
walkie-talkie is a half-duplex device because only one party can talk at a
time.

Most modems contain a switch that lets you select between half-duplex
and full-duplex modes. The correct choice depends on which program
you are using to transmit data through the modem.

Full Duplex

Figure 5: Full duplex connection

Full duplex refers to the transmission of data in two directions

simultaneously. Here, both the devices are capable of sending as well as
receiving data at the same time as shown in Figure 5. As you can see
from Figure 5, that simultaneously bi-directional communication is
possible, as a result, this configuration requires full and independent
transmitting and receiving capabilities at both ends of the
communication channel. Sharing the same channel and moving signals
in both directions increases the channel throughput without increasing
its bandwidth. For example, a telephone is a full-duplex device because
both parties can talk to each other simultaneously. In contrast, a walkie-
talkie is a half-duplex device because only one party can transmit at a
time.

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Most modems have a switch that lets you choose between full-duplex
and half-duplex modes. The choice depends on which communications
program you are running.

SELF ASSESSMENT EXERCISE 1

1) What is Data Communication?

2) Explain the term bandwidth. Why is bandwidth useful?
3) If, a sine wave complex one cycle in 3 seconds, what is its
frequency?
4) Compare Parallel and Serial transmission methods and mention
the situation where Parallel transmission is a better choice as
compared to serial transmission.
5) Give reasons as to why Full duplex is more challenging the’1
simplex and half duplex transmission.
6) Bring out the difference between Synchronous, Asynchronous
and Isochronous transmission.

3.3 Analog and Digital Data Transmission

We know that the two major types of signals are Analog and Digital.
The manner in which these two types of signals can be transmitted from
source to destination is of the same two types that is:

Analog data transmission.

Digital data transmission.

Analog Signal

Figure 6: Analog signal

Analog signals vary constantly in one or more values; these changes in

values can be used to represent data. An analog signal is continuous and
can be represented by using sine waves. Human voice, video and music
are all examples of analog signals, which vary in amplitude (volume)
and frequency (pitch). Human voice generates an analog (continuously
varying) signal containing multiple frequencies that is transmitted as an
analog signal over the medium. Amplifiers are used to overcome the

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attenuation that the signal suffers on its way. The drawback is that
amplifiers amplify noise along with the original signal and hence, if the
signal gets distorted, it cannot be reconstructed and it is a permanent
loss. Due to this reason, this type of transmission is not used where a
high level of accuracy is needed. This is used in telephony where a
slight distortion in human communication does not matter.

The ability to capture the subtle nature of the real world is the single
advantage of analog techniques. However, once captured, modern
electronic equipment, no matter how advanced, cannot copy analog
signals perfectly. Third and fourth generations of audio and video
recordings show marked deterioration.

By converting analog signals into digital, the original audio or video

data can be preserved indefinitely within the specified error bounds and
copied over and over without deterioration. Once continuously varying
analog signals are measured and converted into digital form, they can be
stored and transmitted without loss of integrity due to the accuracy of
digital methods.
Digital Data Transmission

Figure 7: Digital Data Transmission

Digital data transmission describes any system based on discontinuous

data or events. Computers are digital machines because at their most
basic level they can distinguish between just two values, 0 and 1, or off
and on. There is no simple way to represent all the values in between,
such as 0.25. All data that a computer processes must be encoded
digitally, as a series of zeroes and ones.

Information coming out of the computer is in the form of digital signals.

The bandwidth of a digital signal is infinite as compared to any medium,
which has a limited bandwidth. Therefore, as the signal is generated and
enters the medium, at that point of entry, only limited frequencies are
permissible on the medium and this depends upon the bandwidth. As the
signal traverses over the medium it gets distorted and beyond a certain
distance, the signal becomes unrecognisable from the original one. A
hardware device called Repeater is used to regenerate the digital signal.

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The repeater measures the signal values at regular intervals to recognise

the 0’s and l’s in the signal and regenerates them. Hence, there is no loss
of information. The number of repeaters to be used depends on the
distance between the source and the destination. Any line with repeaters
placed at appropriate distance is called a digital line.

When information, music, voice and video are turned into binary digital
form, they can be electronically manipulated, preserved and regenerated
perfectly at high speed. The millionth copy of a computer file is exactly
the same as the original. This is, nevertheless, a major advantage of
digital processing.

3.4 Transmission Impairments

When data is transmitted from a transmitter to receiver, there is scope

for transmission errors. If, transmission media were perfect, the receiver
would receive exactly the same signal that the transmitter sent.
Unfortunately, media are not perfect, so the received signal may
sometimes not be the same as the transmitted signal.
Transmission lines suffer from three major problems:

Attenuation.
Delay distortion.
Noise.

3.4.1 Attenuation

Attenuation is the loss of energy as the signal propagates outwards. On

guided media (e.g., wires and optical fibers), the signal falls off
logarithmically with the distance. Attenuation is very small at short
distances; therefore, the original signal can be recognised without too
much distortion. Attenuation increases with distance as, some of the
signal energy is absorbed by the medium. The loss is expressed in
decibels per kilometer (db/km). The amount of energy lost depends on
the frequency. Attenuation is also higher at higher frequencies.

If the attenuation is high, the receiver may not be able to detect the
signal at all, or the signal may fall below the noise level. In many cases,
the attenuation properties of a medium are known, so amplifiers can be
put in place to try to compensate for the frequency-dependent
attenuation. This approach helps but can never restore the signal exactly
back to its original shape.

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3.4.2 Delay Distortion

Delay distortion is caused by the fact that the signals of varying

frequencies travel at different speeds along the medium. Any complex
signal can be decomposed into different sinusoidal signals of different
frequencies, resulting, in a frequency bandwidth for every signal.

One property of signal propagation is that the speed of travel of the

frequency is the highest at the center of this bandwidth, and lowest at
both ends. Therefore, at the receiving end, signals with different
frequencies in a given bandwidth will arrive at different times. If, the
signals received are measured at a specific time, they will not be exactly
like the original signal resulting in its misinterpretation.
For digital data, fast components from one bit may catch up and
overtake low components from the bit ahead, mixing the two bits and
increasing the probability of incorrect reception.

3.4.3 Noise

Noise is unwanted energy from sources other than the transmitter.

Thermal noise is caused by the random motion of the electrons in a wire
and is unavoidable. Cross talk is caused by inductive coupling between
two wires that are close to each other. Sometimes when talking on the
telephone, you can hear another conversation in the background. That is
crosstalk. Finally, there is impulse noise, caused by spikes on the power
line or other causes. For digital data, impulse noise can wipe out one or
more bits.

3.4.3 Concept of Delays

The average delay required to deliver a packet from source (origin) to

destination has a large impact on the performance of a data network.
Delay considerations strongly influence the choice and performance of
network algorithms, such as routing and flow control. Because of these
reasons, it is very important to understand the nature and mechanism of
network delay, and the manner in which it depends on the characteristics
of the network.

A large delay is disastrous for data transfer. The total delay can be
categorised into two types. The first type is fixed delay. This is the total
delay which is always present due to buffering, link capacity etc. The
second type is variable delay. This is the delay component which is
caused by packets queuing in the routers, congestions etc. Among the
different types of delays, here, we shall discuss Transmission delay and
Propagation delay.

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Transmission delay

Transmission delay is the delay, which is present due to link capacities.

When resource reservation methods are supported in routers,
transmission delays can probably be kept low enough to satisfy the
overall delay constraint of 200 ms.

When data is transmitted, there is always a minimal amount ‘of delay,

due to the capacity of the links along which the data travels. But the
most significant part of the delay of transmission is usually due to
queuing of packets inside routers. This delay is highly variable and
depends both on the number of routers along the path and the load of the
routers.
Propagation delay
Satellite microwave systems can reach remote places on the earth and
can also communicate with mobile devices. As the signal travels a long
distance (around 36,000 km), there is a delay of about 5 kms between,
the transmission and the reception of the signal. This delay is known as
the propagation delay. Such delays occur in all communication
channels, however, small they may be.

Propagation delay is the time between the last bit transmitted at the head
node of the link and the time the last bit is received at the tail node. This
is proportional to the physical distance between the transmitter and the
receiver; it can be relatively substantial, particularly for a satellite link or
a very high-speed link.

The propagation delay depends on the physical characteristics of the link

and is independent of the traffic carried by the link.

3.5 Transmission Media and its Characteristics

Various physical media can be used for the actual transmission of

information from one place to another. Each one has its own niche in
terms of bandwidth, delay, cost, and ease of installation and
maintenance. Transmission media are roughly grouped into guided
media, such as copper wire and fiber optics, and unguided media, such
as radio and lasers.

3.5.1 Magnetic Media

One of the most common ways to transport data from one computer to
another is to write them onto magnetic tape or floppy disks, physically
transport the tape or disks to the destination machine, and read them
back in again. While, this method is not as sophisticated as using a

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geosynchronous communication satellite, it is often much more cost

effective, especially for applications in which high bandwidth or cost
per bit transported is the key factor.

3.5.2 Twisted Pair

Figure 8: Twisted pair cable

Although, the bandwidth characteristics of magnetic tape are excellent,

the delay characteristics are poor. Transmission time is measured in
minutes or hours, not milliseconds. For many applications an on-line
connection is needed. The oldest and still most common transmission
medium is the twisted pair. A twisted pair consists of two insulated
copper wires, typically about 1 mm thick. The purpose of twisting the
wires is to reduce electrical interference from similar pairs that may be
close by.

The most common application of the twisted pair is in the telephone

system. Nearly all telephones are connected to the telephone company
office by a twisted pair. Twisted pairs can run several kilometers
without amplification, but for longer distances, repeaters are needed.
When many twisted pairs run in parallels for a substantial distance, such
as, all the wires coming from an apartment building to the telephone
company office, they are bundled together and encased in a protective
sheath. The pairs in these bundles would interfere with one another if, it
were not twisted.

Twisted pairs can be used for either analog or digital transmission. The
bandwidth depends on the thickness of the wire and the distance
travelled, but several megabits/sec can be achieved for a few kilometers
in many cases.

Twisted pair cable has the following advantages:

Adequate performance and lowest cost per meter as compared to other

cable types as these are inexpensive to install, makes twisted pairs
popular and hence, they are widely used and are likely to remain so for
years to come.

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3.5.3 Baseband Coaxial Cable

Another common transmission medium is the coaxial cable (also known

as “coax”). It has better shielding than twisted pairs, so it can span
longer distances at higher speeds. 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 with a protective plastic
sheath. A cutaway view of a coaxial cable is shown in Figure 9.

Figure 9 Coaxial cable

The construction and shielding of the coaxial cable gives it a good

combination of high bandwidth and excellent noise immunity. The
bandwidth possible depends on the cable length. For I-kin cables, a data
rate of 1 to 2 Gbps is feasible. Longer cables can also be used, but only
at lower data rates or with periodic amplifiers. Coaxial cables used to be
widely used within the telephone system but, have now largely been
replaced by fiber optics on long-haul routes. Coax is still widely used
for cable television and some local area networks.

3.5.4 Broadband Coaxial Cable

The other kind of coaxial cable system uses analog transmission on

standard cable television cabling. It is called broadband. Although the
term “broadband” comes from the telephone world, where it refers to
anything wider than 1 MHz, in the computer networking world
“broadband cable” means any cable network using analog transmission.

Since, broadband networks use standard cable television technology, the

cables can be used up to 300 MHz (and often up to 450 MHz) and can
run for nearly 100 kin due to the analog signaling, which is much less
critical than digital signaling. To transmit digital signals on an analog
network, each interface must contain electronics to, convert the outgoing

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bit stream to an analog signal, and the incoming analog signal to a bit
stream. Depending on the type of electronics, 1 bps may occupy
roughly, 1 Hz of bandwidth. At higher frequencies, many bits per Hz are
possible using advanced modulation techniques.

3.5.5 Optical Fiber

Figure 10: Optical fiber

Fiber optic cable is made of fine strands of silicon glass fiber (thinner
than a human hair), and is coated with a refractive surface. The signals
are converted to light pulses before being sent. When light (provided by
a laser or LED) is show into the strand, it travels along the fiber strand
(the refractive layer prevents it from escaping). Each fiber optic strand
can support thousands of speech channels and multiple TV channels
simultaneously. It is used for long haul telecommunications links, for
providing high-speed data communications links for computers, and
information services to homes (e.g., PAY TV).

Advantages of Fiber optic cable are:

high capacity (laser bandwidth),

immune to interference (electromagnetic), and
can go long distances (low attenuation).

Its disadvantages are:

costly,
difficult to join, and
expensive to install and greater skill is required.

An Optical fiber transmission system has three components: the light

source, the transmission medium, and the detector. Conventionally, a
pulse of light indicates a 1 bit and the absence of light indicates a zero
bit. The transmission medium is an ultra-thin fiber of glass. The detector

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is a photo-divider that 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.
Fibers can be connected in three different ways. First, they can terminate
in connectors and be plugged into fiber sockets. Connectors lose about
10 to 20 percent of the light, but they make it easy to reconfigure
systems.

Second, they can be spliced mechanically. Mechanical splices just place

the two carefully cut ends next to each other in a special sleeve and
clamp them together. The alignment can be improved by passing light
through the junction and then making small adjustments to maximise the
signal. Trained personnel can do mechanical splicing in 5 minutes, and
show result in a 10 percent light loss.

Third, two pieces of fiber can be fused (melted) to form a solid

connection. A fusion splice is almost as good as a single drawn fiber,
but even here, a small amount of attenuation occurs. For all three kinds
of splices, reflections can occur at the point of the splice, and the
reflected energy can interfere with the signal.

3.5.6 Comparison between Optical Fiber and Copper Wire

Optical fiber has many advantages over copper wire. The advantages
are:

Optical fiber can handle much higher bandwidths than copper wire. Due
to the low attenuation, repeaters are needed only about every 30 km on
long lines, whereas, copper wires require repeaters every 5 km, which, is
substantial sayings in cost. Optical fiber also has the advantage of not
being affected by power surges, electromagnetic interference, or power
failures. Neither, is it affected by corrosive chemicals in the air, making
it ideal for harsh factory environments.

Optical fiber is lighter than copper. One thousand twisted pairs 1 km

long weigh 8000 kg. Two fibers have more capacity and weigh only 100
kg, which greatly reduces the need for expensive mechanical support
systems that must be maintained. For new routes, the installation cost of
optical fiber is much lower than that for copper wire.

Finally, optical fibers do not leak light and are quite difficult to tap. This
gives them excellent security against potential wire trappers.

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The reason that optical fiber is better than copper wire is inherent in
underlying physics. When electrons move in a wire, they affect one
another and are themselves affected by electrons outside the wire.
Photons in a fiber do not affect one another (they have no electric
charge) and are not affected by stray photons outside the fiber.

The disadvantages of optical fiber are:

It is a complex technology requiring skills that most engineers do not

possess. Since optical transmission is inherently unidirectional, two-way
communication requires either two fibers or two frequency bands on one
fiber. Fiber interfaces cost more than electrical interfaces.

SELF ASSESSMENT EXERCISE 2

1) What is Analog data transmission?

2) Explain the use of repeaters with respect to data transmission.
3) Describe the three categories of distortion.
4) List out the significance of delays in data transmission.

3.6 Wireless Transmission

Figure 11: Frequency spectrum for Wireless Transmission

Wireless transmission is also called unbounded media. Here, there are

no physical connectors between the two communicating devices.
Usually the transmission is sent through the atmosphere, but sometimes
it can be just across a room. Wireless media is used when a physical
obstruction or distance blocks the use of normal cable media.

The three main types of Wireless Media are:

Radio wave,
Microwave, and
Infrared.

However, wireless also has advantages for fixed devices in some

circumstances. For example, if running a fiber to a building is difficult
due to the terrain (mountains, jungles, swamps, etc.) wireless may be

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preferable. It is noteworthy that modem wireless digital communication

began in the Hawaiian Islands, where large chunks of Pacific Ocean
separated the users and the telephone system was inadequate.

3.6.1 Microwave Transmission

Figure 12: Microwave transmission station

Microwave is a radio system, which uses very high frequencies to send

and receive data. Because of the high frequencies involved, microwave
stations are located about 30 kilometers apart and in line of sight (visible
to each other).

Microwave systems have sufficient bandwidth capacity to support a

large number of voice channels and one or two TV channels.

Above 100 MHz, the waves travel in straight lines and can therefore, be
narrowly focused upon. Concentrating all the energy into a small beam,
using a parabolic antenna (like the familiar satellite TV dish) gives a
much higher signal to noise ratio, but the transmitting and receiving
antennas must be accurately aligned with each other. In addition, this
directionality allows, multiple transmitters lined up in a row to
communicate with multiple receivers in a row without interference.
Before fiber optics, microwaves formed the heart of long distance
telephone transmission system.

Since, microwaves travel in straight lines, if, the towers are too far apart,
the earth will get in the way. Consequently, repeaters are needed
periodically. The higher the towers are, the further apart they can be.
The distance between repeaters increases roughly, with the square root
of the tower height. For 100-m high towers, repeaters can be spaced 80
km apart.

Unlike, radio waves at lower frequencies, microwaves do not pass

through buildings well. In addition, even though the beam may be well

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focused at the transmitter, there is still some divergence in space. Some

waves may be refracted off low-lying atmospheric layers and may take
slightly longer to arrive than, direct waves. The delayed waves may
arrive out of phase with the direct wave and thus cancel the signal. This
effect is called multipath fading and is often a serious problem. It is
weather and frequency dependent. Some operators keep 10 percent of
their channels idle as spares to switch on to when, multi path fading
affects some frequency band temporarily.

In summary, microwave communication is so widely used for long-

distance telephone communication, cellular telephones, television
distribution, and other uses, that a severe shortage of spectrum has
developed.

Microwave systems have the advantage of:

medium capacity,
medium cost, and
can go long distances.

Its disadvantages are:

noise interference,
geographical problems due to line of sight requirements, and
becoming outdated.

Comparison between Microwave and Optical Fiber

The microwave has several significant advantages over optical fiber

cable. The main one is that no right of way is needed, and by buying a
small plot of ground every 50 km and putting a microwave tower on it,
one can bypass the telephone system and communicate directly.

Microwave is also relatively inexpensive. Putting up two simple towers

(maybe just big p6les with four guy wires) and putting antennas on each
one may be cheaper than burying 50 km of fiber through a congested
urban area or up over a mountain, and it may also be cheaper than
leasing optical fiber from a telephone company.

Terrestrial Microwave

Terrestrial Microwave employs Earth-based transmitters and receivers.

The frequencies used are in the low-gigahertz range, hence, limiting all
communication to line of sight.

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Microwave transmissions are carried out using a parabolic antenna that

produces a “arrow, highly directional signal. At the receiving site a
similar antenna, which is sensitive to signals, only within a narrow
focus, is placed. As both the transmitter and receiver are highly focused,
they must be carefully adjusted so that, the transmitted signal is aligned
with the receiver.

Microwave is frequently used as a means of transmitting signals where

it would be impractical to run cables.

Terrestrial microwave systems operate in the low-giga hertz range,

typically at 2-6GHz and 21-23GHz

Attenuation characteristics are determined by transmitter power,

frequency and antenna size. Properly designed systems are not affected
by attenuation under normal operational conditions. Rain and fog,
however, can cause attenuation at higher frequencies.

Microwave systems might be vulnerable to electronic eavesdropping

and signals transmitted through microwave are frequently encrypted.

Satellite Microwave

Satellite Microwave systems relay transmission through communication

satellites that operate in geosynchronous orbits (36,000 -40,000 kIn)
above the Earth.

In order to communicate with satellites, the Earth stations use parabolic

antennas. Satellites can retransmit signals in broad or in narrow beams
depending on the locations that are to receive the signals. When the
destination is on the opposite side of the earth, the first satellite must
relay the signal through another satellite, as it cannot directly transmit to
the receiver.

Satellite Microwave communication is possible with most remote sites

and with mobile devices as no cables are required. Ships at sea and
motor vehicles also use Satellite Microwave communication.

As all signals must travel 36,000 miles to the satellite and 36,000 miles
when returning to the receiver, the time required to transmit a signal is
independent of the distance. The time required for the signal to arrive at
its destination is called propagation delay. The delay encountered with
satellite transmissions is about 0.5 seconds.

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Satellite Microwave communication is extremely expensive, as a result

of which, organisations share the cost or they purchase services from a
commercial provider.

Satellite links operate in the low-giga hertz range, typically at 4-6 GHz.
Attenuation depends on transmitter power, frequency and atmospheric
conditions. Rain and atmospheric conditions may cause attenuation at
higher frequencies.

Signals transmitted through Satellite Microwave are usually encrypted.

3.6.2 Radio Transmission

The radio portion of the electromagnetic spectrum extends from 10KHz

to I GHz. Within this range there are numerous bands or ranges of
frequencies that are designated for specific purposes.. Some of the
familiar frequency bands are:

Short wave,
VHF (Very High Frequency) used for television and FM radio,
and
UHF (Ultra High Frequency) used for television.

Radio waves are easy to generate, can travel long distances, and
penetrate buildings easily, so they are widely used for communication,
both indoors and outdoors. Radio waves also are omni directional,
meaning that they travel in all directions from the source, so that the
transmitter and receiver do not have to be carefully aligned physically
and that the signal can be received by all the radios within the broadcast
area.

The properties of radio waves are frequency dependent. At low

frequencies, radio waves pass through obstacles well, but the power falls
off sharply with distance from the source, roughly as 1/r3 in air. At high
frequencies, radio waves tend to travel in straight lines and bounce off
obstacles. They are also absorbed by rain. At all frequencies, radio
waves are subject to interference from motors and other electrical-
equipment.

3.6.3 Infrared and Millimeter Waves

Unguided infrared and millimeter waves are widely used for short-range
communication. The remote controls used on televisions, VCR’s, and
stereos all use infrared communication. The remote control transmits
pulses of infrared light that carry coded instructions to the receiver on
the TV. They are relatively directional, cheap, and easy to build, but

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they have a major drawback, that is, they do not pass through solid
objects (try standing between your remote control and your television
and see if it still works). In general, as we go from long-wave radio
toward visible light, the waves behave more and more like light and less
and less like radio.

Infrared waves do not pass through solid walls well, as a result of which,
an Infrared system in one room of a building, will not interfere with a
similar system in adjacent rooms, which is a great advantage. Due to this
nature, security of infrared systems against eavesdropping is better than
that of radio systems. Because of these reasons, no government license
is needed to operate an infrared system, in contrast to radio systems,
which must be licensed.

These properties have made infrared suitable for indoor wireless LANS.
For example, the computers and offices in a building can be equipped
with relatively unfocused (i.e., somewhat omni directional), infrared
transmitters and receivers. In this way, portable computers with infrared
capability can be on the local LAN without having to physically connect
to it. During a meeting where several people use their portables, they
can just sit down in the conference room and be fully connected, without
having to plug in. Infrared communication cannot be used outdoors
because the sun shines as brightly in the infrared as in the visible
spectrum.

Two methods of infrared networking that are in use are:

Point-to-point and Broadcast Infrared

Point-to-point

The Point-to-point networks operate by relaying infrared signals from

one device to the next. Hence, transmissions are focused on a narrow
beam, and the transmitter and receiver must be aligned carefully. Point-
to point infrared is not suitable for use with devices that move frequently
because, here, the devices must be carefully aligned and setup.

High power laser transmitters can be used in order to transmit data for
several thousand yards when the line of sight communication is
possible.

The cost of Point-to-point infrared equipment is higher than the cost for
a comparable cabled network. When systems use transmitters that are
based on LED technology and hardware cost is moderate, but, when
long distance systems use high powered laser transmitters then the cost
is very high.

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Infrared devices are insensitive to radio frequency interference, but, the

reception can be degraded by bright light. As the transmitters are tightly
focused, they are fairly immune to electronic eavesdropping.

Broadcast Infrared

Broadcast infrared disperses transmissions so that, they are visible to

several receivers. The two possible approaches to broadcast infrared
networking are:

The active transmitter can be located at a high point so that, it can

transmit to all devices.

A reflective material can be placed on the ceiling. Devices

transmit toward the ceiling, from where, the light signals are
dispersed to other devices in the room.

Installation is simple as device alignment is not critical. Hence, it is

essential that each device has clear transmission and reception pathways.
As all devices are sensitive to light interference, during installation, the
control of ambient light is very important.

3.7 Wireless LAN

Wireless LAN’s are a system of portable computers that communicate

using radio transmission. Wireless LAN’s make use of the omni
directional wireless communication.

The main objective of wireless LAN is to provide high-speed

communication among computers that are located in relatively close
proximity.

Wireless LAN’s are usually configured in an office building with the

base stations strategically placed around the building. Optical fiber cable
can be used to cable all base stations together. If the transmission power
of the base stations and portables is adjusted to a range of 3 or 4 meters,
then, each room acts as a single cell, and the entire building acts as a
large cellular system. Here unlike the cellular telephone system, each
cell has only one channel that covers the entire bandwidth, which is
available. Typically its bandwidth is 1 to 2 Mbps.

The disadvantages of using Radio transmitters are:

When the receiver is within the range of two active transmitters, the
resulting signal will usually be grab led and hence, useless.

In indoor wireless LAN’s, the presence of walls between the stations

have great impact on the effective range of each station.

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4.0 CONCLUSION

In this unit you have learn about the concept of transmission

terminology as well as the different types of data transmission. Also,
you have learnt about the various types of transmission media and their
particular characteristics. Is believe they by how you should be able to
choose a suitable transmission media for your particular network.

5.0 SUMMARY

In this unit, we have studied, the basic concepts of Data Transmission.

To start with, we discussed the basic terms that are frequently used in
Data transmission like Bandwidth, frequency, channel, baud etc.
Bandwidth is the amount of data or signals that a transmission media
can carry in a fixed amount of time and its unit of measurement is bits
per second (bps) for digital signal and Hertz (Hz) for analog signals.
Frequency is the number of cycles or periods that a signal completes
within one second and its unit of measurement is Hertz (Hz). Channel
refers to the communication path between the source and destination.

As it is essential to know how data can be transmitted from the source to

the destination, the different modes of data transmission were outlined
as follows:

Parallel and Serial communication.

Asynchronous, Synchronous and Isochronous communication.
Simplex, Half duplex and Full duplex communication.

We also discussed the two major types of signals that is Analog and
Digital and, the manner in which these two types of signals can be
transmitted from the source to the destination.

When, data is transmitted from the source to the destination, there is,
always a scope for transmission errors and the data may not reach in
exactly the same form as it was sent. We have seen that these
transmission errors are classified into three main categories that is Delay
distortion, Attenuation and Noise. Delay distortion is caused because,
signals at different frequencies, travel at different speeds along the
transmission medium. As the signal travels along the transmission
medium, its strength decreases over distance, this is known as
Attenuation. Usually, some unwanted electromagnetic energy gets
inserted during the course of transmission and this is called Noise. The
concept of Delays and how to reduce them were also discussed.

We have seen that transmission media can be classified in to two

categories, that are, guided media and unguided media. The guided

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media uses physical cable for data transmission. Twisted pair, co-axial
cable and optical fiber are the three main types of guided media; they
differ in their physical characteristics as well as transmission capacities.
In case of unguided media, the transmission medium is air. Unguided
media can be Radio, Microwave or Infrared. Security is a major concern
when using unguided media for transmission.

Towards the end, Wifeless LAN’s were also discussed. Here, we saw
that Wireless LAN’s make use of Radio transmission and their main
objective is to provide high speed communication among computers that
are located in relatively close proximity. In the next unit, we will be
studying, the different Data encoding and communication techniques.

6.0 TUTOR-MARKED ASSIGNMENT

1) Discuss the twisted pair cable.

2) Describe co-axial cable and its uses.
3) Describe the structure of optical fiber and mention its advantages
and disadvantages.
4) Explain how Radio communication differs from Satellite
communication.
5) Explain the working of Wireless LAN’s.

7.0 REFERENCES/FURTHER READINGS

Andrew. S. Tannenbaum, Computer Networks, PHI, New Delhi.

William Stalling, Data and Computer Communication, PHI, New Delhi.

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UNIT 3 DATA ENCODING AND COMMUNICATION

TECHNIQUE

CONTENTS

1.0 Introduction
2.0 Objectives
3.0 Main Content
3.1 Encoding
3.2 Analog to Analog Modulation
3.3 Analog to Digital Modulation
3.4 Digital to Analog Modulation
3.5 Digital to Digital Encoding
4.0 Conclusion
5.0 Summary
6.0 Tutor-Marked Assignment
7.0 References/Further Readings

1.0 INTRODUCTION

You might be aware from the description in the previous blocks, how
data is transmitted through a channel (wired or wireless) in the form of
an analog or digital signal. In this unit, we will elaborate on the
techniques to produce these types of signals from analog or digital data.
We will look at, in brief, on the following encoding techniques
[Figure1]:

Figure 1: Encoding/Conversion Techniques

Analog data as an analog signal

Analog data as a digital signal
Digital data as an analog signal
Digital data as a digital signal

We will confine ourselves to, a treatment of the most useful and

common techniques only, and will skip over the many other kinds of
encoding of data that can be performed.

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2.0 OBJECTIVES

After going through this unit, you should be able to describe:

what encoding means

why encoding is needed
some different types of encoding
mechanisms and techniques used for encoding
when each type of encoding is used with examples.

There are several other types of encoding as well as encoding techniques

that will not be discussed in this unit.

3.0 MAIN CONTENT

3.1 Encoding

Sleekly, we cannot lend a signal containing information directly over a

transmission medium, at least not for long distances. For example, the
sound of our voice can only travel a few hundred meters. If we want to
send our voice to the next city, we have to be able to transform our
voice, to, aft electrical signal that can then, be sent that long distance.
Then, we would also need to perform the reverse conversion at the other
end.

So, we see that, to send a signal over a physical medium, we need to

encode or transform the signal in some way so that the transmission
medium can transmit it. The sender and the receiver must agree on what
kind of transformation has been done so that it can be reversed at the
other end and the actual signal or information can be recovered. The
information content in a signal is based upon having some changes in it.
For example, if we just send a pure sine wave, where the voltage varies
with time as a sine function, then, we cannot convey much information
apart from the fact that there is some entity at the other end that Is doing
the transmitting.

The information content of a signal is dependent on the variation in the

signal. After sending one cycle of a sine wave there is no point in
sending another cycle because we will not be able to convey anything
more than what we have already done. What is needed is to modify the
sine wave in some way to carry the information we want to convey. This
is called modulation.

You know that there are two kinds of signals: analog and digital.
Likewise, there are two types of information that we may want to
transmit, again analog and digital. So, we get four basic combinations of

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encoding that we may need to perform, depending on the signal type as

well as the information type. We shall look at each of these four types
briefly in this unit and will also study the ways in which the actual
encoding can be done.

3.2 Analog- To-Analog Modulation

Let us first look at a situation where our signal and information are both
of the analog type. The act of charging or encoding the information in
the signal is known as modulation. A good example of such encoding is
radio broadcasting. Here we primarily want to send sound in some form
over the atmosphere to the receiving radio gets. The sound is converted
into an analog electrical signal at the source and is used to encode the
signal which is the base frequency at which the transmission is being
done. The reverse process is performed at the radio set to recover the
information in electrical form, which is then converted back to sound so
that, we hear what was being said at the radio station.

Let us, formulate another definition of modulation. When a low

frequency information signal is encoded over a higher frequency signal,
it is called modulation [Ref.3]. The encoding can be done by varying
amplitude (strength of a signal), period (amount of time, in seconds, a
signal needs to complete a cycle) and frequency (number of cycles per
second) and phase (position of waveform relative to zero).

Notice the simulations of the word modulation to the word modifying.

For instance, an audio signal (one that is audible to human ear) can be
used to modify an RF (Radio Frequency) carrier, when the amplitude of
the RF is varied according to the changes in the amplitude of the audio,
it is called amplitude modulation (AM), and when the frequency is
varied, it is called FM (frequency modulation).

Although, it can be dangerous to use analogies as they can be carried too

far, we can understand this process with an example. Suppose we want
to send a piece of paper with something written on it to a person a
hundred meters away. We will not be able to throw the paper that far.
So, we can wrap it around a small stone and then throw the stone
towards the person. He can then unwrap the paper and read the message.
Here, the stone is the signal and the piece of paper is the information
that is used to change the stone. Just as sending the stone alone would
not have conveyed much to our friend, similarly sending only the base
signal (also called carrier signal) will not convey much information to
the recipient.

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Therefore, there are three different ways in which this encoding of the
analog signal with analog information is performed. These methods are:

Amplitude modulation (AM), where the amplitude of the signal

is changed depending on the information to be sent (Figure 2 (a).

Frequency modulation, where the frequency of the signal is

changed depending on the information to be sent (Figure 2 (b)).

Phase modulation, where it is the phase of the signal that is

changed according to the information to be sent.

Amplitude Modulation

Now, let us go into the details. In this type of modulation the frequency
and phase of the carrier or base signal are not altered. Only the
amplitude changes and we can see that the information is contained in
the envelope of the carrier signal. It can be proud/demonstrated that, the
bandwidth of the composite signal is twice that of the highest frequency
in the information signal that modulates the carrier.

By international agreement, for radio transmission using AM, 9 KHz is

allowed as the bandwidth. So, if a radio station transmits at 618 KHz,
the next station can only transmit at 609 or at 627 KHz. It will be clear
that the highest audio frequency that can be carried over AM radio is
thus 4.5 KHz, which is sufficient for most voice and musical pieces.
Actually, the modulating signal is centred around the carrier frequency
and extends the composite signal both ways in equal measure. Each of
these is called a sideband and therefore, AM radio transmission is dual
sideband. This is actually wasteful because the spectrum is
unnecessarily used up, but the cost and complexity associated with
eliminating one sideband, and performing single sideband AM
modulation, have led to the technique not being used widely.

AM radio transmission has been assigned the frequency range of 530 to

1700 KHz. The quality of AM transmission is not very good as noise in
the channel (the atmosphere, here) can easily creep into the signal and
alter its amplitude. So, the receiving end will likely find a fair amount of
noise in the signal, particularly at higher, short wave frequencies. That is
why you often get 1\ lot of static in short wave or even medium wave
broadcasts.

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AM Bandwidth

Figure 2 (a): Amplitude modulation

Frequency Modulation

In contrast to Amplitude Modulation, here it is the frequency of the base

signal that is altered depending on the information that is to be sent. The
amplitude and phase of the carrier signal are not changed at all. It can be
shown that this results in a bandwidth requirement of 10 times the
modulating signal, centred on the carrier frequency.

This method is the less susceptible to noise and gives the best
performance of all data encoding types as far as the quality of the
transmitted signal is concerned. Although digital encoding methods may
give better performance over multiple hops (because in their case, the
original signal can be accurately reconstructed at each hop), Frequency
Modulation (PM) is the best as far as single hop transmission goes.

FM radio transmission has been allocated the spectrum range 88 MHz to

108 MHz. As a good stereo sound signal needs 15 KHz of bandwidth,
this means that PM transmission has a bandwidth of 150 KHz. To be
safe from interference from neighbouring stations, 200 KHz is the
minimum separation needed. As a further safety measure, in any given
area, only alternate stations are allowed and the neighbouring
frequencies are kept empty. This is practical because PM transmission is
line of sight (because of the carrier frequency) and so, beyond a range of
about 100 Km or so, the signal cannot be received directly (this distance
depends on various factors). We can therefore, have the most 50 FM
stereo radio stations in a given geographical area.

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As in the case of AM transmission (having 2 subbands), PM also has

multiple sidebands maybe two or more, which is really wasteful but is
tolerated in the interests of simplicity and cost of the equipment.

In television transmission the bandwidth needed is 4.5 MHz in each

sideband. The video signal is sent using amplitude modulation. The
audio signal goes at a frequency that is 5.5 MHz over the video signal
and is sent as a frequency modulated signal. To reduce the bandwidth
requirement, the video signal is sent using a method called vestigial
sideband that needs only 6 MHz, instead of the 9 MHz that would have
been needed for dual sideband transmission, though, it is more than the
4.5 MHz that a pure single sideband transmission would have needed.

Figure 2 (b): Frequency modulation

Phase Modulation

As you would have guessed by now, in Phase Modulation (PM) the

modulating signal leaves the frequency and amplitude of the carrier
signal unchanged but alters its phase. The characteristics of this
encoding technique are similar to FM, but the advantage is that of
reduced complexity of equipment However, this method is not used in
commercial broadcasting.

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SELF ASSESSMENT EXERCISE

1) Why do we need modulation? Would it be right to simply send

the information as the signal itself?
2) Why is it at there are at most 50 FM radio stations in a particular
geographical area? Justify with calculations.
3) Why is AM the most susceptible to noise, of the three types of
modulation?

3.3 Analog to Digital Modulation

Natural phenomena are analog in nature and can take on any of the
potentially infinite number of values. For example, the actual
frequencies contained in a sound made by a human is an analog signal,
as is the amplitude or loudness of the sound. One example of coding
analog data in digital form is when, we want to record sound on digital
media such as a DVD or in other forms such as MP3 or as a “.wav” file.
Here, the analog signal, that is, the musical composition or the human
voice is encoded in digital form. This is an example of analog to digital
encoding.

While, in the case of analog to analog encoding, the motivation was to

be able to transmit the signal for long distances, here, the main reason is
to be able to change the information itself to digital form. That digital
signal can then be transmitted, if necessary, by any suitable method.

One method of encoding is what is called Pulse Code Modulation

(PCM). This gives very good quality and when used in conjunction with
error correction techniques, can be regenerated at every hop on the way
to its final destination. This is the big advantage of digital signals. At
every hop, errors can be removed and the original signal reconstructed
almost exactly, barring the few errors that could not be corrected.

The first step in PCM is, to convert the analog signal into a series of
pulses (Figure 3). This is called Pulse Amplitude Modulation (PAM).
To do this the analog signal is sampled at fixed intervals and the
amplitude at each sample decides the amplitude of that pulse. You can
see that at this step, the resulting signal is still actually an analog signal
because the pulse can have any amplitude, equal to the amplitude of the
original signal at the time the sample was taken. In PAM, the sampled
value is held for a small time so that the pulse has a finite width. In the
original signal the value occurs only for the instant at which it was
sampled.

One question that arises here is, how many samples do we have to take?
We would not want to take too many samples as that would be wasteful.

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At the same time, if, we take too few samples, we may not be able to
reconstruct the original signal properly. The answer comes from
Nyqist’s theorem, which states that, to be able to get back the original
signal, we must sample at a rate, that is, at least twice that of the highest
frequency contained in the original signal.

Let us do some calculations to see what this means in practice. In the

next unit, you will see that a voice conversation over a telephone has a
range of frequencies from 300 Hz to 3300 Hz. Because the highest
frequency is 3300 Hz, we need at least 6600 samples a second to digitise
the voice to be sent over a phone line. For safety we take 8000 samples
per second, corresponding to a sampling interval of 125 microseconds.

The next stage in the digitization of the signal is quantisation. In this

process, the analog values of the sampled pulses are quantised, that is,
converted into discrete values. For example, if the original analog signal
had an amplitude ranging from +5v to -5v, the result of PAM might be
to produce pulses of the following amplitudes (each sample is taken at
say, intervals of 125 microseconds)

+4.32, +1.78, -3.]9, -4.07, -2.56, +0.08 and so on.

In quantisation, we may decide to give the amplitude 256 discrete

values. So, they will range from -127 to +128. The actual amplitude of
+5v to -5v has to be represented in this range, which means each value
is of39 mV nearly. By this token, the first value of +4.32v lies between
110 and II I, and we can decide that such a value will be taken as 11O.
This is quantisation. The analog values now become the following
quantised values:

110, 45, -81, -104, -65, 2 and so on.

The above discrete value~ are now represented as 8 binary digits with, I
bit giving the sign while the other 7 bits represent the value of the
sample.

In the final stage of the encoding, the binary digits are then transformed
into a digital signal using any of the digital to digital encoding
mechanisms discussed later in this unit. This digital signal is now the
representation of the original analog signal.

PCM is commonly used to transmit voice signals over a telephone line.

It gives good voice quality but, is a fairly complex method of encoding
the signal. There is a simpler method that can be used, but we have to
pay the price in tends of the lower quality of the encoded signal. This is
called Delta modulation. Here, samples are taken as described above,

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but instead of quantising them into 256 or more levels, only the
direction of change is retained. If the sample is larger in value than the
previous one, it is considered a 1 while otherwise it is considered a o bit.
So the sequence above would be encoded as:

1,0,0,0,1,1 and so on.

Figure 3: Pulse code modulation

3.4 Digital to Analog Modulation

So far, we have looked at the codification of analog data, where the

source information could take up any value. We also have need for the
reverse type of encoding, where binary digital values have to be encoded
into an analog signal. This may seem simple because after all, we only
have to give two distinct values to the analog signal, but here you need
to realise that, we have to be able to distinguish between successive
digital values that are the same, say three 1 ‘s in succession or two 0’s in
succession. These should not get interpreted as a single I or a single 0!
This sort of problem did not exist in the case of analog to analog
encoding.

One example where such encoding is needed is, when we need to

transmit between computers over a telephone line. The computers
generate digital data, but the telephone system is analog. So, this
situation is a bit different from the transmission of voice over the
telephone, where the source signal is also analog.

In this kind of encoding, one important factor of interest is the rate at

which we can transfer bits. Clearly, there will be some kind of limit to

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the amount of information that we can send in a given time. This

depends on the available bandwidth of the carrier signal, that is, the
variation that we can permit around the nominal frequency as well as on
the specific technique of encoding that we use.

Here it is important to understand two aspects of the rate of transfer of

information. The first is the bit rate that tells us the number of individual
bits that are transmitted per second. The second, and more important
from the transmission angle, is the baud rate. This is the number of
signal transitions per second that are needed to represent those bits. For
a binary system, the two are equal. In general, the bit rate cannot be
lower than the baud rate, as there has to be at least one signal transition
to represent a bit.

We have seen in analog to analog encoding that, the source signal

modulates the base or carrier signal to convey the information that we
want to transmit. A similar principle is also used in digital to analog
encoding. The carrier signal has to be modulated, but this time by the
digital signal, to produce the composite signal that is transmitted.
However, while in the analog case there were a potentially infinite
number of values that could have been transmitted, here we have only
two values (a 0 or a 1) that will modulate the signal.

If, there is no modulation, the carrier signal will be a pure sine wave at
the frequency of transmission. You will realise that the baud rate that
can be supported also depends on the quality of the line and the amount
of random noise that is present in the medium. Like in analog-to-analog
encoding, there are three properties of the sine wave that we can alter to
convey information. These are the amplitude, the frequency and the
phase. In addition, we can also use a combination of amplitude and
phase change to encode information more efficiently. Modulation is also
referred to as shift keying in this type of encoding technique.

There are three types of digital to analog modulation (Figure 4)

Figure 4; digital to analog modulation techniques

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Now we will take up each one individually.

Amplitude Shift Keying (ASK)

In this kind of encoding, abbreviated as ASK, the amplitude of the

analog signal is changed to represent the bits, while the phase and the
frequency are kept the same. The bigger the difference between the two
values, the lower the possibility of noise causing errors. There is no
restriction, however, on what voltage should represent a 1 or a 0, and
this is left to the designers. For the duration of a bit, the voltage should
remain constant.

One method could be to represent the high voltage as a I and the

negative high voltage as a 0, although the reverse convention could also
be used. Sometimes, to reduce the energy needed for transmission, we
can choose to represent a 0 or a I by a zero voltage, and the other bit by
the high voltage. This scheme is called on-off- keying (OOK).

Like amplitude modulation in the analog case, ASK is vulnerable to

noise. Amplitude changes easily as a result of the noise in the line, and
if, the quantum of noise is great enough, it can result in an error. This
would mean that a 0 gets interpreted as a 1 at the receiving end, or vice
versa. Noise can occur as spikes or as a constant voltage that shifts the
amplitude of the received signal. Even thermal noise, that is fairly
constant, can cause a 0 to be interpreted as a I or the other way round.

To find the bandwidth requirement of an ASK encoded signal on an

ideal, noiseless, line, we have to do a Fourier analysis of the composite
signal. This yields harmonics on either side of the carrier frequency,
with frequencies that are shifted by an odd multiple of half the baud rate.
As most of the energy is concentrated in the first harmonic, we can
ignore the others. It can then be shown that the bandwidth required for
ASK encoding is equal to the baud rate of the signal. So if we want to
transfer data at 256 Kbps, we need a bandwidth of at least 256 KHz.
In a practical case, there will be noise in the line and this ideal cannot be
achieved. This increases the bandwidth requirement by a factor that
depends on the line quality and the carrier amplitude. ASK is a simple
encoding method but is not commonly used by itself because of
efficiency and quality issues.

Frequency Shift Keying (FSK)

Just as in the case of analog to analog encoding, we can encode a digital

signal by changing the frequency of the analog carrier. This is frequency
shift keying (FSK). When a bit is encoded, the frequency changes and
remains constant for a particular duration. The phase and the amplitude

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of the carrier are unaltered by FSK. Just as in FM, noise in the line has
little effect on the frequency and so, this method is less susceptible to
noise.

It is possible to show that an FSK signal can be analysed as the sum of

two ASK signals. One of these is centred around the frequency used for
a 0 bit and the other for the frequency used for a 1 bit. From this, it is
easy to show that the bandwidth needed for an FSK signal is equal to the
sum of the baud rate and the difference between the two frequencies.
Thus, the requirement of FSK is a higher bandwidth that helps us to
avoid the noise problems of ASK.

FSK is not much used in practice because of the need for higher
bandwidth and the comparative complex requirement for changing the
frequency.

Phase Shift Keying (PSK)

We can also encode by varying the phase of the carrier signal. This is
called phase shift keying (PSK) and here, the frequency and amplitude
of the carrier are not altered. To send a 1 we could use a phase of 0
while we could change it to 180 degrees to represent a 1. Such an
arrangement is not affected by the noise in the line, because that affects
amplitude rather than the phase of the signal.

This quality of PSK can be used to achieve more efficient encoding. For
example, instead of having only 2 phases, we could have four phases, 0,
90 degrees, 180 degrees and 270 degrees. Each of these phase shifts
could represent 2 bits at one go, say, the combinations 00, 01, 10 and 11
respectively. Such a scheme is called 4-PSK. The concept can be
extended to higher levels and we could have 8-PSK to send groups of3
bits in one go. This method can be extended further, but at some point
the sensitivity of the communication equipment will not be enough to
detect the small phase changes and we are then limited for that reason.

Figure 5(a): 8 PSK

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Figure 5 (b): 8 PSK

Clearly, the scheme is more efficient than ASK because, we can now
achieve a higher bit rate from the same bandwidth. It can be shown that
the bandwidth required in 2-PSK is the same as that needed in ASK. But
the same bandwidth at 8-PSK can transmit thrice the number of bits at
the same baud rate.

Why can we not apply the same trick in ASK? We could have 4, 8 or
more amplitude levels to transmit 2, 3 or more bits in one signal
transition. The reason is that, ASK is vulnerable to noise and that makes
it unsuitable for using many different amplitude levels for encoding.
Similarly, FSK has higher bandwidth requirements and so we do not use
this kind of technique there as, there is not much to be gained.

Quadrature Amplitude Modulation (QAM)

To further improve the efficiency of the transmission, we can consider

combining different kinds of encoding. While, at least one them has to
be held constant, there is no reason to alter only one of them. Because of
its bandwidth requirements, we would not bother to combine FSK with
any other method. But it can be quite fruitful to combine ASK and PSK
together and reap the advantages. This technique is called Quadrature
Amplitude Modulation (QAM).

We have already seen how ASK is vulnerable to noise. That is why the
number of different amplitude levels is small while there may be more
phase shift levels possible. There are a large number of schemes
possible in the QAM method. For example 1 amplitude and 4 phases is
called 4-QAM. It is the same as 4-PSK because there is no change in the
amplitude. With 2 amplitudes and 4 phases we can send 3 bits at a time
and so this scheme is called 8-QAM (Figure 6).

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Figure 6:4-QAM and 8-QAM constellations

In practical application we use 3 amplitudes and 12 phases or 4

amplitudes and 8 phases. Although, this way, we should be able to send
4 bits at a time (this is 32-QAM), to guard against errors, adjacent
combinations are left unused. So, there is a smaller possibility of noise
affecting the amplitude and causing problems with the signal received.
As a further safeguard, in some schemes, certain amplitudes and phases
are coupled, so that, some amount of error correction is possible at the
physical layer itself.

Note, that the errors we have talked of here are at the physical layer. By
using the appropriate techniques, at the data link layer we achieve error
free transmission irrespective of the underlying mechanisms at the
physical layer. That is not something that will be looked at in this unit.

It can be shown that QAM requires the same bandwidth as ASK or PSK.
So, we are able to achieve a much higher bit rate using the same baud
rate. That is why QAM is the method of encoding used currently in data
communication applications.

3.5 Digital to Digital Encoding

Let us, now look at the last combination of encoding possible, from
digital to digital signals. A simple example is when sending data from a
computer to a printer, both of which understand digital signals. The
transmission has to be for short distances over the printer cable and
occurs as a series of digital pulses. Another example of such encoding is
for transmission over local area networks such as an Ethernet, where the
communication is between computer and computer.

This kind of encoding is really of three types and we will look at each of
the types here. Again, there can be many other mechanisms other than
the ones discussed in this unit, but we will look at only the methods that
are used in data communication applications. These types are unipolar,
polar and bipolar techniques.

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Unipolar Encoding

This is a simple mechanism but is rarely used in practice because of the

inherent problems of the method. As the name implies, there is only one
polarity used in the transmission of the pulses. A positive pulse may be
taken as a I and a zero voltage can be taken as 0, or the other way round
depending on the convention we are using (Figure 7). Unipolar
encoding uses less energy and also has a low cost.

Figure 7: Unipolar encoding

What then are the problems that preclude widespread use of this
technique? The two problems are those of synchronisation and of the
direct current (DC) component in the signal.

In any digital communication system the transmitter and receiver have

to be synchronised or all information may be lost. For example, in
determining when to consider the next bit to have started, a very useful
mechanism is of using signal transition to indicate start of the next bit.
But, if there is a string of bits of the same value, then this method does
not work.

In such a case, we have to rely on the clock of the receiver to determine

when a bit has ended. This has potential problems because sometimes
there can be delays at the transmission end which may stretch the time
of transmission, causing the receiver to wrongly believe that there are
more bits than is actually the case. Moreover, drift in the clock of the
receiver can also lead to difficulties. So, we cannot directly rely on the
transmitter and receiver clocks being accurate enough to achieve
synchronisation. One way out of this is, to send a separate timing pulse
along with the signal on a separate cable, but this increases the cost of
the scheme.

Another problem with unipolar encoding is that the average voltage of

the signal is non-zero. This causes a direct current component to exist in
the signal. This cannot be transmitted through some components of the
circuit, causing difficulties in reception.

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Polar

Unlike unipolar schemes, the polar methods use both a positive as well
as a negative voltage level to represent the bits. So, a positive voltage
may represent a 1 and a negative voltage may represent a 0, or the other
way round. Because both positive and negative voltages are present, the
average voltage is much lower than in the unipolar case, mitigating the
problem of the DC component in the signal. Here, we will look at three
popular polar encoding schemes.

Non-return to Zero (NRZ) is a polar encoding scheme which uses a

positive as well as a negative voltage to represent the bits. A zero
voltage will indicate the absence of any communication at the time.
Here again there are two variants based on level and inversion. In NRZ-
L (for level) encoding, it is the levels themselves that indicate the bits,
for example a positive voltage for a I and a negative voltage for a O. On
the other hand, in NRZ-I (inversion) encoding, an inversion of the
current level indicates a 1, while a continuation of the level indicates a 0.

Regarding synchronisation, NRZ-L is not well placed to handle it if,

there is a string of 0’s or 1‘s in the transmission. But NRZ-I is better off
here as a I is signaled by the inversion of the voltage. So every time a I
occurs, the voltage is inverted and we know the exact start of the bit,
allowing the clock to be synchronised with the transmitter. However,
this advantage does not extend to the case where there is a string of 1’s.
We are still vulnerable to losing synchronisation in such a case.

Figure 8: NRZ -L and NRZ-I encoding

Return to Zero (RZ) is a method that allows for synchronisation after

each bit. This is achieved by going to the zero level midway through
each bit. So a I bit could be represented by the positive to zero transition
and a 0 bit by a negative to zero transition. At each transition to zero, the

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clocks of the transmitter and receiver can be synchronised. Of course,

the price one has to pay for this is a higher bandwidth requirement.

Figure 9: RZ encoding

A third polar method is biphase encoding. While in RZ, the signal goes
to zero midway through each bit, in biphase it goes to the opposite
polarity midway through each bit. These transitions help in
synchronisation, as you may have guessed. Again this has two flavours
called Manchester encoding and Differential Manchester encoding. In
the former, there is a transition at the middle of each bit that achieves
synchronisation. A 0 is represented by a negative to positive transition
while a 1 is represented by the opposite. In the Differential Manchester
method, the transition halfway through the bit is used for
synchronisation as usual, but a further transition at the beginning of the
bit represents the bit itself. There is no transition for a 1 and there is a
transition for a 0, so that a 0 is actually represented by two transitions.

Figure 10: Manchester and differential Manchester encoding

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Bipolar

This encoding method uses three levels, with a zero voltage representing
a 0 and a 1 being represented by positive and negative voltages
respectively. This way the DC component is done away with because,
every I cancel the DC component introduced by the previous 1. This
kind of transmission also ensures that every 1 bit is synchronised. This
simplest bipolar method is called Alternate Mark Inversion (AMI). The
problem with Bipolar AMI is that synchronisation can be lost in a long
string of 0’s.

One way of synchronising O’s is to use the High Density Bipolar 3

(HDB3) method. This changes the pattern after every four consecutive
0’s. The change is to represent the 0 by a positive or negative signal
instead of the zero voltage. How do we prevent this from being wrongly
interpreted as a I? It is done. by using the same voltage level as was used
for the previous 1. As in bipolar encoding, a real 1 bit is represented by
the opposite voltage level every time, there is no possibility of confusing
the 0 with a 1. So we deliberately violate the convention to achieve
synchronisation, a scheme which works because, the violation can be
logically detected and interpreted for synchronisation.

HDB3 changes the pattern of four O’s depending on the number of 1’s
since the last such substitution and the polarity of the last 1. If the
number of 1’s since the last substitution is odd, the pattern is violated at
the fourth O. So if the previous 1 was positive, the 0 is also made
positive to avoid confusion with a 1. If the number of 1’s since the last
substitution is even, the first and fourth zeroes have a pattern violation.

Another method of achieving 0 synchronisation is called 8-Zero

Substitution (B8ZS). Here, a string of 8 zeroes is encoded depending on
the polarity of the previous actual 1 bit that occurred. If the previous 1
was sent as a negative voltage, the zeroes are sent as three O’s followed
by a negative, positive, zero, positive, negative voltage sequence. A
similar but opposite pattern violation is performed for the case where the
last 1 was positive. This way a deliberate pattern violation is used to
achieve synchronisation.

4.0 CONCLUSION

In this unit, you have learnt about data encoding and communication
techniques. I believe by now you should be able to discuss intelligently
about encoding, what it means, why it is readed and the various types of
encoding mechanisms and techniques.

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5.0 SUMMARY

In this unit, you have seen the need for data encoding and seen that there
are four types of data encoding. These arise from the fact that there are 2
source signal types and 2 transmission types. You have seen the
different kind of techniques used for each type of data encoding -analog-
to-analog, analog to digital, digital to analog and digital-to-digital. The
bandwidth needed, noise tolerance, synchronisation methods and other
features of each different technique of encoding have been elaborated
upon.

6.0 TUTOR-MARKED ASSIGNMENT

1) Why is PAM a necessary pre-requisite to PCM? Why can we not

use PCM directly?
2) What would be the minimum sampling interval needed for
reconstructing a signal where the highest frequency is I KHz?
3) Consider a signal where the amplitude varies from +6.4v to -6.4v.
If we want to quantise it into 64 levels, what would be the
quantised values corresponding to signals of -3.6v and +0.88v?
4) What is the difference between the bit rate and the baud rate?
Explain with an example.
5) If our equipment is able to reliably detect differences of voltage
of up to 0.5 v, and the probability is 99.74% that noise will cause
a change in the amplitude of our signal of no more than 0.2 v,
then how many amplitude levels can one have if the peak signal
strength is to vary from between +3v to -3v?
6) If our equipment can reliably detect phase changes of up to 200;
how many phase levels can we use in a PSK system?
7) Given the characteristics (of questions 2 and 3 above) and using
only half the possible combinations for safety, what level of
QAM can be achieved?
8) Which type of encoding is most effective at removing the DC
component in the signal and why?
9) How does return to uro ensure synchronisation irrespective of the
data that is transmitted? What is its disadvantage?
10) How can we reconstruct the correct signal inspire of pattern
violation in bipolar encoding?

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7.0 REFERENCES/FURTHER READINGS

Michael A Gallo and William M Hancock (2002). Computer

Communications and Networking Technologies, Thomson Asia;
Second Reprint.

Behrouz Forouzan (1999). Introduction to Data Communications and

Networking, Tata McGraw-Hill.

Tirothy S. Ramteke (2004). Networks, Second Edition, Pearson

Education: New Delhi.

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UNIT 4 MULTIPLEXING AND SWITCHING

CONTENTS

1.0 Introduction
2.0 Objectives
3.0 Main Content
3.1 Multiplexing
3.1.1 Frequency Division Multiplexing
3.1.2 Time Division Multiplexing
3.2 Digital Subscriber Lines
3.3 ADSL vs. Cable
3.4 Switching
3.4.1 Circuit Switching
3.4.2 Packet Switching
4.0 Conclusion
5.0 Summary
6.0 Tutor-Marked Assignment
7.0 References/Further Readings

1.0 INTRODUCTION

The transmission of data over a network, whether wireless or not,

requires us to solve the problem of being able to send a large amount of
data among different groups of recipients at the same time without the
message of one being mixed up with those of the others. For example,
think of the thousands of radio or television channels that are being
broadcast throughout the world simultaneously, or of the millions of
telephone conversations that are taking place every minute of the day.
This feat is achieved by multiplexing the transmissions in some way. In
this unit, we will look at the different methods of multiplexing that are
commonly used, frequency division multiplexing and time division
multiplexing. Time division multiplexing again can be synchronous or
statistical.

There are some differences in the characteristics of voice and data

communication. Although, finally everything is really data, these
differences dictate the design of the telephone network as well as the
techniques of switching. When one wants to transmit data over a
telephone line, we have to make some changes to be able to get
sufficiently high speeds. We will look at ADSL, a scheme for doing this
at rates that can compete on cost and quality with those offered by cable
television service providers. We will also look at the advantages and
disadvantages of the two methods and of high-speed data access.

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When constructing networks of any size, a fundamental requirement is

that any two nodes of the network should be able to communicate with
each other, for, if they cannot do so, they are not on the same network.
This brings up the issue of how to switch the data stream, that is, to
make sure it reaches its destination and not some other random location
on the network. This unit will, describe the different switching
techniques available to make this possible.

2.0 OBJECTIVES

After going through this unit, you should be able to:

state what multiplexing and switching mean

state how a telephone line can be used for transmitting data using
ADSL
describe the differences between ADSL and cable television for data
access;
describe the different kinds of multiplexing and switching
state the characteristics of Frequency Division Multiplexing
describe the features of Time Division Multiplexing, both
synchronous and statistical
differentiate between the different kinds of switching.

3.0 MAIN CONTENT

3.1 Multiplexing

If, one wanted to send data between a single source and a single
destination, things would be comparatively easy. All it would need is a
single channel between the two nodes, of a capacity sufficient to handle
the rate of transmission based on Nyqist’s theorem and other practical
considerations. Granted that there would be no other claimants for the
resources, there would be no need for sharing and no contention.

The transmission channel would be available to the sole users in the

world at all times, and any frequency which they chose could be theirs.
In a broadcasting case, we could have the single source transmitting at
any time of its choosing and at any agreed upon frequency.

However, things are not so straightforward in the real world. We have a

large number of nodes, each of which may be transmitting or receiving,
from or to possibly different nodes each time. These transmissions could
be happening at the same moment. So, when we need to transmit data on
a large scale, we run into the problem of how to do this simultaneously,

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because, there can be many different sources and the intended recipients
for each source are often different. The transmission resource, that is the
available frequencies, is scarce compared to the large number of users.
So, there will have to share the resource and consequently, the issue of
preventing interference between them will arise.

If, all possible pairs of nodes could be completely connected by

channels(?!), we would still not have a problem. But that is obviously
out of the question, given the very large number of possible source and
destination nodes. There would be over a billion telephones in the world
today, for instance.

This problem is solved by performing what is called multiplexing. It can

be done by sharing the available frequency band or by dividing up the
time between the different transmissions. The former is called
Frequency Division Multiplexing (FDM) while the other scheme is
Time Division Multiplexing (TDM).

Another reason for multiplexing is that it is more economical to transmit

data at a higher rate as the relative cost of the equipment is lower. But at
the same time, most applications do not require the high data rates that
are technologically possible. This is an added inducement to multiplex
the data so that, the effective cost can be brought down further by
sharing across many different, independent transmissions.

In this context, a multiplexer is a device that can accept n different

inputs and send out I single output. This output can be transmitted over a
link or medium to its destination, where to be useful, the original inputs
have to be recovered. This is done by a demultiplexer. We need to
realise that for this kind of scheme to work, the creation of the
composite signal by the multiplexer needs to be such that, the original
component signals can be separated at the receiving end -otherwise we
would end up with just a lot of noise!

When we transmit data over a cable, we are really setting up a different

medium. We can transmit data over different cables at the same
frequency at the same time without interference because the media or
links are different Even in radio transmission, where the medium is
space and hence is a single medium available to all transmissions,
geographical distance can in many cases give rise to different links. A
low power medium wave transmission happening in India can be done
simultaneously with a similar transmission in Europe without
interference or the need for any special precautions. However,
throughout the rest of the unit, when we talk of multiplexing, we are
referring to the simultaneous transmission of data over the same medium
or link.
3.1.1 Frequency Division Multiplexing

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Suppose, it is human voice that has to be transmitted, over a telephone.

This has frequencies that are mostly within the range of 300 Hz to 3400
Hz. We can modulate this on a bearer or carrier channel, such as one at
300 kHz. Another transmission that has to be made can be modulated to
a different frequency, such as, 304 kHz, and yet another transmission
could be made simultaneously at 308 kHz. We are thus, dividing up the
channel from 300 kHz up to 312 kHz into different frequencies for
sending data. This is Frequency Division Multiplexing (FDM) because
all the different transmissions are happening at the same time -it is only
the frequencies that are divided up.

The composite signal to be transmitted over the medium of our choice is

obtained by summing up the different signals to be multiplexed (Figure
1). The transmission is received at the other end, the destination and
there, it has to be separated into its original components, by
demultiplexing. In practice, a scheme like this could result in
interference or cross talk between adjacent channels because the
bandpass filters that are used to constrain the original data between the
agreed upon frequencies (300 to 3400 kHz) are not sharp. To minimise
this, there are guard bands, or unused portions of the spectrum between
every two channels.

Another possible cause of interference could arise because of the fact

that the equipment, such as amplifiers used to increase the strength of
the signal, may not behave linearly over the entire set of frequencies that
we seek to transmit. Then, the output can contain frequencies that are
the sum or difference of the frequencies used by the input. This
produces what is called intermodulation noise.

In this kind of division, it should be realised that the actual modulation

technique used is not of consequence. So, one could use analog
modulation (AM) or Frequency Modulation (FM). Also the composite
signal that we have produced could again be modulated over a different
frequency altogether. For example, the three voice channels, that have
been modulated for commercial broadcast radio to produce a spectrum
from 300 kHz to 312 kHz could be modulated onto a 2 GHz satellite
channel for long distance transmission to the other side of the earth. This
second modulation could use a technique different from the first one.
The only thing that needs to be take care of is, that the recovery of the
original signals have to be done in the reverse order, complementing the
method used for producing the composite signal.

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Frequency (Hz) Frequency (Khz)

(a) (b)

Figure I: Frequency division multiplexing

[Sowrce Computer Network by A.S Tanenbaum]

The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) has standardised a

hierarchy of schemes that utilise FDM for the transmission of voice and
video signals. To begin with, a cluster of 12 voice channels, each of 4
kHz is combined to produce a signal of bandwidth 48 kHz that is then,
modulated and transmitted over the 60 to 108 kHz band. This is called a
group.
The next level of the hierarchy is the supergroup, where 5 such groups
are combined to use 240 kHz of bandwidth, occupying from 3]2 to 552
kHz. The next level is the mastergroup that consists of 5 such
supergroups. This uses 1232 kHz from 812 to 2044 kHz. Again, 3 such
supcrgroups form a supermaster group that contains 3.872 MHz from
8.516 to 12.388 MHz. The United States uses a similar hierarchy as
decided by AT&T (the telecommunications company) that is not
entirely identical to the ITU standard.

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Figure 2: Analog hierarchy

We, thus, see that the original signal could find itself subjected to
modulation several times, each of which may be of different kinds,
before it is finally transmitted. This raises the possibility of interference
and noise, but, with the very good equipment available today, this need
not be a matter of concern.

FDM has the disadvantage of not being entirely efficient if the

transmissions that are multiplexed together have periods of silence or no
data. Since, a frequency band is dedicated to each data source, any such
periods are simply not utilised.

3.1.2 Time Division Multiplexing

Another multiplexing scheme is to use the entire bandwidth for each

channel but to divide it into different time slots, as shown below.

Figure 3: Time division multiplexing

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In this case, we have four different transmissions occurring with each

being ¼ of the time slice. The slice should be small enough so that the
slicing is not apparent to the application. So, for a voice transmission a
cycle of l00ms could be sufficient as we would not be able to detect the
fact that there are delays. In that case, each transmission could be
allotted a slice of 25ms.

At the receiving end, the transmission has to be reconstructed by

dividing up the cycle into the different slices, taking into account the
transmission delays. This synchronisation is essential, for
ifthe1ransmission delay is, say 40ms, then the first transmission would
start reaching 40 ms later, and would extend to 65ms. If, we interpreted
it to be from 0 to 25 ms, there would be complete loss of the original
transmission. This interleaving of the signal could be at any level
starting from that of a bit or a byte or bigger.

Synchronous Time Division Multiplexing

In this kind of Time Division Multiplexing (TOM), the simpler situation

is where the time slots are reserved for each transmission, irrespective of
whether it has any data to transmit or not. Therefore, this method can be
inefficient because many time slots may have only silence. But it is a
simpler method to implement because the act or multiplexing and
demultiplexing is easier. This kind of TDM is known as Synchronous
TDM.

Here, we usually transmit digital signals, although the actual

transmission may be digital or analog. In the latter case, the composite
signal has to be converted into analog data by passing it through a
modem. Here, the data rate that the link can support has to at least equal
the sum of the data rates required for each transmission. So, if one has to
transmit four streams of data at 2400 bps each, we would need a link
that can support at least 9600 bps. For each data stream, we would
typically have a small, say I character buffer, that would take care of any
data flow issues from the source.

Although, the transmission has to be synchronous, that is not the reason

the scheme is called Synchronous TDM. It is because of the fact that
each data source is given fixed slots or time slices. We can also support
data sources with differing data rates. This could be done by assigning
fewer slots to slower sources and more slots to the faster ones. Here, a
complete cycle of time slots is called a frame. At the receiving end, the
frame is decomposed into the constituent data streams by sending the
data in each time slot to the appropriate buffer. The sequence of time
slots allotted to a single data source makes up a transmission channel.

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We have already seen that the transmission in TDM must be

synchronous because otherwise, all the data would be garbled and lost.
How is this achieved? Because this unit is concerned with the physical
layer and not the data link layer, we will not concern ourselves with the
problem of flow control or error correction or control. But even at the
physical layer, we have to ensure that each frame is synchronised to
maintain the integrity of the transmission.

One scheme to attain .this is to add an extra bit of data to each frame. In
succeeding frames, this extra bit forms a fixed pattern that is highly
unlikely to occur naturally in the data. The receiver can then use this fact
to synchronise the frames. Suppose each frame has n bits. Starting from
anywhere, the receiver compares bit number 1, n+ 1, 2n+ 1 and so on. If
the fixed data pattern is found, the frames are synchronised. Otherwise,
the receiver commences to check bit number 2, n+2, 2n+2, ...until it can
determine whether the frames are in synchronization or otherwise. This
continues till, it is able to synchronise the frames and can then start
receiving the data from the various channels.

Even after this, it is important to continue to monitor the fixed pattern to

make sure that the synchronisation remains intact. If it is lost, the routine
of re-establishing it needs to be repeated as before.

The second problem in synchronising the transmission is the fact that

there can be some variations between the different clock pulses from the
different input streams. To take care of this, we can use the technique of
pulse stuffing. Here, the multiplexed signal is of a rate that is a bit
higher than that of the sum of the individual inputs. The input data is
stuffed with extra pulses as appropriate by the multiplexer at fixed
locations in the frame. This is needed so that the demultiplexer at the
other, receiving, end can identify and remove these extra pulses. All the
input data streams are thus synchronised with the single local,
multiplexer clock.

Statistical Time Division Multiplexing

We have seen that synchronous TDM can be quite wasteful. For

example, in a voice transmission, much of the bandwidth can be wasted
because there are typically many periods of silence in a human
conversation. Another example, could be, that of a time sharing system
where many terminals are connected to a computer through the network.
Here too, many of the time slots will not be used because there is no
activity at the terminal. In spite of being comparatively simpler,
synchronous TDM is therefore, often not an attractive option.

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To take care of this problem, we can use statistical TDM. This is a

method where there are more devices than the number of time slots
available. Each input data stream has a buffer associated with it. The
multiplexer looks at the buffer of each device that provides the input
data and checks to see if it has enough to fill a frame. If, there are
enough, the multiplexer sends the frame. Otherwise, it goes to the next
device in line and checks its input buffer. This cycle is continued
indefinitely. At the receiving end the demultiplexer decomposes the
signal into the different data streams and sends them to the
corresponding output line.

The multiplexer data rate is not higher than that of the sum of all the
input devices connected to it. So statistical, TDM can make do with a
lower transmission rate than needed by synchronous TDM, at the cost of
more complexity. The other way in which this is of benefit is, by the
ability to support higher throughput for the same available data rate of
the multiplexer. This capability is easily realised during the normal,
expected data transmission periods when the amount of data that the
different input devices have available for transmission is, in fact, lower
than the capacity of the multiplexing device. But the same attribute
becomes a disadvantage during peak loads, where all or many of the
devices may have data to transmit for a short time. In such a situation,
the slack that was available to us for more efficient transmission is no
longer present. We will see later how to handle peak load situations in
statistical TOM.

In this kind of scheme it is not known to us which input device will have
data to send at a given time. So we cannot use a round robin positional
scheme that was possible in synchronous TOM. Each frame has to be
accompanied by information that will tell the demultiplexer which input
device the frame belongs to, so that it can be delivered to the appropriate
destination. This is the overhead of statistical TDM, besides increased
complexity of equipment.

If, we are sending input data from only one source at a time, the
structure of a frame would need to have an address field for the source
followed by the data for it. This is really the statistical TDM data frame.
It would form the data part of a larger, enclosing HOLC frame if we are
using HOLC as the transmission protocol. This frame would itself have
various other fields that we will not discuss here.

Such a scheme is also not as efficient as we can make it. This is because
the quantum of data available from the source, in that time slot, may not
be enough to fill the TDM sub frame. So, while it may be an adequate
method if the load is not heavy, we also need to think of a method that
can utilise available resources better.

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The way to do this would be, to have more than one input data source
transmit in a single TDM frame. We would then need to have a more
complex structure for the frame whereby, we would have to specify the
different input devices in the frame followed by the length of the data
field. More sophisticated approaches could be used, in order to optimise
the number of bits, we need to encode all this addressing and data
information.

For peak loads, there is need for some kind of buffering mechanism, so
that, whenever there is excess input from the data sources that the
multiplexer cannot immediately handle, it is stored until it can be sent.
The size of the buffer needed will increase as the transmission capacity
of the multiplexer decreases, as it will become more likely that an input
data stream will not be transmitted immediately. It will also depend on
the average data rate of the input devices taken together. No matter what
the buffer size we choose, there is always a non-uro probability that the
buffer itself will overflow, leading to loss of data. If, the average data
rate of all devices is close to the peak rate, then we are approaching a
situation of synchronous TDM where we are not able to take advantage
of periods of silence that is the basis of statistical TDM.

3.2 Digital Subscriber Lines

Digital Subscriber Lines are an example of multiplexing in action. They

are really telephone lines that can support much higher data rates than
are possible with an ordinary telephone connection. The concept came
up in response to the high data rates of more than 10 Mbps offered by
cable television providers. Compared to those rates, the 56 Kbps
possible over a telephone dial up connection was a miserable offering.

The 56 Kbps rate is really an artificial barrier arising from the fact that
voice telephone line standards limited the bandwidth to about 3.1 KHz
to take advantage of the normal range of the human voice in
conversation. Nyquist’s theorem and the limitations of line quality
ensured that we ended up with that rate. Once the 3.1 KHz limit is
removed, the telephone line can support much higher data speeds.

Out of the several different technical solutions that came about, the
ADSL (Asymmetric DSL) technology has proved to be the most
popular. Asymmetric comes from the fact that the data rates in the two
directions are different. The approach is to divide the 1.1 MHz
bandwidth available over the Cat-3 telephone cables into 256 channels.
Of these channels, 0 is used for normal voice communication. The next
5 channels are not used to ensure separation and non-interference
between data and voice transmissions. The next 2 channels are used for

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upstream and downstream control. The remaining 248 channels are

available for data transmission.

Like in voice circuits, it would have been possible to use half the
channels for communication in each direction. But, statistics show that
most users download much more data than they upload. So usually 32
channels are dedicated to uploading, that is, transferring data from the
users to the provider and the remaining 216 channels are used for
downloading data to the users. This typically translates into 512 Kbps to
1 Mbps download and 64 Kbps to 256 Kbps upload data rates. This
then, is the asymmetric aspect of the DSL line.

A problem with ADSL is that the physics of the local loop is such that,
the speed at which it can be driven depends heavily on the distance
between the subscriber’s premises and the provider’s nearest termination
point. The speed falls sharply with distance and so, distance can become
a limiting factor in being able to offer competitive speed compared to
that of the cable television providers.

However, ADSL is comparatively simple for a service provider to offer,

given an existing telephone network, and does not require much change
to its already available equipment. It necessitates two modifications, one
each, at the subscriber end and at the end office. On the user’s premises,
a Network Interface Device has to be installed that incorporates a filter.
This is called a splitter and it sends the non-voice portion of the signal to
an ADSL modem. The signal from the computer has to be sent to the
ADSL modern at high speed, usually done these days by connecting
them over a USB port.

At the provider’s end office, the signal from the users is recovered and
converted into packets that are then sent to the Internet Service Provider,
which may be the telephone company itself.

3.3 ADSL vs. Cable

At first glance, a comparison between ADSL and cable may seem like a
no contest. Cable television, sent over coaxial cables, has a bandwidth
that is potentially hundreds of times that of the twisted pair Cat-3 cable
used for telephone connections. But, as we go along, it turns out that
there are considerations in favour of both sides.

First, there are specific assurances regarding bandwidth that we get from
telephone companies who provide ADSL connectivity. An ADSL link is
a dedicated connection that is always available to the user, unlike
television cable that is shared by scores or even hundreds of subscribers
in the immediate neighbourhood. So the kind of speeds that we can get

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over cable can vary from one moment to the next, depending on the
number of users that are working at the time.

There are security risks associated with the fact that cable is shared.
Potentially other users can always tap in and read (even change) what
you are sending or receiving. The problem does not exist on ADSL,
because, each channel is separate and dedicated to the specific user.
Though, cable traffic is usually encrypted by the provider, this situation
is worse than ADSL where other users just do not get your traffic at all.
Also because the channel is dedicated to you, the total number of users
does not have any effect on your access speeds as there is no contention
with other users.

3.4 Switching

There are many potential sources of data in the world and likewise,
many potential recipients. Just think of the number of people who may
like to reach one another over the telephone. How can one ensure that
every data source is able to connect to the recipient? Clearly one cannot
have a physical link between every pair of devices that might want to
communicate! Therefore, we need a mechanism, to be able to connect
together devices that, need to transfer data between them. This is the
problem of switching.

There are two basic approaches to switching. In circuit switching, we

create a circuit or link between devices, for the duration of time for
which they wish to communicate. This requires a mechanism for, the
initiating device to choose the device that it wants to send data to. All
devices must also have an identifying, unique address that can be used
to set up the circuit. Then, the transmission occurs, and when it is over,
the circuit is dismantled so that the same physical resources can be used
for another transmission.

The packet switching approach can be used when we are using

datagrams or packets to transmit data over the channel. Each datagram is
a self-contained unit that includes within itself the needed addressing
information. The datagrarns can arrive at the destination by any route
and may not come in sequence.

3.4.1 Circuit Switching

As mentioned already, in circuit switching, we create a link or circuit

between the devices that need to communicate, for the duration of the
transmission only. It entails setting up the circuit, doing the actual
transmission that can be simplex, half duplex or full duplex, and then
dismantling the circuit for use by another pair of devices. An example is

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shown in the Figure 4 where there are 7 devices. These are divided into
two groups of 3 on the left and 4 on the right. To ensure complete
connectivity between them at all times, we would need 12 physical
links. But, if connectivity is not required at all times, we can achieve
connectivity between any of the devices by grouping them together and
using switches to achieve temporary links.

For example, we can have 7 links that connect the devices A, Band C on
the left to the switch. The other devices D, E, F and G on the right are
also connected to the same switch. The switch can connect any two
devices together using only these seven links as desired.

The capacity of the switch is determined by the number of circuits that it

can support at any given time. In the above example, we have seen a
switch with 1 input and 1 output. If devices C and E are communicating
with each other, the others cannot communicate at the same time,
although, there are available links from them to the switch. A circuit
switch is really a device that has n inputs and m outputs (n need not be
equal to m).

There are two main approaches to circuit switching, called space

division or time division switches. Space division switches are so called
because the possible circuit paths are separated from one another in
space. The old, and now obsolete, crossbar telephone exchanges are an
example of space division switching. The technique can be used for both
digital or analog systems. There were other designs of such switching
but the only one that went into large scale use was the crossbar. Because
of the way it is constructed, such switching does not have any delays.
Once the path is established, transmission occurs continuously at the
rate that the channel can support.

In essence, a crossbar connects p inputs to q outputs. Each such

connection is actually performed by connecting the input to the output

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using some switching technology such as, a transistor based electronic

switch or an electromechanical relay. This requires a large number of
possible connections, called cross points. For a 10,000 line telephone
exchange, it would mean that, each of the 10,000 possible inputs be able
to connect to any of the 10,000 possible outputs, requiring a total of
100,000,000 crosspoints. As this is clearly impractical, the pure crossbar
design is not usable on a commercial scale. Moreover, there are inherent
inefficiencies in this design as statistically, only a small fraction of these
crosspoints are ever in use simultaneously.

The way to get around this limitation is, to split the switch into different
stages. If we consider a 36 line exchange where each of36 inputs needs
to be connected to 36 outputs, we can do so in, say, 3 stages. The first
stage could have 3 switches, each with 12 inputs and 2 outputs to the
two second stage switches. These intermediate switches could each have
3 inputs from the 3 first stage switches and 3 outputs to the 3 third stage
switches. The last stage of the switches would then have 2 inputs from
the 2 second stage switches and 12 outputs, each to 12 of the 36 devices.
It is thus, possible for each of the 36 inputs to connect to each of the 36
outputs as required, using only 72 + 18 + 72 = 162 crosspoints, instead
of the 1296 crosspoints that would have been required without the
multistage design. The following Figure 5 shows the multistage switch.

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If, we use a single stage switch, we will always be able to connect each
device to any other device that is not already busy. This is because all
the paths are independent and do not overlap. What this means is that,
we will never be starved of circuits and will never suffer the problem of
blocking. For multistage switching, the reduction in the number of
crosspoints required comes at the cost of possible blocking. This
happens when there is no available path from a device, to another free
device, that we desire to connect to. In the Figure 5, if we have a switch
in the first stage that is already serving 2 input devices, then there are no
free outputs from that stage. We cannot therefore service more than 2
input devices connected to one switch at a time and the 3M device
would not be able to connect anywhere, getting a busy signal.

It is possible to minimise the possibility of blocking by using stochastic

analysis to find the least number of independent paths that we should
provide for. However, we will not go into such an analysis in this unit.
But, we can see that the limiting factor in the Figure 5 is the middle
stage where there are only 3 inputs and 2 outputs. This is the point at
which congestion is most likely to occur. You too may have experienced
blocking when trying to make a telephone call and found that you got an
exchange busy tone, indicating that it was not the number you called but
the exchange (switch) itself that was congested. Such a problem is, most
likely to occur during periods of heavy activity such as at midnight on a
new year’s day, when many people might be trying to call one another
to exchange greetings.

Another advantage of multistage switching is that, there are many paths

that can be used to connect the input and output devices. So, in the
above case, if there is a failure in one of the connections in the first stage
switch, two input devices can still connect to it. In the case of single
stage switching, that would have meant that we could not set up a circuit
between those devices.

Let us, now look at another method of switching that uses time slots
rather than spatial separation. You have already seen how synchronous
TDM involves transmission between input and output devices using
fixed time slots dedicated to each channel. But, that is not switching
because the input-output device combinations are fixed. So, if we have
three devices A, B and C transmitting and three devices D, E and F that
are receiving the respective transmissions, there will be no way to
change the circuit path so that A can transmit to E or F.

To achieve switching, we use a device called a Time Slot Interchange

(TSI). The principle of such a device is simple. Based on the desired
paths that we want to set up, the TSI changes the input ordering in the
data streams. So, if the demultiplexer is sending the outputs to D, E and

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F in order, and if we want that A send data to E instead of F, and that B

send data to F rather than E, then the TSI will change the input ordering
of the time slots from A, B, C to C, A, B. The demultiplexer will not be
aware of this and will continue to send the output the same way as
before. The result will be, that our desired switching will be
accomplished. However, unlike space division switching, our output
will be subject to delays because we might have to wait for the input
from the right device before it can be transmitted. This is unlike space
division switching where the data can be sent in a steady stream.

How does the TSI work? It consists of a control unit that does the actual
reordering of the input. For this, it has to first, buffer the input it gets, in
the order it gets it. This would be stored in some kind of volatile
memory. The control unit then sends out the data from the buffer in the
order in which it is desired. Usually the size of each buffer would be that
of the data that the input generates in one time slice.

We do not have to confine ourselves to a single type of switch. There

can be switches that are based on a combination of both kinds of
switching. For example, we could have a multistage switch where, some
of the stages are space division switches whiles others are time division
switches. With such an approach, we can try to optimise the design by
reducing the need for crosspoints while keeping the delays in the whole
system to a minimum. For example, we could have a TST three stage
switch where the first and last stages use time division switching while
the middle stage uses crosspomts.

Circuit switching is useful for voice based communication because of

the characteristics of the data transfer. Although, a voice conversation
tends to have periods of silence in between, those periods are usually
brief. The rest of the time there is data available for transmission.
Secondly, in such communication, we cannot tolerate delays of more
than about 100 ms as that becomes perceptible to the human ear and is
quite annoying to the speaker and listener.

Again, because it is human beings that are present at both ends, the rate
at which data is generated at both ends is similar, even if one person
talks a bit faster than the other! Also, the other human can usually
understand what is being said even if he cannot at the same rate. And if
really required, one can communicate to the other to speak slower or
louder. But, when we are dealing with data generating devices, there can
always be a mismatch between the rate at which one device generates
data and at which the other device can assimilate it. Moreover, there can
be long periods when there is no data generated at all for transmission.
In such a situation, circuit switching will not be a suitable method and
we have to look at something that takes care of the characteristics of
data communication between devices.

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3.4.2 Packet Switching

Packet switching Figure 6 is a method of addressing these problems of

circuit switching. It will be further elaborated in the Block 3. It is based
on the concept of data packets, called datagrams. These are self
contained units that include the address of the destination, the actual
data and other control information. It takes care of the sporadic nature of
data communication where transmissions tend to occur in bursts. So, we
do not waste transmission capacity by keeping circuits connected but,
idle while there are periods of silence. Even if we multiplex the channel,
we cannot cater to a situation where all or most of the devices are silent,
leading to underutilisation of the capacity. The concept is so interesting
that it is worth devoting few words to it.

Whenever a user wants to sends a packet to another user, s/he transmit

to the nearest router either on its own LAN or over a point-to-point link
to the caviar. The packet is stored for verification and then transmitted
further to the next router along in way until it reaches for fixed
destination machine. This mechanism is called packet switching.

Some of the other limitations of circuit switching for sending data are:

It is not possible to prioritise a transmission. In a circuit

switching mechanism, all the data will be sent in the order in
which it is generated, irrespective of its importance or urgency.
This is [me for voice transmission, in which we want to hear
things in the sequence in which they are spoken at the other end,
but this does not work for data where, some packets may be more
important than others and the order of delivery does not have to
be sequential.

A circuit, once set up, defines the route that will be taken by the
data until it is dismantled and set up again. Sometimes, that
circuit may have been set up via a less advantageous set of links
because that was the best route available at the time it was set up
(best could be in terms of channel capacity, delays, line quality or
other parameters). Now, subsequently, even if another, better
route is released by other devices, we cannot change over to this
better route without disconnecting the previous circuit and
forcing the participants to set up the call again.

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Figure 6: Picket switching

A datagram can contain different lengths of data. Besides, it would have

control information such as the address to which it needs to be sent, the
address from which it has originated, its type and priority and so on.
From its source node it is sent to a neighbouring node, depending on its
final destination. The format of the datagram depends on the protocol
that is used and it is the responsibility of each node to route the
datagram onto the next node that would take it to its destination. There
can be several routes possible and each node would make the decision
based on availability, traffic conditions, channel quality and so on.

Although datagram length can vary, long messages would have to be

split into more than one datagram as the network protocol would have a
limit on the maximum size of a datagram. Because each datagram is
routed independently, the different datagrams that make up a message
may arrive out of sequence at the destination, as different routes may
take different times to traverse. In communication protocols it is the
responsibility of the network layer to make sure that routing gets done,
while it is the transport layer that ensures that the message at the
receiving end is in the proper sequence.

Again, the physical link between two nodes can be of any type and is of
no consequence at the higher layers of the communication protocol in
use. That link itself may be multiplexed and may carry several
transmissions simultaneously, for the same or different pairs of source
and destination nodes. Moreover, these transmissions may be happening
in different directions.

This was the datagram approach to packet switching. It is also possible

to look at packet switching in terms of a virtual circuit, which again has
two different approaches that are in current practice.

In a virtual circuit, when the first datagram is sent out, we decide on the
route that will be followed, and subsequent datagrams continue to
follow that route. So, it is like circuit switching to’ a large extent. But, in
circuit switching the link is dedicated to the pair of nodes and there is no

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multiplexing that happens at the level of individual switches. In virtual

circuits there can be multiplexing at the switches as well.

Permanent virtual circuits are dedicated channels set up for

communication between a pre-decided pair of nodes. It is thus, akin to a
leased line where the routing is decided once the virtual circuit is set up.
There is no call set up required because, the link is always available to
the pair of nodes. On the other hand, we can also have switched virtual
circuit where the routing is decided every time a pair of nodes want to
communicate. This is like a dial-up connection where any two pairs of
nodes can communicate by setting up a call that is terminated when the
conversation is over.

Another difference between circuit and virtual circuit switching has to

do with reliability and failure recovery. In circuit switching, if the link
breaks because of a failure in any portion, the call is terminated. It
would have to be established again for the conversation to continue. In
virtual circuits, although the route is decided at the beginning when the
session is set up, in case of failure of any part of the route, an alternate
route will be agreed upon and set up.

Also, in circuit switching there is no possibility of failure due to

congestion after the link is set up. In virtual circuits, congestion can
occur even later because of multiplexing at the switches.

4.0 CONCLUSION

This unit has extensively described the basic concepts behind

multiplexing and switching. You have learnt how a telephone line can
be used for transmitting data using ADSL and also the differences
between ADSL and cable television for data access.

You have also learnt about the characteristics of frequency Division

Multiplexing and the features of Time Division Multiplexing both
synchronous and statistical different kinds of switching.

5.0 SUMMARY

Multiplexing is needed in communication networks because of the

scarcity of bandwidth compared to the large number of users. Frequency
Division and Time Division Multiplexing are the two ways of
multiplexing, of which Time Division Multiplexing can be synchronous
or asynchronous. The asynchronous method is more complex but more
efficient for data transmission.

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ADSL is a means of utilising sing the existing capacity of the local loop
in the telephone system for providing subscribers with high speed data
access. Such access is also provided by companies over the cable
television network. ADSL is more secure and predictable in terms of
service quality, while cable does not have the limitations of distance
from the end office that ADSL has.

Switching is necessary to connect two nodes or devices over the

network that intends to communicate for a limited duration. Circuit
switching is more suitable for voice communication, and can be done
using space division, time division or a combination of both kinds of
switches. Multistage switching is needed to optimise the number of
crosspoints needed. Packet switching is used for data transmission and
allows for prioritising of data packets, alternate routing as needed and is
also more efficient for the bursty traffic pattern of data communication.
Datagrams are self contained packets of data that are routed by the
intermediate nodes of the network. Switched or permanent virtual
circuits can also be utilised, where the route is established at the
beginning of the session, but can be altered without disrupting the
channel in case of failure of any part of the route.

6.0 TUTOR-MARKED ASSIGNMENT

1) What is the problem in offering high speed ADSL connection to

all subscribers that have a telephone?
2) Which method is more efficient in terms of capacity utilisation?
3) Do you think voice transmission could be done using packet
switching?
4) What sort of problems could arise in trying to completely connect
all data transmission devices in the world?
5) What are some of the requirements for a multiplexed signal to be
useful?
6) Is multiplexing needed for transmissions over different links?
7) What are the problems that can occur in Frequency Division
Multiplexing?
8) What is the method that FDM uses to mix signals that can be
recovered later?
9) List the considerations that make FDM useful and possible.
10) What are the considerations in choosing the length of the time
slice for Time Division Multiplexing?
11) Why must the multiplexer and demultiplexer be synchronised?
Why then is synchronous TDM so called?
12) What are the problems in synchronising the transmission and
how can they be taken care of?

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13) What are the inefficiencies inherent in synchronous Time

Division Multiplexing and how does statistical TDM seek to
reduce them?
14) What price do we have to)my for increased efficiency in
statistical TDM?
15) What would happen if the load from the input devices exceeds
the capacity of the multiplexer?
16) How does ADSL enable high speed data access although voice
lines are so slow?
17) Why is ADSL called asymmetric and why is it not kept
symmetric?
18) How can a cable provider improve quality of service after the
number of users becomes larger?
19) Why is ADSL more secure than cable for data communication?
20) Why is switching necessary?
21) What is circuit switching?
22) What is packet switching? How does it differ from circuit
switching?
23) What is meant by multistage switching? Is the capacity of such a
switch limited?
24) List five important features of space division switching.
25) What are the characteristics of time division switching?
26) How can we combine space and time division switching? What
are the advantages of such an approach?
27) Why is circuit switching suitable for voice transmission?
28) What are the features needed for a switching mechanism that
transmits data?
29) What is a virtual circuit? How does it differ from circuit
switching?
30) What are datagrams and how can they be used to transmit data?

7.0 REFERENCES/FURTHER READINGS

Andrew .S. Tannenbaum, Computer Networks, PHI, New Delhi.

William Stalling, Data and Computer Communication. PHI, New Delhi.

Behrouz Forouzan, (1999). Introduction to Data Communications and

Networking Tala McGraw-Hill, New Delhi.

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MODULE 2 MEDIA ACCESS CONTROL AND DATA

LINK LAYER

Unit 1 Data Link Layer Fundamentals

Unit 2 Retransmission Strategies
Unit 3 Contention-Based Media Access Protocols
Unit 4 Wireless LAN and Datalink Layer Switching

UNIT 1 DATA LINK LAYER FUNDAMENTALS

CONTENTS

1.0 Introduction
2.0 Objectives
3.0 Main Content
3.1 Framing
3.2 Basics of Error Detection
3.3 Forward Error Correction
3.4 Cyclic Redundancy Check Codes for Error Detection
3.5 Flow Control
4.0 Conclusion
5.0 Summary
6.0 Tutor-Marked Assignment
7.0 References/Further Readings

1.0 INTRODUCTION

Data Link Layer (DLL) is the second layer of the OSI model which
takes services from the Physical layer and provides services to the
network layer. DLL transfers the data from a host to a node or a node to
another node.

The main task of the data link layer is to take a raw data from
transmission facility and transform it into a line that appears free of
transmission errors to the network layer. Data packets are encoded and
decoded into bits. These are called frames. The Functions of the Data
Link Layer are Framing, Frame synchronisation, Error Handling Flow
Regulation, Addressing and Access Control. The data link layer is
divided into two sublayers: The Media Access Control (MAC) layer and
the Logical Link Control (LLC) layer. The MAC sublayer controls how
a computer on the network gains access to the link resources and grants
permission to transmit it. The LLC layer controls frame synchronisation,
flow control and error checking.

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Frame is a data structure used in transmissions at DLL consisting of a

header and a trailer bracketing a data frame. Packets are the fundamental
unit of information transport in all modem computer networks, and
increasingly, in other communication networks as well these are
converted to frame at DLL. The destination host not receiving the data
bits as transmitted by the source host is termed as error in data. The
error needs to be detected or corrected, as the data on the network must
be error free and reliable which is one of the key features of the DLL.
There are various methods used for detection and correction of these
errors viz.: FEC (Forward Error Correction) and CRC (Cyclic
Redundancy Check). To transmit data from a source to a destination
node, anode in a network should be uniquely identified. This
identification is known as the address of the node. Access control is
related to addressing the problem of “Which channel or node on a LAN
or WAN would transmit data?” The data link layer also deals with the
problem of difference in the speed of transmission of data by the sender
and receiver. Very often the speed of the receiver is slower than the
speed of the sender. To overcome the same, the DLL has many flow
control mechanism as part of its functionality.

2.0 OBJECTIVES

After going through this unit, you should be able to understand:

the functionality of the Data Link Layer

the concept of framing and how framing is done
the types of errors that can be generated in frames during
transmission
error in a data frame methods
for detecting errors methods
for correcting errors
forwarding the error correction method for error correction
following the CRC method for error detection
the meaning of flow control
the methods for Managing Flow Control and error control.

3.0 MAIN CONTENT

3.1 Framing

As you already know, the physical layer deals with raw transmission of
data in the form of bits and gives services to the data link layer. The data
link layer provides services to the network layer as shown in the Figure
1:

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Figure 1: Data link layer providing services to network layer

The raw data coming from the Physical layer is converted into frames
for forwarding to the network layer. This is done to ensure that the
transmission of data is error free. Error detection and correction (if
required) is done by the Data link layer, which is discussed in the
following sections. The structure of the frame is shown in Figure 2.

Converting the bit stream into frames is a tedious process. The

beginning and end of each frame should be explicitly marked. The
easiest way to do so is to insert some time gap between frames.

Figure 2: Frame format

But, it is difficult to keep track of counts on timing to mark the start and
end time of each frame. So to overcome the same, we will discuss the
following methods for framing.

Character Count
Character Patterns
Bit Patterns
Framing by Illegal code (code violation)

Character Count

The first framing method, Character count, uses a header field to specify
the number of characters in the frame. The Data Link Layer at the
destination checks the header field to know the size of the frame and
hence, the end of frame. The process is shown in Figure 3 for a four-
frame of size 4,5,5 and 9 respectively.

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----FRAM 1---- ----FRAME 2--- ---FRAME 3--- -----FRAME 4

6 1 2 3 5 4 5 6 7 5 8 9 1 2 9 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0

Figure 3: Character count

However, problems may arise due to changes in character count value

during transmission. For example, in the first frame if the character
counts 4 changes to 6, the destination will receive data out of
synchronisation and hence, it will not be able to identify the start of the
next frame. This example is shown in Figure. 4. Even, after a request
from the destination to the source for retransmission comes, it does not
solve the problem because the destination does not know from where to
start retransmission.

-------FRAM 1---- -----FRAME 2

6 1 2 3 5 4 5 6 7 5 8 9 1 2 9 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0

ERROR-----DATA Received Out of Order -------------------------------

Figure 4: Problem in character count

Character Patterns

The 3econd framing method, Character stuffing, solves the problem of

out of synchronisation. Here, each frame starts with special character set
e.g., a special ASCII character sequence.

The frame after adding the start sequence and the end sequence is shown
in Figure 5.

Begin each frame with DLE STX.

End each frame with DLE ETX.

DLE stands for Data Link Escape

STX stands for Start of Text

ETX stands for End of Text

DLE STX ………………………….. DLE ETX

Figure 5: Character patterns (Character stuffing)

If a OLE ETX occurs in the middle of the data and interferes with the
data during framing then, insert an ASCII OLE character just before

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DLE character in the data. The Receiver interprets the single DLE as an
escape indicating that the next character is a control character.

If two OLE’s appear in succession at the receiver’s end, the first is

discarded and the second is regarded as data. Thus, framing OLE STX
or OLE ETX is distinguished by whether OLE is present once or twice.

Figure(c): After destuffing

A problem with character stuffing is that not all bit streams are character
oriented (e.g., Unicode is a 16-bit code). Hence, for arbitrary sized
characters the process of character stuffing becomes more complex. So
next we will discuss a new method known as the bit stuffing, which
solves the problem of arbitrary sized character.

Bit Patterns

This method is similar to the one discussed above, except that, the
method of bit stuffing allows insertion of bits instead of the entire
character (8 bits). Bit pattern framing uses a particular sequence of bits
called a flag for framing. The flag is set as the start and the end of the
frame.

Use of bit patterns is to keep the sequence of data in the same order.

Flag = 0 111111 0 (begins and ends frame.)

In this case the transmitter automatically inserts a 0 after 5 consecutive

1’s in the data. This is called Bit stuffing. The receiver discards these
stuffed O’s as soon as it encounters 5 consecutive 1’s in the received
data as shown with the help (If an example described in Figure 7 (a), (b)
and (c).

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11111111110010011

Figure 7(1): Original’ data ready to be senl

01111110111110111110001001101111110

Figure 7(b): Data after adding Flag and stuffing

11111111110010011

Figure 7(c): Data after destuffing

Framing by Illegal Code (Code violation)

A fourth method is based on any redundancy in the coding scheme. In

this method, we simply identify an illegal bit pattern, and use it as a
beginning or end marker, i.e., certain physical layers use a line code for
timing reasons.

For example: Manchester Encoding

1-It can be coded into two parts i.e., high to low =10

0 -It can be coded into two parts i.e., low to high =01

Codes of all low (000) or all high (111) aren’t used for the data and
therefore, can be used for framing.

SELF EXERCISE ASSIGNMENT

1) Name different framing methods.

2) Write the bit sequence after bit stuffing for the data stream
110001111111100001111100.
3) Why bit stuffing is advantageous over character stuffing?

3.2 Basics of Error Detection

The Network should ensure complete and accurate delivery of data from
the source node to destination node. But many times data gets corrupted
during transmission. As already discussed in the previous block, many
factors can corrupt or alter the data that leads to an error. A reliable
system should have methods to detect and correct the errors. Firstly, we
will discuss what the error could be then, in the later section we will
discuss the process of detecting and correcting them.

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Types of Error

Several types of error may occur during transmission over the network:

1-bit error
burst error
lost message (frame)

1-bit error: 1-bit error/Single bit error means that only one bit is
changed in the data during transmission from the source10 the
destination node i.e., either 0 is changed to 1 or 1 is changed to 0 as
shown in Figure 8.

Figure 8: 1 bit error

This error will not appear generally in case of serial transmission. But it
might appear in case of parallel transmission.

Burst error: Burst error means that 2 or more bits of data are altered
during transmission from the source to the destination node. But, it is
not necessary that error will appear in consecutive bits. Size of burst
error is from the first corrupted bit to the last corrupted bit as shown in
Figure 9.

Figure 9: Burst error

An n-bit burst error is a string of bits inverted during transmission. This

error will hardly occur in case of parallel transmission. But, it is difficult
to deal with all corrupted bits at one instance.

Lost Message (Frame)

The sender has sent the frame but that is not received properly, this is
known as loss of frame during transmission. To deal with this type of

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error, a retransmission of the sent frame is required by the sender. We

will discuss retransmission strategies in the next unit.
Now we will discuss some methods for error detection.

Error Detection

As already discussed in the beginning of this section accurate delivery

of data at the receiver’s site is, one of the important goals of this layer.
This implies that the receivers should get the data that is error free.
However, due to some factors if, the data gets corrupted, we need to
correct it using various techniques. So, we require error detection
methods first to detect the errors in the data before correcting it. Error
detection is an easy process.

For error detection the sender can send every data unit twice and the
receiver will do bit by bit comparison between the two sets of
information. Any alteration found after the comparison will, indicate an
error and a suitable method can be applied to correct the error.

But, sending every data unit twice increases the transmission time as
well as overhead in comparison. Hence, the basic strategy for dealing
with errors is to include groups of bits as additional information in each
transmitted frame, so that, the receiver can detect the presence of errors.
This method is called Redundancy as extra bits appended in each frame
are redundant. At the receiver end these extra bits will be discarded
when the accuracy of data is confirmed.

Redundancy check methods commonly used in data transmission are:

Parity check
CRC
Checksum

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Parity Check

The most common method used for detecting errors when the
number of bits in the data is small, is the use of the parity bit.

A parity bit is an extra binary digit added to the group of data

bits, so that, the total number of one’s in the group is even or odd.

Data bits in each frame is inspected prior to transmission and an

extra bit (the parity bit) is computed and appended to the bit
string to ensure even or odd parity, depending on the protocol
being used.

If odd parity is being used, the receiver expects to receive a block

of data with an odd number of 1’s.

For even parity, the number of I ‘s should be even.

In the example below, even parity is used. The ninth column contains
the parity bit.

010101010
011110011
111100110

Use of parity bits a rather weak mechanism for detecting errors.

A single parity bit can only detect single-bit errors.
Block Sum Check Method
This is an extension to the single parity bit method. This can be
used to detect up to two bit errors in a block of characters.
Each byte in the frame is assigned a parity bit (row parity).
An extra bit is computed for each bit position (column parity).
The resulting set of parity bits for each column is called the block
sum check. Each bit that makes up the character is the modulo-2
sum of all the bits in the corresponding column.

Block Sum Check, example

Sender’s data: 0000100 0010101 0101011

1 0000100
1 0010101
0 0101011
0 0111010

Data after adding parity bits:

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00001000 00101010 01010110 01110100

This method detects single bit errors as well as increases the probability
of finding burst error.

CRC

Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC) is used to detect burst errors

In this method, you would need to treat strings of bits as coefficients of

a polynomial code that uses modulo 2 arithmetic. In modulo 2 arithmetic
there are no carriers for addition and borrows for subtraction.
Polynomial codes treat bit strings as representative of polynomials with
coefficients of 0 and I only.

For example, the bit sequence 100101 is represented by the polynomial

x5 + x2 + 1 (1.x5 +0.x4+0.x3+l.x2+0.x2+1.x0). When the polynomial
method is employed, the sender and the receiver must agree upon a
generator polynomial both the high and low order bits of the generator
must be 1.

In this method the Sender divides frame (data string) by a predetermined

Generator Polynomial and then appends the remainder (called
checksum) onto the frame before starting the process of transmission. At
the receiver end, the receiver divides the received frame by the same
Generator polynomial. If the remainder obtained after the division is
zero, it ensure that data received at the receiver’s end is error free. All
operations are done modulo 2.

An example that explains finding CRC (Cyclic Redundancy Check) will

follow later.

Checksum

In this method the checksum generator divides the given input data into
equal segments of k bits (8 or16). The addition of these segments using
ones complement arithmetic is complimented. This result is known as
the checksum and it is appended with the data stream. This appended
data stream is transmitted across the network on the transmission media.
At the receiver end add all received segments. If the addition of
segments at the receiver end is all 1’s then, the data received is error free
as, complement of the same will be all 0’s. Then the data can be
accepted, otherwise, data can be discarded.

For example:

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Sender’s data 00000010 01010000

00000010
01010000
Sum 01010010

Checksum (Compliment) 10101101

Data with appended checksum: 00000010 01010000 10101101

Receiver’s accept the data as

00000010 01010000 10101101

At receiver’s end
00000010
01010000
10101101
sum 11111111

Complement 00000000

As complement is 0 it indicates that the data received at the receiver’s

end is error free so, it will be accepted by the receiver.

The checksum method detects all errors as it retains all its carries.

Odd number of bits

Most of even number of bits.

3.3 Forward Error Correction

In the previous section we have discussed detection of error that appears
after the transmission of data over the network from sender to receiver.
In this section, we will study how to perform correction of errors.
Forward Error Correction (FEC) is a type of error correction method
which improves on simple error detection schemes by enabling the
receiver to correct errors once they are detected. This reduces the need
for retransmissions of error frames.

Firstly we consider the simple case i.e., correcting single bit error. As
we have discussed earlier that a single bit error can be detected by
adding one additional bit (parity bit! redundant bit). This additional bit
can detect error in any bit stream by differentiating the two condition
error or not error as a bit can have two states only i.e., 0 and 1.

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For correction of detected single bit error two states are not sufficient.
As an error occurs in bit stream indicates that one bit is altered from
either 0 to 1 or 1 to 0. To correct the same, conversion of altered bit is
required. For performing this conversion we must know the location of
bit which is in error. Therefore, for error correction identification of
location of error bit is required. For example, for applying error
correction of single bit error in ASCII character we must find which of 7
bit is altered. For doing this we could have eight different states i.e., no
error, error in bit position 1, error in bit position 2 up to error in bit
position 7. For this we need many redundant bits to represent all eight
states.

Here, 3 bit redundancy code can represent all possible eight states
because 3 bits can represent 8 states (000 to 111). But if an error occurs
in redundancy bit then we need 3 Additional bits added with 7 ASCII
character bits, it covers all possible error locations.

So we can generalise if we have n data bits and r redundancy bits then

total n+r will be the transmittable bits and r bits must be able to
represent at least n+r+ 1 different states, here plus I indicates no error
state. Hence n+r+ 1 states are identifiable by r additional bits and r
additional bits represents 2’ different states.

2r >= n+r+1

For example, in 7 bit ASCII character we need at least 4 redundant bits

as 24>=7+4+ 1.

Hamming code is one such error correcting code.

For the example discussed above for a 7 bit ASCII character and 4
redundant bit, we will have total bits as n+r i.e., 7+4 = 11. These 4
redundant bits can be inserted in 7 bit data stream in position 1,2,4 and 8
(in II bit sequence at 2°,21,22,23) named as rl,r2,r4 and r8 respectively.

In Hamming code each redundant bit is the combination of data bits

where each data bit can be included in more than one combination as
shown below.

rl: 1,3,5,7,9,11
r2: 2,3,6,7,10,11
r3: 4,5,6,7
r8: 8,9,10,11

Now we will find the values of redundant bit rl,r2, r4 and r8 for the data
bit sequence 1010101 as shown in following Figure.

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Assume that during transmission tile number 5 bit is altered from 0 to I,

So at receiver end for error detection and correction new parities will be
calculated as earlier. Error new parity

0101 = 5. It implies 5th bit is the error bit. The binary number obtained
from new parties will indicate the error bit location in the received data
stream. Subsequently that bit can be altered and data can be corrected.

If all the values in the new parity column are 0, we conclude that the
data is error free. In the given example if no error it should be 0000.

3.4 Cyclic Redundancy Check Codes for Error Detection

The most commonly used method for detecting burst error in the data
stream is Cyclic Redundancy Check Method. This method is based on
the use of polynomial codes. Polynomial codes are based on
representing bit strings as polynomials with coefficients as 0 and 1 only.

For example, the bit string 1110011 can be represented by the following
polynomial:

1.x6+1.x5+.1.x4+0.x3+0.x2’+ l.x1 + l.x0

This is equivalent to:

x6 + x5 + x4 + x1 + 1.

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The polynomial is manipulated using modulo 2 arithmetic (which

is equivalent to Exclusive OR or XOR).

Depending on the content of the frame a set of check digits is

computed for each frame that is to be transmitted. Then the
receiver performs the same arithmetic as the sender on the frame
and check the digits. If the result after computation is the same
then the data received is error free.

A different answer after the computation by the receiver indicates

that, some error is present in the data.

The computed check digits are called the frame check sequence
(FCS) or the cyclic redundancy check (CRC).

The CRC method requires that:

The sender and receiver should agree upon a generator

polynomial before the transmission process start.

Both the high and low bits of the generator must be 1.

To compute the checksum for a frame with m bits, the size of the
frame must be longer than the generator polynomial.

Algorithm for Computing the Checksum is as follows as:

Let D(x) be the data and G(x) be the generating polynomial. Let r be the
degree of generator polynomial G(x).

Step 1: Multiple the data D(x)by x’, giving r zeros in the low-
order end of the frame.

Step 2: Divide the result obtained in step I by G(x), using

modul0-2 division.

Step 3: Append the remainder from step 2 to D(x), thus, placing r

tends in the r low-order positions.

The type of generating polynomial is important for finding the types of

error that are detected.

A generator polynomial of R bits will detect:

- all single-bit errors

- all double-bit errors

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- all odd-number of bit errors

- all burst errors < R
- most burst errors >= R

Example:

Data 1011101

Generator Polynomial G(x): x4+x2+1 = 10101

Here the size of the generator polynomial is 5 bit long, so, we will place
5 -1 = 4 O’sin the low order data stream. So the data will be:

Data 10111010000

Now using modul02 division, (for getting data ready to be transmitted),

we will divide the data by the generator polynomial as shown in the
Figure 10.

Division diagram at sender’s site

Figure 10: Cyclic redundancy check

The remainder obtained after the division of 011 1, will be placed on the
low order bits of the data stream. So the Data that is transmitted over the
network by the sender is D(x)= 10111010111

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Now at the receiver’s end, the receiver receives D(x) as data which will
be divided by the generator polynomial as shown in Figure 11.

Division diagram at receiver’s site

Figure 11: Cyclic redundancy check the receiver side

Here the remainder obtained after division is 0000, so it ensure that data
received at the receiver end is error free otherwise, it indicates that the
data has some error in it. In this way the CRC method can detect
whether the data has some error or is error free.

3.5 Flow Control

Another important issue for the data link layer is dealing with the
situation which occurs when the sender transmits frames faster than the
receiver can accept or process them. If the sender is working on a fast
machine and the receiver is working on a slow machine this situation
may occur in the network. In this process of transmission, some of the
frames might be lost as they were not processed by the receiver due to
it’s low speed, while the sender might have through the transmission to

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be completely error free. To prevent this situation during transmission, a

method is introduced called the Flow Control.

Flow control means using some feedback mechanism by which, the

sender can be aware of when to the send next frame, and not at the usual
speed of the sender. If the frame is accepted /processed by the receiver
then only with the sender send the next frame. It may be said that the
speed of the sender and the receiver should be compatible with each
other, so that the receiver will receive or process all frames sent by the
sender as every receiver has a limited block of memory called the buffer,
reserved for storing incoming frames.

There are several methods available for deciding when a sender should
send one frame or the next frame. Flow control ensures that the speed of
sending the frame, by the sender, and the speed of processing the
received frame by the receiver are compatible.

There are two basic strategies for flow control:

1) Stop-and-wait
2) Sliding window.

We shall start with the assumption that the transmission is error free and
that we have an ideal channel.

Slop and Wait

Stop-and-Wait Flow Control (Figure 12) is the simplest form of flow

control. In this method, the receiver indicates its readiness to receive
data for each frame, the message is broken into multiple frames. The
Sender waits for an ACK (acknowledgement) after every frame for a
specified time (called time out). It is sent to ensure that the receiver has
received the frame correctly. It will then send the next frame only after
the ACK has been received.

Operations:

1) Sender: Transmits a single frame at a time.

2) Receiver: Transmits acknowledgement (ACK) as it receives a
frame.
3) Sender receives ACK within time out.
4) Go to step I.

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Figure 12: Stop and Wait

If a frame or ACK is lost during transmission then it has to be

transmitted again by the sender. This retransmission process is known as
ARQ (automatic repeat request). Stop and Wait ARQ is one of the
simplest methods of flow control. It will be further discussed in detail in
the next unit.

The problem with stop and wait is that only one frame can be
transmitted at a time and that often leads to inefficient transmission
channel till we get the acknowledgement the sender can not transmit any
new packet. During this time both the sender and the channel are
unutilised.

To deal with this problem, there is another flow control method i.e.,
sliding window protocol which is discussed below:

Sliding Window Protocol

In this flow control method, the receiver allocates buffer space for n
frames in advance and allows transmission of multiple frames. This
method allows the sender to transmit n frames without an ACK. A k-bit
sequence number is assigned to each frame. The range of sequence
number uses modul0-2 arithmetic. To keep track of the frames that have
been acknowledged, each ACK has a sequence number. The receiver
acknowledges a frame by sending an ACK that includes the Sequence
number of the next expected frame. The sender sends the next n frames
starting with the last received sequence number that has been
transmitted by the receiver (ACK). Hence, a single ACK can
acknowledge multiple frames as shown in the Figure 13.

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The receiver receives frames 1,2 and 3. Once frame 3 arrives ACK4 is
sent to the sender. This ACK4 acknowledge the receipt of frame 1,2 and
3 and informs the sender that the next expected frame is frame 4.
Therefore, the sender can send multiple back-to-back frames, making
efficient use of the channel.

Normal Flow diagram of a sliding window

Figure 13: Normal now diagram of sliding

Sequence number is a field in the frame that is of finite size. If k bits are
reserved for the sequence number, then the values of sequence number
ranges from 0 to 2k–1 (Modulo Arithmetic).

Operation of a Sliding Window

Sending Window

In this mechanism we maintain two types of windows (buffer) sending

window and receiving windows as shown in Figure 14 & 15.

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At any instant, the sender is permitted to send frames with sequence

numbers in a certain range (3-bit sending window) as shown in Figure
14

Figure 14: Sending window in I sliding window

Receiving Window

The receiver maintains a receiving window depending on the sequence

numbers of frames that are accepted as shown in Figure 15.

Figure 15: Receiving window In I sliding window

Functioning of Sliding Window

Flow control is achieved as the receiver can control the size of the
sending window by limiting the size of the sending window. Similarly,
data flow from the sender to the receiver can be limited, and that too can
controls the size of receiving window as explained with the help of an
example in Figure 16.

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Example

Figure 16: Function of a sliding window machine

Two types of errors are possible while transmission from source to

destination takes place

1) Lost frame: Frame (data or control) fails to arrive.

2) Damaged frame: Frame is recognised, but some bits have been
changed.

Two commonly used methods for sliding window are:

1) Go-back-n ARQ
2) Selective-repeat ARQ

Details of these two ARQ requests are discussed in the next unit.

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4.0 CONCLUSION

In this unit we have described the elementary issues of the Data Link
Lagos such as how to divide data streams into frames. You have learnt
the different types of errors that may occur. During the transmission of
frames from the source mode to the destination mode, also detecting and
correcting these errors. You have also learnt about flow control and the
various methods for flow control.

5.0 SUMMARY

This unit introduced the basic fundamental issues related to the Data
Link Layer. The concept of framing and different methods of framing
like Character Count, Character Stuffing, Bit stuffing and Framing by
Illegal code has been focused up on. In the Data Link layer, data flow
and error control is discussed. This error and flow control is required in
the system for reliable delivery of data in the network. For the same,
different types of error, different methods for error detection and
correction are discussed. Among various methods, Block sum check
method detects burst of error with high probability. CRC method is the
one which detects the error with simplicity. Forward Error Correction is
the error correction method that uses the parity concept. For flow
control, stop and wait method tries to ensure that the speed of the sender
and the receivers are matching to an extent. To overcome this sliding
Window protocol is introduced. Sliding window protocol can send many
frames at one instance and that increases the efficiency of transmission
channel. If some error occurs in the data then retransmission of the error
frame is required and it is known as ARQ.

6.0 TUTOR-MARKED ASSIGNMENT

1) Define parity bit? Also define even and odd parity?

2) Name the method that can detect single bit error and burst error.
3) Define checksum.
4) Define Hamming distance.
5) Generate the Hamming code for the following input data 101111
6) Find the CRC for the data polynomial x’+r+X+ I where generator
polynomial is x3+1.
7) How does the sliding window protocol increase the utilisation of
bandwidth?
8) Define ARQ. How does ARQ facilitate the error control process?

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7.0 REFERENCES/FURTHER READINGS

Andrew S. Tanenbaum, Computer Networks, 4th Edition, Prentice Hall

of India, New Delhi.

William Stalling, Data and Computer Communications, 5th Edition,

Pearson Education, New Delhi.

Behrouz A. Forouzan, Data Communications and Networking, 3rd

Edition, Tata McGraw Hill, New Delhi.

Leon Garcia and Widjaja, Communication Networks-Fundamental

Concepts and Key Architectures, 3rd Edition, Tata McGrew Hill,
New Delhi.

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UNIT 2 RETRANSMISSION STRATEGIES

CONTENTS

1.0 Introduction
2.0 Objectives
3.0 Main Content
3.1 Stop & Wait ARQ
3.2 Go-Back-N ARQ
3.3 Selective Repeat ARQ
3.4 Pipelining
3.5 Piggybacking
4.0 Conclusion
5.0 Summary
6.0 Tutor-Marked Assignment
7.0 References/Further Readings

1.0 INTRODUCTION

In the previous unit we discovered that, Data Link Layer is responsible

for ensuring that data is received at the receiver’s end in line and error
free. For the same task it has two important functions to perform that is
Flow control and Error control. Flow and Error control are performed by
the data link protocol. Before starting discussion on methods for flow
and error control, firstly, we will define Flow control and Error control.

Flow control deals with when the sender should send the next frame and
for how long the sender should wait for an acknowledgement. Data link
protocol takes care of the amount of data that a sender can send and that
a receiver can process as, the receiver has its own limitation in terms of
speed for processing the frames. It also sees the compatibility of speed
of both the sender and the receiver.

Error control deals with error detection and correction method that we
have already discussed in the previous unit. If, an error is found in the
frame either due to Joss of frame or due to damage of frame,
retransmission of the same is required by the sender. Retransmission is
required when a sender does not receive a positive acknowledgement in
time, due to a loss of frame or loss of acknowledgement or if, the sender
receives negative acknowledgment from the receiver due to frame not
been error free. This process of retransmission is called ARQ
(Automatic Repeat Request). The set of rules that will determine the
operations for the sender and the receiver are named the ARQ protocol.
This ARQ protocol makes the network reliable, and that is, one of the
important requirements of a network system if, data transmits from one
node to another over the network and ensures that data received at

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receiver’s site is complete and accurate. Here, we will refer to ACK, for
positive acknowledgement (that is receiver has correct data) and NAK
(REJect) to refer to negative acknowledgement (that is frame is received
with some error). In this unit, you will study three commonly used
methods for flow and error control that is Stop & Wait ARQ, GoBack-n
ARQ and Selective Repeat ARQ.

2.0 OBJECTIVES

After going through this unit, you should be able to:

define flow and error control

define IS ARQ
define functionality of data link protocol
define Stop & Wait ARQ method for error and flow control
define GoBack-n ARQ method for error and flow control
perform selective Repeat ARQ method for error and flow control
define pipelining.

3.0 MAIN CONTENT

3.1 Stop & Wait ARQ

This is the simplest method for flow and error control. This protocol is
based on the concept that, the sender will send a frame and wait for its
acknowledgment. Until it receives an acknowledgment, the sender
cannot send the next frame to the receiver. During transmission of frame
over the network an error can appear.

Error can be due to a frame getting damaged/lost during transmission.

Then, the receiver discards that frame by using error detection method.
The sender will wait for acknowledgement of frame sent for a
predetermined time (allotted time). If timeout occurs in the system then,
the same frame is required to be retransmitted. Hence, the sender should
maintain a duplicate copy of the last frame sent, as, in future it can be
required for retransmission. This will facilitate the sender in
retransmitting the lost/damaged frame.

At times the receiver receives the frame correctly, in time and sends the
acknowledgment also, but the acknowledgment gets lost/damaged
during transmission. For the sender it indicates time out and the demand
for retransmission of the same frame appears in the network. If, the
sender sends the last frame again, at the receiver’s site, the frame would
be duplicated. To overcome this problem it, follows a number
mechanism and discards the duplicate frame.

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Another situation when a error can appear in the network system is

when the receiver receives the frame out of order, then it simply discards
that frame and sends no acknowledgement. If, the acknowledgement is
not received by the sender in time then, it assumes that the frame is lost
during transmission, and retransmits it.

For distinguishing both data frame and acknowledgement frame, a

number mechanism is used. For example A data frame 0 is
acknowledged by acknowledgement frame 1, to show that the receiver
has received data frame 0 and is expecting data frame l from the sender.

Both the sender and the receiver both maintain control variable with
volume 0 or 1 to get the status of recently sent or received. The sender
maintains variable S that can hold 0 or 1 depending on recently sent
frame 0 or 1. Similarly the receiver maintains variable R that holds 0 or
1 depending on the next frame expected 0 or 1.

Here, we are considering one directional information flow (Frame) and

other direction control information (ACK) flow. If transmission of
frames leads to an error then, the recovery process of the same demands,
a retransmission strategy to be used that leads to four different possible
outcomes, that are:

Normal Operation
When ACK is lost
When frame is lost
When ACK time out occurs

Normal Operation

If the sender is sending frame 0, then it will wait for ack 1 which will be
transmitted by the receiver with the expectation of the next frame
numbered frame1. As it receives ACK1 in time (allotted time) it will
send frame I. This process will be continuous till complete data
transmission takes place. This will be successful transmission if ack for
all frames sent is received in time. It is shown with the help of Figure.1

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When ACK is lost

Here the sender will receive corrupted ACK1 for frame sent frame O. It
will simply discard corrupted ACK 1 and as the time expires for this
ACK it will retransmit frame O. The receiver has already received frame
0 and is expecting frame1, hence, it will discard duplicate copy of frame
0. In this way the numbering mechanism solves the problem of duplicate
copy of frames. Finally the receiver has only one correct copy of one
frame. This is explained with the help of Figure. 2.

When Frame is lost

If the receiver receives corrupted/damaged frame1, it will simply discard

it and assumes that the frame was lost on the way. And correspondingly,

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the sender will not get ACK0 as frame has not been received by the
receiver. The sender will be in waiting stage for ACK0 till its time out
occurs in the system. As soon as time out occurs in the system, the
sender will retransmit the same frame i.e frame 1 (F1) and the receiver
will send ACKO in reply as shown in Figure. 3.

When ACK time out occurs

In this operation, the receiver is not able to send ACK1 for received
frame0 in time, due to some problem at the receiver’s end or network
communication. The sender retransmits frame0 as ACK1 is not received
in time. Then, the sender retransmits frame0 as ACK1 time expires. At
the receiver end, the receiver discards this frarne0 as the duplicate copy
is expecting frame1 but sends the ACK1 once again corresponding to
the copy received for frame0. At the sender’s site, the duplicate copy of
ACK1 is discarded as the sender has received ACK1 earlier as explained
with the help of Figure 4.

Figure 4: ACK lime out

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These operations indicate the importance of the numbering mechanism

while, transmitting frames over the network. The method above
discussed has low efficiency due to improper use of the communication
channel. So, now, we will discuss the case if flow of data is
bidirectional. In Bidirectional transmission both the sender and the
receiver can send frames as well as acknowledgement. Hence, both will
maintain S and R variables. To have an efficient use of bandwidth the
ACK can be appended with the data frame during transmission. The
process of combining ACK with data is known as Piggybacking. The
concept of piggybacking is explained in a later section. This reduces
transmission overhead and increases the overall efficiency of data
transmission.

The process is shown in Figure.5.

Figure 5: Piggybacking 1

The problem with stop and wait is that only one frame can be
transmitted at a time and this leads to inefficiency of transmission. To
deal with this, we have another error and flow control method that we
will discuss in the next section.

3.2 Go-Back-N ARQ

In this section, we will try to overcome the inefficient transmission that

occurs in Stop & Wait ARQ. In this method, many frames can be
transmitted during the process without waiting for acknowledgement. In
this, we cart send n frames without making the sender wait for
acknowledgements. At the S8I1ie time, the sender will maintain a copy
of each sent frame till acknowledgement reaches it safely. As seen
earlier in the Stop & Wait ARQ where, we used number mechanism,
here also, we will use number method for transmission and receipt of
frames. Each frame will have k bit sequence number that will be added
with the frame. If, the frame can have k bit sequence number then the

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numbers will range between o to 2k-1. For example if k is 2 bit then

numbers will be 0,1,2,3,0,1,2,3,0,

The sender can send 4 frames continuously without waiting for

acknowledgment. But, the receiver will look forward to only one frame
that must be in order. If, the frame received is not in order, it will simply
keep on discarding the frame till, it receives the desired sequence
number frame. The receiver is not bound to send an individual
acknowledgment for all frames received; it can send a cumulative
acknowledgment also. The receiver will send a positive
acknowledgement if, the received frame is the desired sequence number
frame. Otherwise, it will keep on waiting if, the frame received is
corrupted or out of order. As soon as the timer expires for the frame sent
by the sender, the sender will GoBack and retransmit all frames
including the frame for which the timer expired, till, the last sent frame.
Hence, it is named as Go-Back-N ARQ. The process of retransmission
for an error frame is shown in Figure 6.Go-Back- N is used in HDLC
protocol.

Figure 6: Go-Back-N

If, the error rate is high, then, this leads to a lot of wastage of bandwidth
as the sender will retransmit all the frames from, the frame in which
error appears till the last sent. To increase the efficiency of transmission,
when the error rate is high, another protocol called Selective Repeat
ARQ is used which is discussed in the next section.

3.3 Selective Repeat ARQ

.
This method increases the efficiency of the use of bandwidth. In this
method, the receiver has a window with the buffer that can hold multiple
frames sent by the sender. The sender will retransmit only that frame
which has some error and not all the frames as in Go-Back-N ARQ.
Hence, it is named as selective repeat ARQ. Here, the size of the sender
and the receiver window will be same. The receiver will not look
forward only to one frame as in Go-Back-N ARQ but it will look
forward to a continuous range of frames. The receiver also sends NAK
for the frame which had the error and required to be retransmitted by the
sender before the time out event fires. As in the earlier section we

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discussed, each frame will have a sequence number that will be added
with the frame. If, the frame can have k bit sequence number then the
sequence number of frames will range between 0 t0 2k-1. For example, if
k is 2 bit then numbers will be 0,1,2,3,0,1,2,3,0, Size of sender and
receiver window would be 2k/2 i.e 4/2=2 or it can be written as 2k-1. If
the window size is 2 and acknowledgement for frame0 and frame1 both
gets lost during transmission then, after timer expires the sender will
retransmit frame0 though the receiver is expecting frame2 after frame1
was received without any error. Hence, frame0 will be discarded by the
receiver as a duplicate frame. If the receiver window size is more than
two, the receiver will accept duplicate frame0 as a new frame and hence,
the size of window should be 2k/2. The process is shown in Figure. 7.

Figure 7: Selective Repeat

TCP uses Selective repeat ARQ strategy to deal with flow and error
control If, we consider bidirectional transmission i.e., data and
acknowledgement flow from both sender and receiver then, the concept
of Piggybacking can be used in a similar fashion as already discussed in
Stop & Wait ARQ method, in order to better utilize bandwidth.

3.4 Pipelining
Pipelining in the network is one task that starts before the previous one
is completed. We might also say that the number of tasks is buffered in
line, to be processed and this is called pipelining. For example, while
printing, through the printer before one task printing is over we can give
commands for printing second task. Stop & Wait ARQ does not use
pipelining. As in Stop & Wait ARQ the sender cannot send the next
frames till it receives acknowledgement for the frame sent. Here,
Pipelining is used in Go-Back-N ARQ and Selective repeat ARQ as
both methods can send multiple frames without holding the sender for
receiving the acknowledgement for frame sent earlier. This process of
pipe lining improves the efficiel1cy of bandwidth utilisation. Now, we
will explain with the help of Figure 8 how pipelining is used in Go-
Back-N ARQ.

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Figure 8: Pipelining in Go-Bank-N

Here frame0 is received by the receiver and without waiting for

acknowledgment of frame 0 sent at sender site, the sender is allowed to
send frame 1. This process is known as pipelining.

Similarly, selective repeat pipelining is used as shown in Figure 9

below.

Figure 9: Pipelining in selective repeat

In this example we can show how pipelining increases the overall

utilisation of bandwidth. Frame0 and frame1 are sent in continuous
order without making the sender wait for acknowledgment for frame0
first.

3.5 Piggybacking

Piggybacking is the process which appends acknowledgement of frame

with the data frame. Piggybacking process can be used if Sender and
Receiver both have some data to transmit. This will increase the overall
efficiency of transmission. While data is to be transmitted by both
sender and receiver, both will maintain control variable S and R. We
will explain the process of piggybacking when the sender and the
receiver both are transmitting data with the help of Figure 10.

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Sender Receiver

Figure 10: Piggybacking

Here, both the sender and the receiver maintain control variables S and
R. The sender sends frame 0 (F0) with ACK0 appended along with it.
Similarly, the receiver sends Frame 0(FO) with ACK1 appended to it.
This way transmitting both frame and acknowledgement will
concurrently increase optimal efficiency of bandwidth utilisation
because piggybacking will get a free side.

4.0 CONCLUSION

In this unit you have learnt about various protocols for retransmission in
cases where errors occur during transmission like stop and wait ARQ
method, Gob Back – ARQ, Selective repeat ARQ and pipelining.

5.0 SUMMARY

This unit focuses on one prime function of the Data link layer that is
flow and error control for achieving the goal of reliable data
transmission over the network. For flow and error control retransmission
strategies are considered. Flow control specifically talks about the speed
of sending the frame by the sender and processing the received frame by
the receiver. The speed for the sender and the receiver must be
compatible. So, that all frames can be received in order and processed in
time. Error control technique combines two processes error detection
and error correction in the data frame. In Stop & wait ARQ protocol
sender waits for acknowledgment for the last frame sent. After the
acknowledgment is received by the sender then only the next frame can
be sent. In Go-Back-N ARQ frames can be sent continuously without
waiting for the sender to send the acknowledgement. If an error is found
in any frame then frames received after that will be discarded by the
receiver. Retransmission of frames will start from the error frame itself.
In selective repeat Process frames can be sent continuously. But here,
the receiver has a buffer window that can hold the frames received after
the error frame. Hence, retransmission will be only for error frame. This

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increases the efficiency of data transmission on a network. For better

utilisation of bandwidth, piggybacking can be used. Piggybacking
process appends acknowledgement along with the data frame, This will
be efficient for bidirectional communication.

6.0 TUTOR-MARKED ASSIGNMENT

1) Define flow and error control.

2) Explain Go-Back-N ARQ and Selective repeat ARQ are better
methods for retransmission.
3) Give an example where pipelining can be applied.
4) What is the significance of control variables S and R?

7.0 REFERENCES/FURTHER READINGS

Andrew S. Tanenbaum, Computer Networks. 4” Edition, Prentice Hall

of India, New Delhi.

William Stalling, Dala and Computer Communications. 5th Edition,

Prentice Hall of India, New Delhi.

Behrouz A. Forouzan, Dala Communications and Networking. 3”

Edition, Tata McGraw Hill, New Delhi.

Leon Garcia and Widjaja, Communication Network, Fundamental

Concepts and Key Architectures. 3” Edition, Tata McGraw Hill,
New Delhi.

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UNIT 3 CONTENTION-BASED MEDIA ACCESS

PROTOCOLS

CONTENTS

1.0 Introduction
2.0 Objectives
3.0 Main Content
3.1 Advantages of Multiple Access Sharing of Channel
Resources
3.2 Pure ALOHA
3.3 Slotted ALOHA
3.4 Carrier Sense Multiple Access (CSMA)
3.5 CSMA with Collision Detection (CSMA/CD)
3.6 Ethernet Frame Format (IEEE 802.3)
4.0 Conclusion
5.0 Summary
6.0 Tutor-Marked Assignment
7.0 References/Further Readings

1.0 INTRODUCTION

As discussed in first unit of this module the Data Link Layer (DLL) is
divided into two sub layers i.e., the Media Access Control (MAC) layer
and the Logical Link Control (LLC)layer. In a network nodes are
connected to or use a common transmission media. Based on the
connection of nodes, a network can be divided into two categories, that
is, point-to-point link and broadcast link. In this unit, we will discuss,
broadcast link and their protocols. If, we talk about broadcast network
then, a control process for solving the problem of accessing a multi
access channel is required. Many protocols are available for solving the
problem of multi-access channel. These protocols can control an access
on shared link as in broadcast network. It is an important issue to be
taken into consideration that is, how to who gets access to the channel
while, many nodes are in competition as shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1: Shared media

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The protocol which decides who will get access to the channel and who
will go next on the channel belongs to MAC sub-layer of DLL. Channel
allocation is categorized into two, based on the allocation of broadcast
among competeting users that is Static channel allocation problem and
Dynamic Channel allocation problem as shown in Figure 2. In this unit,
we will also discuss whether some access conflict or collision comes in
the network, and how to deal with these conflicts. This is an important
issue for LAN.

Figure 2: Channel allocation technique

Here the transmission of frames can occupy the medium or any arbitrary
time or in slotted time intervals (time is divided into slots). When the
transmission station senses whether the channel is busy or free, this is
called carrier sensing.

2.0 OBJECTIVES

After going through this unit, you should be able to learn:

the need for accessing multi-access channel

common methods for accessing multi-access channel like FDM,
TDM
the need for Dynamic channel allocation method
pure ALOHA method for channel allocation
slotted ALOHA method for channel allocation
carrier sensing method CSMA to improve performance
carrier sensing with collision detection method CSMA/CD
IEEE 802.3 standard and their Different Cabling types
basics of Giga Bit Ethernet.

3.0 MAIN CONTENT

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3.1 Advantages of Multiple Access Sharing of Channel

Resources

MAC sub layer’s primary function is to manage the allocation of one

broadcast channel among N competing users. For the same, many
methods are available such as static, and dynamic allocation method.

In the static channel allocation method, allocating a single channel

among N competing users can be either FDM (Frequency division
multiplexing) or TDM (Time division multiplexing). In FDM the total
bandwidth will be divided into N equal parts for N users. This way,
every user will have their own frequency band so no conflict or collision
will occur among user in the network. But, this is feasible only when the
number of users are small and traffic is also limited. If, the number of
users becomes large this system has face many problems like either one
user is gets one frequency band that is not used at all or the other user
does not get a frequency band for transmission. Hence, it is simple and
efficient for a small number of users. Similarly, in TDM (Time Division
Multiplexing), discussed with first Block every user will get a fixed Nm
time slot.

In the dynamic channel allocation the important issues to be considered

are whether, time is continuous or discrete or whether the station is
carrier sensing large number of stations each with small and bursty
traffic.

Many methods are available for multiple access channel like ALOHA,
CSMA etc. that we will discuss in the following section.

3.2 Pure ALOHA

As we have discussed earlier in the previous unit, if, one node sends a
frame to another node, there can be some error in the frame. For the
same we discussed some retransmission strategies to deal with the error.
But, in case of allocating a single channel among N uncoordinated
competing users, then the probability of collision will be high. Station
accesses the channel and when their frames are ready. This is called
random access. In an ALOHA network one station will work as the
central controller and the other station will be connected to the central
station. If, any of stations want to transmit data among themselves, then,
the station sends the data first to the central station, which broadcast it to
all the stations.

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Figure 3: ALOHA

Here, the medium is shared between the stations. So, if two stations
transmit a frame at overlapping time then, collision will occur in the
system. Here, no station is constrained, any station that has data /frame
to transmit can transmit at any time. Once one station sends a frame
(when it receives its own frame and assumes that the destination has
received it) after 2 times the maximum propagation time. If the sender
station does not receive the its own frame during this time limit then, it
retransmit this frame by using back off algorithm that we will discuss
later on. And if, after a number of repeats if it does receive own pocket
then the station gives up and stops retransmitting the same frame.

Let R be the bit rate of the transmission channel and L be the length of
the frame. Here, we are assuming that the size of frame will be constant
and hence, it will take constant time t= L/R for transmission of each
packet.

As in the case of Pure ALOHA protocol frames can be sent any time so,
the probability of collision will be very high. Hence, to present a frame
from colliding, no other frame should be sent within its transmission
time. We will explain this with the help of the concept of vulnerable
period as shown in Figure 4. Let a frame is that transmitted at time to
and t be the time required for its transmission. If, any other station sends
a frame between to and t0+t then the end of the frame will collide with
that earlier sent frame. Similarly, if any other station transmits a frame
between the time interval t0+t and t0+2t again, it will result in a garbage
frame due to collision with the reference frame. Hence, 2t is the
vulnerable interval for the frame. In case a frame meets with collision
that frame is retransmitted after a random delay.

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Figure 4: Vulnerable period

Hence, for the probability of successful transmission, no additional

frame should be transmitted in the vulnerable interval 2t.

To find the probability of no collision with a reference a frame, we

assume that a number of users are generating new frames according to
Poisons distribution. Let S be the arrival rate of new frames per frame
time. As we find probability of no collision, S will represent the
throughput of the system. Let 0 be the total arrival rate of frames
including retransmission frames (also called load of the system). For
finding the probability of transmission from the new and retransmitted
frame. It is assumed that frames arrival is Poisson distributed with an
average number of arrivals of G frames/frame time. The probability of k
frames transmission in 2t seconds is given by the Poisson distribution as
follows:

The throughput of the system S is equal to total arrival rate 0 times the
probability of successful transmission with no collision

That is S = G * P
S = G * P (zero frame transmission in the vulnerable interval i.e.,
2t seconds) since
P [K frame in vulnerable interval 2t) = (2G)e-2G , K = 0, 1,2,3
K!

Thus
P [K = 0 in 2t] = -, 2G
Hence, S = G * P = G.e-2G
Note that the averages load is O. Hence it is 20 in 2t
S = G * e-2G

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The relationship between S vs. 0 can be shown in Figure 5.

Figure 5; Throughput vs. load graph of pure ALOHA

As G is increasing, S is also increasing for small values of G. At G=1/2,

S attains its peak value i.e., S=1/2e i.e., O.18(approx). After that, it starts
decreasing for increasing values of G. Here, the average number of
successful transmission attempts/frames can be given as GIS = e2G.

An average number of unsuccessful transmission attempts/frame is G/S

– 1 = e2G – 1.

By this, we know that the performance of ALOHA is not good as

unsuccessful transmission are increasing exponentially with load G. So,
we will discuss Slotted ALOHA in the next section to see how
performance can be improved.

3.3 Slotted ALOHA

In this, we can improve the performance by reducing the probability of

collision. In the slotted ALOHA stations are allowed to transmit frames
in slots only. If more than one station transmit in the same slot, it will
lead to collision. This reduces the occurrence of collision in the network
system. Here, every station has to maintain the record of time slot. The
process of transmission will be initiated by any station at the beginning
of the time slot only. Here also, frames are assumed to be of constant
length and with the same transmission time. Here the frame will collide
with the reference frame only if, it arrives in the interval t0-t t0 t0. Hence,
here the vulnerable period is reduced that is to t seconds long.

The throughput of the system S is equal to the total arrival rateG times
the probability of successful transmission with no collision

That is S = G’P
S = G * P (zero frame transmission in t seconds)

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The probability of k frames transmission in t seconds and is given by the

Poisson distribution as follows:

P[k] = (G)k e-G/k!, k = 0,1,2,3

Here average load in the vulnerable interval is G (one frame time)

Hence, the probability of zero frames in t seconds = e-G

S= G’ e-G

Figure 6: Throughput vs. load graph of slotted ALOHA

From the figure we can see that the system is exhibiting its performance,
Maximum throughput that can be achieved with Slotted ALOHA S=l/e=
36 % (Approx.) However, with this performance also we are not able to
utilise the medium in an efficient manner. Due to the high rate of
collision systems the bandwidth is which was designed to implement
random access in LANs. So, we will discuss a new protocol called
CSMA in the next section.

3.4 Carrier Sense Multiple Access (CSMA)

As we have seen in previous section, the Slotted ALOHA maximum

throughput that can be achieved is lie only, though, the stations do not
keep track of what the other station is doing or what’s going on in the
medium. Then also, many frames meet and collide. So in LANs we will
observe the behavior of other station as well and try to reduce the
number of collision to achieve better throughput of the network. To
achieve maximum throughput here, we will try to restrict transmission
that will cause collision by sensing whether the medium has some data
or not. Protocols in which station senses the channel before starting
transmission are in the category of CSMA protocols (also known as
listen before talk protocols).

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CSMA have many variants available that are to be adapted according to

the behaviour of the station that has frames to be transmitted when the
channel is busy or that some transmission is going on. The following are
some versions of CSMA protocols:

1-Persistent CSMA
Non-Persistent CSMA
p-Persistent CSMA

1-Persistent CSMA

In this protocol a station i.e., who wants to transmit some frame will
sense the channel first, if it is found busy than that some transmission is
going on the medium, then, this station will continuously keep sensing
that the channel. And as soon as this station finds that the channel has
become idle it will transmit its frame. But if more than one station is in
waiting state and keeps track of the channel then a collision will occur in
the system because both waiting station will transmit their frames at the
same time. The other possibility of collision can be if the frame has not
reached any other station then, it indicates to the second station that the
channel is free. So the second station also starts its transmission and that
will lead to collision. Thus I-persistent CSMA a greedy protocol as to
capture the channel as soon as it finds it idle. And, hence, it has a high
frequency of collision in the system. In case of collision, the station
senses the channel again after random delay.

Non-Persistent CSMA

To reduce the frequency of the occurrence of collision in the system

then, another version of CSMA that is non-persistent CSMA can be
used. Here, the station who has frames to transmit first sense whether
the channel is busy or free. If the station finds that channel to be free it
simply transmits its frame. Otherwise, it will wait for a random amount
of time and repeat the process after that time span is over. As it does not
continuously senses the channel to be, it is less greedy in comparison of
I-Persistent CSMA. It reduces the probability of the occurrence of
collision as the waiting stations will not transmit their frames at the
same time because the stations are waiting for a random amount of time,
before restarting the process. Random time may be different for different
stations so, the likelihood waiting station will start their transmission at
the same time is reduced. But, it can lead to longer delays than the 1-
Persistent CSMA.

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p-Persistent CSMA

This category of CSMA combines features of the above versions of

CSMA that is 1-persistent CSMA and non-persistent CSMA. This
version is applicable for the slotted channel. The station that has frames
to transmit, senses the channel and if found free then simply transmits
the frame with p probability and with probability l-p it, defers the
process. If the channel is found busy then, the station persists sensing
the channel until it became idle. Here value of p is the controlling
parameter.

After studying the behaviour of throughput vs load for persistent CSMA

it is found that Non-Persistent CSMA has maximum throughput. But we
can using collision detection mechanism improve upon this to achieve
more throughput in the system using collision defection mechanism and
for the same we will discuss CSMA/CD in the next section.

3.5 CSMA with Collision Detection (CSMA/CD)

As before here also any transmission in the system needs to sense the
channel to see whether it is busy or free. The stations ensure that the
transmission will start only when it finds that the channel is idle. In
CSMA/CD the station aborts the process of transmission as soon as they
detect some collision in the system. If two stations sense that the
channel is free at the same time, then, both start transmission process
immediately. And after that, both stations get information that collision
has occurred in the system. Here, after the station detecting the collision,
the system aborts the process of transmission. In this way, time is saved
and utilisation of bandwidth is optimised. This protocol is known as
CSMA/CD and, this scheme is commonly used in LANs. Now, we will
discuss the basic operation of CSMA/CD. Let, t be the maximum
transmission time between two extreme ends of a network system
(LAN). At to station A, at one extreme end of the LAN begins the
process of transmitting a frame FA. This frame reaches the station E
which at another extreme end of the same network system in t
propagation delay away. If no other station in between has started its
frame transmission, it implies that A has captured the channel
successfully. But, in case EF station E starts its frame transmission just
before the arrival of frame from station A frame then, collision will take
place. Station A will get the signal of collision after 2t time. Hence, 2t
time is required to ensure that station A has captured the channel
successfully as shown with the help of Figure 8.

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Figure 8: Collision deleelion

Collision of frames will be detected by looking at the strength of electric

pulse or signal received after collision. After a station detects a collision,
it aborts the transmission process and waits for some random amount of
time and tries the transmission again with the assumption that no other
station has started its transmission in the interval of propagation time.
And hence, in CSMA/CD the channel can be any of the following three
states as it can be shown with the Figure 9.

Transmission of frame is going on.

Idle slot.
Contention period/slot.

Figure 9: Transmission states

In CSMA/CD a station with a frame ready to begin transmission senses

the channel and starts transmission if it finds that the channel is idle.
Otherwise, if it finds it busy, the station can persist and use backoff
algorithm which will be discussed in the next paragraph.

Backoff Algorithm

With the help of backoff algorithm we will see how the randomisation
process occurs as soon as collision detection takes place. Time is
divided into discrete slots with the length of worst case propagation time
(propagation time between two extreme ends of LAN) 2t. After the first
collision in the system, each station waits for 0 or I slot time before

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trying transmission for the next time. If, two stations that collide is
select the same random number then collision will be repeated. After the
second collision, the station will select 0, 1,2 or 3 randomly and wait for
these many number of slots. If, the process of collision will occur
repeatedly, then, the random number interval would be between 0 and
2i-1 for ith collision and this number of slots will be the waiting time for
the station. This algorithm is known as the binary exponential algorithm.

3.6 Ethernet Frame Format (IEEE 802.3)

Ethernet protocol is a MAC sublayer protocol. Ethernet stands for cable

and IEEE 802.3 Ethernet protocol was designed to operate at 10 Mbps.
Here, we will begin discussing the Ethernet with various types of
cabling. With the help of Figure 9, we will try to summarise the cabling
used for baseband 802.3 LANs.

IEEE 802.3 Ethernet accesses the channel using I -persistent CSMA/CD

method in LAN. Now we will discuss MAC frame structure for IEEE
802.3 with the help of Figure 10.

Figure 10: Ethernet Frame Fnrmlt

Each frame has seven fields explained as follows:

Preamble: The first field of 802.3 frame is 7 byte (56 bits) long with a
sequence of alternate 1 and 0 Le., 10101010. This pattern helps the
receiver to synchronise and get the beginning of the frame.

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Starting Delimiter (SD): The second field start delimiter is I byte (8

bit) long. It has pattern 10101011. Again, it is to indicate the beginning
of the frame and ensure that the next field will be a destination address.
Address, here, can be a single address or a group address.

Destination Address (DA): This fie)d is 6 byte (48 bit) long. It contains
the physical address of the receiver.

Source Address (SA): This filed is also 6 byte (48 bit) long. It contains
the physical address of the sender.

Length of Data Field: It is 2 byte (16 bit) long. It indicates the number
of bytes in the information field. The longest allowable value can be
1518 bytes.

Data: This field size will be a minimum of 46 bytes long and a

maximum of 1500 bytes as will be explained later.

Pad: This field size can be 0 to 46 bytes long. This is required if, the
data size is less than 46 bytes as a 802.3 frame must be at least 64 bytes
long.

Frame Checksum (FCS): This field is 4 bytes (32 bit) long. It contains
information about error detection. Here it is CRC-32.

Minimum and Maximum Length of Frame

Minimum frame length = 64 bytes = 512 bits

Maximum frame length= 1518 bytes = 12144 bits

Minimum length or lower limit for frame length is defined for normal
operation of CSMA/CD. This is required so that, the entire frame is not
transmitted completely before its first bit has been received by the
receiver. If, this happens then the probability of the occurrence of
collision will be high (the same has been explained earlier in the
previous section CSMA/CD).

Hence, Ethernet frame must be of64 bytes long. Some of the bytes are
header and trailer parts of the frame. If, we consider 6 bytes destination
address, 6 bytes source address, 2 bytes length and 4 bytes FCS
(6+6+2+4=18) then, the minimum length of data will be 64-18= 46
bytes. If, frame is less than 46 bytes then, padding bits fill up this
difference.

As per 802.3 standard, the frames maximum length or upper limit of

frame is = 1518 bytes (excluding preamble and SD). If we subtract 18
bytes of header and trailer then, the maximum length will be 1500 bytes.

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4.0 CONCLUSION

In this unit you have learnt about the various MAC sub-layer protocols
like pure ALOHA, slotted ALOHA, CSMA and CSMA/CD. The next
unit will introduce you to Wireless LAN and Data Link Layer
Switching.

5.0 SUMMARY

In some networks, if a single channel and many users use that channel,
then, allocation strategy is required for the channel. We have discussed
FDM and TDM allocation method. They are the simplest methods for
allocation. They work efficiently for a small number of user. For a large
number of users the ALOHA protocol is considered. There are two
versions of ALOHA that is Pure ALOHA and Slotted ALOHA. In Pure
ALOHA no slotting was done but the efficiency was poor. In Slotted
ALOHA, slots have been made, so that every frame transmission starts
at the beginning of the slot and throughput is increased by a factor of2.
For avoiding collision and to increase efficiency in sensing the channel,
CSMA is used. Many versions of CSMA are persistent and non-
persistent. In CSMA/CD collision detection process is added so that
process can be aborted just after a collision is detected. Ethernet is a
commonly used protocol for LAN. IEEE 802.3 Ethernet uses 1
persistent CSMA/CD access method.

6.0 TUTOR-MARKED ASSIGNMENT

1) Why is DLL divided into two sub layers? What are the key
functions of those sub layers?
2) How does Slotted ALOHA improve the performance of the
system over Pure ALOHA?
3) How has non-persistent reduced the probability of collision?
4) Explain Back off Algorithm and give one example of where it is
used.

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7.0 REFERENCES/FURTHER READINGS

Andrew S. Tanenbaum, Computer Networks. 4th Edition, Prentice Hall

of India, New Delhi.

William Stalling, Data and Computer Communications. 5th Edition,

Pearson Education, New Delhi.

Behrouz A. Forouzan, Data Communications and Networking. 3”

Edition, Tata McGraw Hill, New Delhi.

Communication Networks- Fundamental Concepts and Key

Architectures. Leon Garcia and Widjaja 3” Edition, Tata
McGraw Hill, New Delhi.

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UNIT 4 WIRELESS LAN AND DATA LINK LAYER

SWITCHING

CONTENTS

1.0 Introduction
2.0 Objectives
3.0 Main Content
3.1 Introduction to Wireless LAN
3.2 Wireless LAN Architecture (IEEE 802.1 I)
3.3 Hidden Station and Exposed Station Problems
3.4 Wireless JAN Protocols: MACA and MACAW 49
3.5 IEEE 802.11 Protocol Stack
3.5.1 The 802.11 Physical Layer
3.5.2 The 802.11 MAC Sub-layer Protocol
3.6 Switching at Data Link Layer
3.6.1 Operation of Bridges in Different LAN
Environment
3.6.2 Transparent Bridges
3.6.3 Spanning Tree Bridges
3.6.4 Source Routing Bridges
4.0 Conclusion
5.0 Summary
6.0 Tutor-Marked Assignment
7.0 References/Further Readings

1.0 INTRODUCTION

The Previous discussion, we had in this block was related to wired

LANs but recently, wireless LANs are taking a dominant position due to
coverage of location difficult to wire, to satisfy the requirement of
mobility and adhoc networking. In a few years from now, we will notice
a broader range of wireless devices accessing the Internet, such as
digital cameras, automobiles, security systems, kitchen appliances.
KUROSE and ROSS [reference] writes that some day wireless devices
that communicate with the Internet may be present everywhere: on
walls, in our cars, in our bedrooms, in our pockets and in our bodies.

In this unit, we cover two broad topics: Wireless LAN, its protocols, its
standard and Data Link Layer Switching. In organisation we need an
interconnection mechanism so that all nodes can talk to each other.
Bridges and switches are used for this purpose. The spanning tree
algorithms are used to build plugs and act as bridges.

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2.0 OBJECTIVES

After going through this unit, you should be able to:

understand what is a wireless LAN

describe the various LAN Protocols
understand the IEEE 802.11 Standard
describe the operation of bridges (transparent, spanning tree and
remote bridges).

3.0 MAIN CONTENT

3.1 Introduction to Wireless LAN

As the number of mobile computing and communication devices grows,

so does the demand to connect them to the outside world, A system of
notebook computers that communicate by radio can be regarded as a
wireless LAN. These LANs have different properties than conventional
LANs and require special MAC sublayer protocols. The 802.11b
standard defines the physical layer and media access sublayer for
wireless local area network.

To understand the concept, we will take a simplistic view that, all radio
transmitters have some fixed range. When a receiver is within a range of
two active transmitters, the resulting signal will generally be garbled and
of no use. It is important to realise that in some wireless LANs, not all
stations are within the range of one another, which leads to a variety of
complications, which we will discuss in the next sections.

Wireless LANs are commonly being used in academic institutions,

companies, hospitals and homes to access the internet and information
from the LAN server while on roaming.

3.2 Wireless LAN Architecture (IEEE 802.11)

The wireless LAN is based on a cellular architecture where the system is

subdivided into cells as shown in Figure 1. Each cell (called basic
service set or BSS, in the 802.11) is controlled by a base station (called
access point or AP). Wireless LAN may be formed by a single cell, with
a single access point (it can also work within an AP), most stations will
be formed by several cells, where the APs are connected through some
kind of backbone (called distribution system or DS). This backbone may
be the Ethernet and in some cases, it can be the wireless system. The DS
appears to upper-level protocols (for example, IP) as a single 802
network, in much the same way as a bridge in wire 802.3. The Ethernet
network appears as a single 802 network to upper-layer protocols.

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Stations can also group themselves together to form an ad hoc network:

a network with no central control and with no connections to the
“outside world.” Here, the network is formed “on the fly,” simply
because, there happens to be mobile devices that have found themselves
in proximity to each other, that have a need to communicate, and that
find no preexisting network infrastructure. An ad hoc network might be
formed when people with laptops meet together (for example, in a
conference room, a train, or a car) and want to exchange data in the
absence of a centralised AP. There has been tremendous interest in ad
hoc networking, as communications between devices continue to
proliferate.

3.3 Hidden Station and Exposed Station Problems

There are two fundamental problems associated with a wireless network.

Assume that there are four nodes A, B, C and D. Band C are in the radio
range of each other. Similarly A and B are in the radio range of each
other. But C is not in the radio range of A.

Now, suppose that there is a transmission going on between A and B

(Figure 2 (a). If C also wants to transmit to B, first, it will sense the
medium but will not listen to A’s transmission to B because, A is
outside its range. Thus, C will create garbage for the frame coming from
A if, it transmits to B. This is called the hidden station problem. The
problem of a station not being able to detect another node because that
node is too far away is called hidden station problem.

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Now, let us consider the reverse situation called the exposed station
problem. (Figure 2 (b).)

(a) Hidden Station Problem (b) Exposed Station Problem

Figure 2: Hidden and exposed station problem

In this case, B is transmitting to A. Both are within radio range of each

other. Now C wants to transmit to D. As usual, it senses the channel and
hears an ongoing transmission and falsely concludes that it cannot
transmit to D. But the fact is transmission between C and D would not
have caused any problems because, the intended receivers C and D are
in a different range. This is called exposed station problem.

3.4 WIRELESS LAN PROTOCOLS: MACA AND

MACA W

In this section, we, will describe two wireless LAN protocols: MACA
and MACA W. MACA is the oldest protocol of the two. MACA was
proposed as an alternative to CSMA Protocol which has certain
drawbacks:

First, it senses the channel to see if the channel is free, it transmits a

packet, otherwise it waits for a random amount of time.

Hidden Station Problems leading to frequent collision.

Exposed terminal problems leading to worse bandwidth

utilisation. MACA eliminates the hidden and exposed station
problems using RTS (Repeat to Send) and CTS (Clear to Send)
handshake mechanism, which is explained below through a
Figure 3. RTS and CTS packets carry the expected duration of
the data transmission, which will have some implications. All
nodes near the sender/receiver after hearing RTS/CTS will defer
the transmission. Therefore, it avoids some cases of hidden and
exposed station problems. However, it does not always avoid
these problems. If, the neighbour hears the RTS only, it is free to
transmit once the waiting interval is over.

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(c) Data Transmission between A and B

Figure 3: MACA Protocol

Just assume that, there are four nodes A, B, C, and D in a wireless LAN
(Figure 3). A is a sender and B is a receiver. The station C is within
range of A but not within range of B. Therefore, it can hear transmission
from A (i.e., RTS) but not transmission from B (i.e., CTS) (Figure 3(a)
and 3(b). Therefore, it must remain silent long enough for the CTS to be
transmitted back to A without conflict. The station D is within the range
of B but not A so it hears CTS but not RTS. Therefore, it must remain
silent during the upcoming data transmission, whose length it can tell by
examining the CTS frame. This is illustrated through a diagram (Figure
3(a) and 3(c) A sends RTS to B. Then B sends CTS to A. Then, follows
data between A and B.

C hears the RTS from A but not the CTS from B. As long as it does not
interfere with the CTS, it is free to transmit while the data frame is being
sent. In contrast, the station D is within range of B but not A. It does not
hear the RTS but does hear the CTS. Hearing the CTS tips it off that, it
is close to a station that is about to receive a frame, so it defers sending
anything until that frame is expected to be finished.

Despite these precautions, collisions can still occur. For example, Band
C could both send RTS frames to A at the same time. These frames will
collide and will be lost. In the event of a collision, an unsuccessful
transmitter (i.e. one that does not hear a CTS within the expected time
interval) waits a random amount of time and tries again later. MACAW
(MACA for wireless) extends MACA to improve its performance which
will have the following handshaking mechanism. RTS-CTS-DS-Data
ACK It isalso illustrated through the following diagram (Figure
4).

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Figure 4: The MACAW protocol

MACA W extends MACA with the following features:

Data link layer acknowledgement: It was noticed that without data

link layer acknowledgements, lost frames were not retransmitted
until the transport layer noticed their absences,much later. They
solved this problem by introducing an ACK frame after each
successful data frame.

Addition of carrier sensing: They also observed that CSMA has

some use, namely, to keep a station from transmitting a RTS while at
the same time another nearby station is also doing so to the same
destination, so carrier sensing was added.

An improved backoff mechanism: It runs the backoff algorithm

separately for each data stream (source-destination pair), rather than
for each station. This change improves the fairness of the protocol.

DS (Data sending) message: Say a neighbour of the sender

overhears an RTS but not a CTS from a receiver. In this case it can
tell ifRTS-CTS was successful or not. When it overhears OS, it
realises that the RTS-CTS was successful and it defers its own
transmission.

Finally, they added a mechanism for stations to exchange information

about congestion and a way to make the back off algorithm react less
violently to temporary problems, to improve system performance.

3.5 IEEE 802.11 Protocol Stack

IEEE 802.11 standard for wireless LAN is similar in most respects to

the IEEE 802.3 Ethernet standard addresses. As shown in the Figure 5
the physical layer of 802.11 corresponds to the OSI physical layer fairly
well but, the data link layer in all the 802 protocols is split into two or
more sub layers. In 802.11, the MAC (Medium Access Control) sub
layer determines how the channel is allocated, that is, who gets to

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transmit next. Above it is the LLC (Logical Link Control) sublayer,

whose job is to hide the differences between the different 802 variants
and make them indistinguishable as far as the network layer is
concerned.

Figure 5: Part of the 802.11 protocol ,tack

3.5.1 The 802.11 Physical Layer

The 802.11 physical layer (PHY) standard specifies three transmission

techniques allowed in the physical layer. The infrared method used
much the same technology as television remote controls do. The other
two use short-range radio frequency (RF) using techniques known as
FHSS (Frequency Hopped Spread Spectrum) and DSSS (Direct
Sequence Spread Spectrum). Both these techniques, use a part of the
spectrum that does not require licensing (the 2.4 -GHz ISM band).
Radio-controlled garage door openers also use the same piece of the
spectrum, so your notebook computer may find itself in competition
with your garage door. Cordless telephones and microwave ovens also
use this band. All of these techniques operate at 1 or 2 Mbps and at low
enough power that they do not conflict too much. RF is capable of being
used for ‘not line of sight’ and longer distances.

The other two short range radio frequency techniques are known as
spread spectrum. It was initially developed for military and intelligence
requirement. The essential idea is to spread information signal over a
wider bandwidth to make jamming and interception more difficult. The
spread spectrum is ideal for data communication because, it is less
susceptible to radio noise and creates little interference. It is used to
comply with the regulations for use with ISM Band.

There are two types of spread spectrum:

(i) Frequency Hopping (FH), and

(ii) Direct Sequence (DS)

Both these techniques are used in wireless data network products as well
as other communication application such as, a cordless telephone please
refer to [5] for further studies.

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Under this scheme, the signal is broadcast over a seemingly random data
sequence RF hopping from frequency to frequency at split second
intervals. A receiver hopping between frequencies in synchronisation
with the transmitter, picks up the message. Using FHSS (Frequency
Hopped Spread Spectrum) the 2.4 GHz is divided into 75 MHz Channel.
In this scheme, a pseudorandom number generator is used to produce the
sequence of the frequencies hopped to. As long as all stations use the
same seed to the pseudorandom number generator and stay synchronised
in time, they will hop to the same frequencies simultaneously. FHSS’
randomisation provides a fair way to allocate spectrum in the
unregulated ISM band. It also provides some sort of security. Because
an intruder does not know the hopping sequence it cannot eavesdrop on
transmissions. Over longer distance, multipath fading can be an issue,
and FHSS offers good resistance to it. It is also relatively insensitive
radio interference, which makes it popular for building-to-building links.
Its main disadvantage is its low bandwidth. FHSS allows for a less
complex radio design than DSSS but FHSS is limited to 2 Mbps data
transfer rate due to FCC regulations that restrict subchannel bandwidth
to I MHz causing many hops which means a high amount of hopping
overhead. The DSSS is a better choice for WLAN application. It is also
restricted to 1 or 2 Mbps.

DSSS divides 2.4 GHz band into 14 channels. Channels using at the
same location should be separated 25 MHz from each other to avoid
interference. FHSS and DHSS are fundamentally different signaling
techniques and are not capable of inter operating with each other. Under
this scheme, each but in the original signal is represented by multiple
bits in the transmitted signal, which is known as chipping code. The
chipping code spreads the signal across a wider frequency band in direct
proportion to the number of bits used. Therefore, a 10 bit chopping code
spreads signal across a frequency band that is 10 times greater than I bit
chipping code (Ref. 3).

3.5.2 The 802.11 MAC Sub-layer Protocol

After the discussion on the physical layer it is time to switch over to the
IEEE 802.11 MAC sublayer protocols which are quite different from
that of the Ethernet due, to the inherent complexity of the wireless
environment compared to that of a wired system. With Ethernet (IEEE
802.3) a node transmits, in case, it has sensed that the channel is free. If,
it does not receive a noise burst back within the first 64 bytes, the frame
has almost assuredly been delivered correctly. With wireless technology,
this situation does not hold.

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As mentioned earlier 802.11 does not use CSMA/CD due to the

following problems:

(i) The Hidden Station Problem: CSMA does not avoid the hidden
station problem (Figure (a) & (b))

A transmit to B
B receives the message A tries to transmit to B
C does not hear the transmission C also tries to transmit both
(a) Message to B arrive at B
leading to garbage.
(b)

Figure 6: (a) The hidden station problem

(ii) The exposed Station Problem CSMA may cause nodes to

unnecessarily refrain from accessing the channel as shown in the
Figure below:

Radio Range

B Transmits to A which is heard by C

C unnecessarily avoids sending a message to D even though there would
be no collision
Figure 6: (b) The exposed station problem

(iii) In addition, most radios are half duplex, meaning that they cannot
transmit and listen for noise bursts at the same time on a single
frequency as Ethernet does.

To deal with this problem, 802.1 I supports two modes of operation.

DCF (Distributed Coordination Function)

PCP (Point Coordinated Function) (optional)

Now, we, will examine IEEE 802.11 DCF separately. It does not use
any central control. In this respect it is similar to Ethernet.
When DCF is employed, 802.11 uses a protocol called CSMA/CA
(CSMA with Collision Avoidance). In this protocol, both physical

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channel sensing and virtual channel sensing are used. Two methods
of operation are supported by CSMAICA. In the first method (Physical
sensing), before the transmission, it senses the channel. If the channel is
sensed idle, it just wants and then transmitting. But it does not sense the
channel while transmitting but, emits its entire frame, which may well
be destroyed at the receiver’s end due to interference there. If, the
channel is busy, the sender defers transmission until it goes idle and then
starts transmitting. If, a collision occurs, the colliding stations wait for a
random time, using the Ethernet binary exponential back off algorithm
and then try again later.

The second mode of CSMAICA operation is based on MACAW and

uses virtual channel sensing, as illustrated in Figure 6. In this example,
there are four stations A, B, C, and D. A is a transmitter and B is a
receiver, C is within the radio range of A (and possibly within the range
of B) where as D is within the range of B but not within range of A.

When A has to send data to B, it begins by sending an RTS frame to B

to request permission to send it a frame. When B receives this request, it
may decide to grant permission, in which case it sends the

Figure 7: The use of virtua1 channel sensing using CSMA/CA

CTS frame back. Upon receipt of the CTS, A now sends its frame and
starts an ACK timer. Upon correct receipt of the data frame, B responds
with an ACK frame leading to the closure of data transfer operation
between A & B. In case A’s ACK timer expires before the ACK gets
back to it, the whole protocol is run again.

Now, how will C and D nodes react to it? Node C is within range of A,
so it may receive the RTS frame. C may receive the RTS frame because
it is in the rage of A. From the information in the RTS frame it estimates
how long the transfer will take, including the final ACK and asserting a
kind of virtual channel busy for itself, indicated by NA V (Network
Allocation Vector) as shown in Figure 7. Similarly, D also asserts the

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NA V signal for itself because it hears the CTS. The NA V signals are
not for transmission. They are just internal reminders to keep quite for a
certain period of time.

In contrast to wired networks, wireless networks are noisy and

unreliable. To deal with the problem of noisy channels, 802.11 allows
frames to be fragmented into smaller pieces, each with its own
checksum because, if a frame is too long, it has very little chance of
getting through undamaged and will, probably have to be retransmitted.
The fragments are individually numbered and acknowledged using a
stop and wait protocol at LLC (i.e., the sender may not transmit
fragment k+ 1 until it has received the acknowledgement for fragment
k). Once the channel has been acquired using RTS and CTS, multiple
fragments can be sent in a row, as shown in Fig. 8. A sequence of
fragments is called a fragment burst.

Figure 8: A fragment burst

The second advantage of fragmentation is that it increases the channel

throughput by not allowing retransmission to the bad fragments rather
than the entire frame. The size of C fragment can be adjusted by a base
station in a cell. A base station in a cell can adjust the size of C
fragment. The NA V mechanism keeps other stations quiet, only until
the next acknowledgement, but another mechanism (described below) is
used to allow a whole fragment burst to be sent without interference.
So, far we have discussed DCF in which, the base station polls the other
stations, asking them if they have any frames to send. Since,
transmission order is completely controlled by the base station in PCF
mode, no collisions ever occurs. The standard prescribes the mechanism
for polling, but not the polling frequency, polling order, or even whether
all stations need to get equal service.

The basic mechanism is for the base station to broadcast a beacon frame
periodically (10 to 100 times per second). The beacon frame contains
system parameters, such as hopping sequences and dwell times (for
FHSS), clock synchronisation, etc. It also invites new stations to sign up
for polling services. Once a station has signed up for polling service at a

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certain rate, it is effectively guaranteed a certain fraction of the

bandwidth, thus making it possible to give guarantee of quality services.

Battery life is always an issue with mobile wireless devices, so 802.11

pays attention to the issue of power management. In particular, the base
station can direct a mobile station to go into sleep state until explicitly
awakened by the base station or the user. Having told a station to go to
sleep, however, means that the base station has the responsibility for
buffering any frames directed at it while the mobile station is asleep.
These can be collected later.

PCF and DCF can coexist within one cell. At first it might seem
impossible to have central control and distributed control operating at
the same time, but 802.11 provides a way to achieve this goal. It works
by carefully defining the interframe time interval. After a frame has
been sent, a certain amount of dead time is required before any station
can send a frame.

3.6 Switching At Data Link Layer

Before discussing data ‘link layer switching devices, let us talk about
repeaters which are layer I devices. Repeaters provide both physical and
electrical connections. Their functions are to regenerating and propagate
a signal in a channel. Repeaters are used to extend the length of the
LAN which depends upon the type of medium. For example 10 mbps
802.3 LAN that uses UTP cable (10 BASE- T) has a maximum
restriction of 100 meters. Many organisations have multiple LANs and
wish to connect them. LANs can be connected by devices called
bridges, which operate as the data link layer. Unlike repeaters, bridges
connect networks that have different physical layers. It can also connect
networks using either the same or different types of architecture at the
MAC. (Token ring, FOOl, Ethernet etc).

Bridges have some other characteristics:

(i) Store and forward device.

(ii) Highly susceptible to broadcast storms.

Bridges are store and forward devices to provide error detection. They
capture an ell1tire frame before deciding whether to filter or forward the
frame, which provides a high level of error detection because a frame’s
CRC checksum can be calculated by Tile Bridge. Bridge is highly
susceptible to broadcast storms. A broadcast storm occurs when several
broadcasts are transmitted at the same time. It can take up huge
bandwidth.
Before looking at the technology of bridges, it is worthwhile taking a
look at some common situations in which bridges are used. Tanenbaun

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[Ref. I] has six reasons wmy a single organisation may end up with
multiple LANs.

1) Multiple LANs in organization

Many university and corporate departments have their own LANs,

primarily to connect their own personal computers, workstations, and
servers. Since the goals of the various departments differ, different
departments choose different LANs. But there is a need for interaction,
so bridges are needed.

2) Geographical difference

The organisation may be geographically spread over several buildings

separated by considerable distances. It may be cheaper to have separate
LANs in each building and connect them with bridges and later link
them to run a single cable over the entire site.

Backbone LAN (For example -FDDI)

Figure 9: Multiple LANs connected by backbone to handle a total load higher

than the capacity of single LAN

3) Load distribution: It may be necessary to split what is logically

a single LAN into separate LANs to accommodate the load.

4) Long Round Trip delay: In some situations, a single LAN

would be adequate in terms of the load, but the physical distance
between the most distant machines is can be great (e.g. more than
2.5 km for Ethernet). Even if, laying the cable is easy to do, the
network would not work due to the excessively long round-trip
delay. The only solution is to partition the LAN and install
bridges between the segments. Using bridges, the total physical
distance covered can be increased.

5) Reliability

By inserting bridges at critical points reliability can be enforced in the

network by isolating II defective node. Unlike a repeater, which just
copies whatever it sees, a bridge can be programmed to exercise some
discretion regarding what forwards and what it does not forward.

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6) Security

Is a very important feature in bridges today, and can control the

movement of sensitive trafI1c by isolating the different parts of the
network.

In an idea! sense, a bridge should have the following characters:

(i) Fully transparent

It means that it should allow the movement of a machine from one cable
segment to another cable segment without change of hardware and
software or configuration tools.

(ii) Interpretability

It should allow a machine on one LAN segment to talk to another

machine on another LAN segment.

3.6.1 Operation of Bridges in Different LAN Environment

Having studied the features of bridges and why we require multiple

LANs, let’s learn how they work. Assume that, there are two machines
A and B. Both of them are attached to a different LANs. Machine A is
on a wireless LAN (Ethernet IEEE 802.3). While B is on both LANs are
connected to each other through a bridge. Now, A has a packet to be
sent to B. The flow of information at Host A is shown below:

1) The packet at machine A arrives at the LLC sublayer from the

application layer through the transport layer and network layer.

2) LLC Sub layer header get attached to the packet.

3) Then it moves to the MAC Sublayer. The packet gets MAC

sublayer header for attachment.

4) Since the node is part of a wireless LAN, the packet goes to the
air using GRF.

5) The packet is then picked up by the base station. It examines its

destination address and figures that it should be forwarded to the
fixed LAN (it is Ethernet in our case).

6) When the packet arrives at the bridge which connects the wireless
LAN and Ethernet LAN, it starts at the physical layer of the

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bridge and moves to its LLC layer. At the MAC sublayer its
802.11 header is removed.

7) The packet arrives at the LLC of a bridge without any 802.11

header.

8) Since the packet has to go to 802.3 LAN, the bridge prepares

packets accordingly.

Note that a bridge connecting k different LANs will have K different

MAC sublayers and k different physical layers. One for each type

So far we have presented a very simplistic scenario in forwarding a

packet from one LAN to another through a bridge. In this section, we
will point out some of the difficulties that one encounters .when trying
to build a bridge between the various 802 LANs due to focus on the
following reasons:

1) Different frame Format

To start with, each of the LANs uses a different frame format. Unlike
the differences between Ethernet, token bus, and token ring, which were
due to history and big corporate egos, here the differences are to some
extent legitimate. For example, the Duration field in 802.11 is there, due
to the MACA W protocol and that makes no sense in Ethernet. As a
result, any copying between different LANs requires reformatting,
which takes CPU time, requires a new checksum calculation, and
introduces the possibility of undetected errors due to bad bits in the
bridge’s memory.

2) Different data rates

When forwarding a frame from a fast LAN to a Slower one, the bridge
will not be able to get rid of the frames as fast as they come in.
Therefore, it has to be buffered. For example, if a gigabit Ethernet is
pouring bits into an II-Mbps 802.11 LAN at top speed, the bridge will
have to buffer them, hoping not to run out of memory.

3) Different frame lengths

An obvious problem arises when a long frame must be forwarded onto a

LAN that cannot accept it. This is the most serious problem. The
problem comes when a long frames arrives. An obvious solution is that
the frame must be split but, such a facility is not available at the data
link layer. Therefore the solution is that such frames must be discarded.
Basically, there is no solution to this problem.

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4) Security

Both 802.11 and 802.16 support encryption in the data link layer, but the
Ethernet does not do so. This means that the various encryption services
available to the wireless networks are lost when traffic passes over the
Ethernet.

5) Quality of service

The Ethernet has no concept of quality of service, so traffic from other

LANs will lose its quality of service when passing over an Ethernet.

3.6.1 Transparent Bridges

In, the previous section, we dealt with the problems encountered in

connecting two different IEEE 802 LANs via a single bridge. However,
in large organisations with many LANs, just interconnecting them all
raises a variety of issues, even if they are all just Ethernet. In this
section, we introduce a type of bridge called Transparent Bridge, which
is a plug and play unit which you connect to your network and switch it
on. There is no requirement of hardware and software changes, no
setting of address switches, no downloading of routing tables, just plug
and play. Furthermore, the operation of existing LANs would not be
affected by the bridges at all. In other words, the bridges would be
completely transparent (invisible to all the hardware and software).
Operating in a promiscuous mode, a transparent bridge captures every
frame that is transmitted in all the networks to which the bridge is
connected. The bridge examines every frame it receives and extracts
each frame’s source address, which it adds to the backward address
table.

Figure 10: A configuration with four LANs and two bridge.

As an example take the following Confirmation (Figure 10). There are 3

LANs: LAN1, LAN2 and LAN3 and two Bridges BI and B2. BI is
connected to LAN1 and LAN2 and bridges B2 is connected to LAN2
and LAN3. The routing procedure for an incoming frame depends on the

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LAN it arrives on (the source LAN) and the LAN its destination is on
(the destination LAN), as follows:

1) If destination and source LANs are the same, discard the frame.
(For example packet from A is going to B. Both are on the same
LAN i.e. LAN1).

2) If the destination and source LANs are different, forward the

frame. (For example, a packet from A on LAN I has to go to D
on LAN 3)

3) If the destination LAN is unknown, use flooding.

When the bridges are first plugged in, all its hash tables are empty. None
of the bridges know where these destination nodes are exactly.
Therefore, they use a flooding algorithm: every incoming frame for an
unknown destination is output on all the LANs to which the bridge is
connected, except to the one it arrived on. Gradually, the bridges learn
where destinations are. Once the destination is known there is no more
flooding and the packet is forwarded on the proper LAN.

The algorithm used by the transparent bridges is called backward

learning. As mentioned above, the bridges operate in promiscuous
mode, so they see every frame sent on any of their LANs. By looking at
the source address, they can tell which machine is accessible on which
LAN. For example, if bridge B2 in Figure 10 sees a frame on LAN 3
coming from D, it knows that D must be reachable via LAN3, so it
makes an entry in its hash table noting that frames going to D should use
LAN 3.

3.6.3 Spanning Tree Bridges

For reliability, some networks contain more than one bridge, which
increases the likelihood of networking loops. A networking loop occurs
when frames are passed from bridge to bridge in a circular manner,
never reaching its destination. To prevent networking loops when
multiple bridges are used, the bridges communicate with each other and
establish a map of the network to derive what is called a spanning tree
for all the networks. A spanning tree consists of a single path between
source and destination nodes that does not include any loops. Thus, a
spanning tree can be considered to be a loop-free subset of a network’s
topology. The spanning tree algorithm, specified in IEEE 802.ld,
describes how bridges (and switches) can communicate to avoid
network loops.

3.6.4 Source Routing Bridges

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IBM introduced source routing bridges for use in token ring networks.
With source routing, the sending machine is responsible for determining
whether, a frame is destined for a node on the same network or on a
different network. If, the frame is destined for a different network, then,
the source machine designates this by setting the high-order bit of the
group address bit of the source address to 1. It also includes in the
frame’s header the path the frame is to follow from source to
destination. Source routing bridges are based on the assumption that a
sending machine will provide routing information for messages destined
for different networks. By making the sending machine responsible for
this task, a source routing bridge can ignore frames that have not been
“marked” and forward only those frames with their high-order
destination bit set to 1.

4.0 CONCLUSION
In this conclusive unit of this module, you have bean take through the
two broad topics: Wireless LAN, its standard and Data Link Layer
Switching through bridges and Switches.

5.0 SUMMARY
In this unit we discussed two major topics wireless LANs and switching
mechanism at the data link layer with IEEE at the data link layer. With
IEEE 802.11 standardisation, wireless LANs are becoming common in
most of the organisations but, they have their own problems and
solutions CSMA/CD does not work due to hidden station problem. To
make CSMA work better two new protocols, MACA and MACA W
were discussed. The physical layer of wireless LAN standard i.e. IEEE
802.11 allows five different transmission modes, including infrared,
various spread spectrum schemes etc. As a part of inter LANs
connecting mechanism we discussed different types of bridges.
Bluetooth was not taken up in this unit, although, it is a very important
topic today. It is a also a wireless network used for connecting handsets
and other peripherals to computers without wires.

6.0 TUTOR-MARKED ASSIGNMENT

1) What is Hidden Station Problem?
2) Why CSMA/CD cannot be used in wireless LAN environment?
Discuss.
3) How is MACAW different from MACA?
4) What are the features of a transparent bridge?
5) What are the difficulties in building a bridge between the various
802 LANs?
7.0 REFERENCES/FURTHER READINGS

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Practice Hall of India, (2003). Computer Networks, A. S. Tanenbaum 4th

Edition, New Delhi.

J.F. Kurose & K. W. Ross, (2003).Computer Networking, A Top Down

Approach Featuring the Internet, Pearson Edition.

Behrouz Forouzan, (1999). Introduction to Data Communication &

Networking, Tata McGraw Hill.

Leon Garcia, and Widjaja, (2000). Communications Networks, Tata

McGraw Hill.

Willian Stallings, Data and Computer Communications, 6tb Edition,

Pearson Education, New Delhi.

MODULE 3 NETWORK LAYER

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Unit 1 Introduction to Layer Functionality and Design Issues

Unit 2 Routing Algorithms
Unit 3 Congestion Control in Public Switched Network
Unit 4 Internetworking

UNIT 1 INTRODUCTION TO LAYER

FUNCTIONALITY AND DESIGN ISSUES

CONTENTS

1.0 Introduction
2.0 Objectives
3.0 Main Content
3.1 Connection Oriented vs. Connection-less Services
3.1.1 Connection-oriented Services
3.1.2 Connection-less Services
3.2 Implementation of the Network Layer Services
3.2.1 Packet Switching
3.2.2 Implementation of Connection -oriented Services
3.2.3 Implementation of Connection-less Services
3.3 Comparison between Virtual Circuit and Datagram Subnet
3.4 Addressing
3.4.1 Hierarchical versus Flat Address
3.4.2 Static vs Dynamic Address
3.4.3 IP Address
3.5 Concept of Congestion
3.6 Routing Concept
3.6.1 Main Issues in Routing
3.6.2 Classification of Routing Algorithm
4.0 Conclusion
5.0 Summary
6.0 Tutor-Marked Assignment
7.0 References/Further Readings

1.0 INTRODUCTION

In the previous blocks of this course, we have learned the basic

functions of physical layer and data link layer in networking. Now, in
this chapter, we will go through the functions of the network layer.

The network layer is at level three in OSI model. It responds to service

requests from the transport layer and issues service requests to the data
link layer. It is responsible for end-to-end (source to destination) packet
delivery, whereas the data link layer is responsible for node-to-node

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(hop-to-hop) packet delivery. Three important functions of the network

layers are:

Path Determination

It determines the route taken by the packets from the source to the
destination.

Forwarding

It forwards packets from the router's input to the appropriate router

output.

Call Setup

Some network architectures require router call setup along the path
before the data flows. To perform these functions, the network layer
must be aware of the topology of the communication subnet (i.e., set of
routers, communication lines).

For end-to-end delivery, the network provides two type of services i.e.,
connection oriented service and connection less service to the
transport layer. The network layer services meet the following entries
[ref.1].

Transport layer should not be aware of the topology of the,

network (subnet).
Services should be independent of the router technology.

In this unit, we will first go through the basic concepts of these services
and will then differentiate between these two. Then, we will introduce
some other concepts like routing and congestion.

2.0 OBJECTIVES

After going through this unit, you should be able to:

define basic functions of the network layer

differentiate between connection oriented and connection less
services
define the concept of addressing in networking
define congestion in the network layer
explain the concept of routing
explain the concept of pocket switching
define packet switching network.
3.0 MAIN CONTENT

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3.1 Connection Oriented vs. Connection Less Services

In computer networks, delivery between source and destination can be

accomplished in either of the two ways:

Connection-oriented services
Connection-less services.

3.1.1 Connection-Oriented Services

Connection-oriented services define a way of transmitting data between

a sender and a receiver, in which an end-to-end connection is established
before sending any data. After establishing a connection, a sequence of
packets, (from the source to destinati1m), can be sent one after another.
All the packets belonging to a message are sent from the same
connection. When all packets of a message have been delivered, the
connection is terminated.

In connection-oriented services, the devices at both the endpoints

use a protocol to establish an end-to-end connection before
sending any data.

Connection-oriented service usually has the following characteristics:

i) The network guarantees that all packets will be delivered in order

without loss or duplication of data.

ii) Only a single path is established for the call. and all the data
follows that path.

iii) The network guarantees. a minimal amount of bandwidth and this

bandwidth is reserved for the duration of the call.

iv) If the network is over utilised, future call requests are refused.

Connection-oriented service is sometimes called a “reliable” network

service because:

It guarantees that data will arrive in the proper sequence.

Single connection for entire message facilitates
acknowledgement process and retransmission of damaged and
lost frames.

Connection-oriented transmission has three stages. These are:

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(i) Connection establishment

In connection oriented services, before transmitting data, the sending

device must first determine the availability of the other to exchange data
and a connection must be established by which data can be sent.
Connection establishment requires three steps. These are:

a) First the sender computer requests the connection by sending a

connection request packet to the intended receiver.

b) Then the receiver computer returns a confirmation packet to the

requesting computer.

c) Finally, the sender computer returns a packet acknowledging the

confirmation.

(ii) Data transfer

After the connection gets established, the sender starts sending data
packets to the receiver.

(iii) Connection termination

After all the data gets transferred, the connection has to be terminated.
Connection termination also requires a three-way handshake i.e.:

(a) First, the sender computer requests disconnection by sending a

disconnection request packet.

(b) Then, the receiver computer confirms the disconnection request.

(c) Finally, the sender computer returns a packet acknowledging the

confirmation.

Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) is a connection-oriented

protocol.

3.1.2 Connection-less Services

Connection-less services define a way of communication between two

network end points in which, a message can be sent from one end point
to another without prior arrangement. The sender simply starts sending
packets, addressed to the intended recipient.

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Connectionless service is a service that allows the transfer of

information among subscribers without the need for end-to-end
connection establishment procedures.

Connection-less service is sometimes known as “unreliable” network

service. Connection-less protocols are usually described as stateless
because the endpoints have no protocol-defined way of remembering
where they are in a “conversation” of message exchange.

The Internet Protocol (IP) and User Datagram Protocol (UDP) are
connectionless protocols, but TCP/IP (the most common use of IP) is
connection-orientated.

3.2 Implementation of the Network Layer Services

In this section, we will examine how the network layer services are
implemented. Two different services are taken into consideration
depending on the type of service being offered. These two schemes are
known as virtual circuit subnet (VC subnet) for connection-oriented
service and datagram subnet for connection-less services. A VC subnet
may be compared to the physical circuit required in a telephone setup. In
a connection-oriented service, a route from the source to the destination
must be established. In a datagram subnet, no advance set up is needed.
In this case, packets are routed independently. But, before we take up
the implementation issues let us, revisit the packet switching concepts
once again. The services are implement through a packet switched
network.

3.2.1 Packet Switching

In the fourth unit of Block I, we introduced the concept of packet

switching. We further elaborate in this section, in the context of the
network layer. The network layer operates in the packet switched
network (or subnet) environment which comprises several routers linked
with transmission lines (leased or dial up) besides user's machines as
shown in Figure 1.

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Figure 1: A Packet switched network

This subnet works in the following manner. Whenever user wants to

send a packet to another users, s/he transmits the packet to the nearest
router either on its own LAN or over a point-to-point link to the carrier.
The packet is stored for verification and then transmitted further to the
next router along the way until it reaches the final destination machine.
This mechanism is called packet switching.

But, why packet switching? Why not circuit switching? Now, let us
discuss these issues.

Circuit switching was not designed for packet transmission. It was

primarily designed for voice communication. It creates temporary
(dialed) or permanent (leased) dedicated links that are wel1 suited to this
type of communication [Ref 2].

(i) Data transmission tends to be bursty, which means that packets

arrive in spurts with gaps in between. In such cases, transmission
lines will be mostly idle leading to wastage of resources if we use
circuit switching for data transmission.

(ii) Single Data Rate: In circuit switching mechanism there is a

single data rate for the two end devices which limits flexibility
and usefulness of circuit switched connection for networks
interconnection of a variety of digital devices.

(iii) No priority to transmission: Circuit switching treats all

transmissions as equal. But often, with data transmission we may
be required to send a certain packet on a high priority basis,
which may not be implemented with the circuit switching
approach.

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3.2.2 Implementation of Connection-oriented Services

To implement connection-oriented services, we need to form a virtual-

circuit subnet. This idea behind the creation of a VC is so that, a new
route for every packet sent. In virtual circuits:

Firnt, a connection needs to be established.

After establishing a connection, a route from the source machine
to the destination machine is chosen as part of the connection
setup and stored in tables inside the routers. This route is used for
all traffic flowing over the connection.
After transmitting all the data packets, the connection is released.
When the connection is released, the virtual circuit is also
terminated.

In a connection-oriented service, each packet carries an identifier that

identifies the virtual circuit it belongs to.

Now, let us take an example, consider the situation of a subnet in Figure

2. In this figure, H1, H2 and H3 represent host machines and RI, R2, R3,
R4, RS and R6 represent routers. Processes are running on different
hosts.

Here, host HI has established connection 1 with host H2. It is

remembered as the first entry in each of the routing tables as shown in
Table 1. The first line ofRI 's table says that, if a packet bearing
connection identifier 1 comes in from HI, it is to be sent to router R3,
and given connection identifier 1. Similarly, the first entry at R3 routes
the packet to RS, also with connection identifier 1.

Now, let us consider a situation in which, H3 also wants to establish a

connection with H2. It chooses connection identifier I (because it is
initiating the connection and this is its only connection) and informs the
subnet to setup the virtual circuit. This leads to the second row in the
table. Note, that we have a conflict here because although R1 can easily
distinguish -connection I packets from HI and connection I packets from
H3, R3 cannot do this. For this reason, RI assigns a different connection
identifier to the outgoing traffic for the second connection (No.2). In
order to avoiding conflicts of this nature, it is important that routers have
the ability to replace connection identifiers in outgoing packets. In some
contexts, this is called label switching.

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3.2.3 Implementation of Connection-less Services

In this section, we shall discuss the implementation of these services i.e.,

how connection-less services are implemented in real networks. To
implement connection-less services, we need a datagram subnet.

In these services, packets are individually injected into the subnet and
their routing decisions are not dependent on each other (packets).
Therefore, in connectionless services, no advance setup is needed. In
this context, the packets are frequently called datagrams and the subnet
is called a datagram subnet.

Now, let us take an example to learn how a datagram subnet works.

Consider the situation of Figure 3. In this Figure, HI and H2 represent

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host machines and RI, R2, R3, R4, R5 and R6 represent routers.
Suppose, that the process running at host HI has a long message to be
transmitted to a process running at H2 machine. To do so, it transfers the
message to the transport layer with appropriate instructions to deliver it
to the process running at H2. Where is the transfer layer process
running, can you figure out? Well, it may also be running on HI but
within the operating system. The transport layer process adds a transport
header to the front of the message and transfers the message (also called
TPDU) to the network layer, The network layer too, might be running as
another procedure within the operating system.

Let us assume, that the message is five times longer than the maximum
packet size, therefore, the network layer has to break it into five packets,
1,2, 3, 4 and 5 and send each of them in turn to router RI (because it is
linked to RI) using some point-to-point protocol. After this, the carrier
(supported by ISP) takes over. Every router has an internal table telling
it where to send packets for each possible destination. Each table entry
is a pair consisting of a destination and the outgoing line to use for that
destination. Only directly-connected lines can be used. For example, in
Figure 3, RI has only two outgoing lines-to R2 and R3. So every
incoming packet must be sent to one of these routers.

As the packets arrive at RI from HI, packets 1, 2, and 3 were stored

briefly (to verify their checksums). Then, each packet was forwarded to
R3 according to Rl 's table (table not shown here). Packet I was then
forwarded to R5 and from R5 to R6. When it got to R6, it was
encapsulated in a data link layer frame and sent to H2. Packets 2 and 3
follow the same route.

However, something different happened to packet 4 and 5. When it got

to RI it was sent to router R2, even though it has the same destination.
Due to some reason (for ex. congestion), RI decided to send packet 4
and 5 via a different route than that of the first three.

The algorithm that manages the tables and makes the routing decisions
is known as the routing algorithm. In next unit, we shall study routing
algorithms. Students are requested to refer to [Ref. I] for further study
on the implementation of connection oriented and connection less
services. You should focus on connecting routing tables.

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Figure 3: Routing in a datagram subnet

3.3 Comparison between Virtual Circuit and Datagram

Subnet

Both virtual circuits and datagrams have their pros and cons. We shall
compare them on the basis of different parameters. These various
parameters are:

Router memory space and bandwidth

Virtual circuits allow packets to contain circuit numbers instead of full

destination addresses. A full destination address lit every packet may
represent a significant amount of overhead, and hence waste bandwidth.

Setup time vs. address parsing time

Using virtual circuits requires a setup phase, which takes time and
consumes memory resources. However, figuring out what to do with a
data packet in a virtual-circuit subnet is easy: the router simply uses the
circuit number to index into a table to find out where the packet goes. In
a datagram subnet, a more complicated lookup procedure is required to
locate the entry for the destination.

Amount of table space required in router memory

A datagram subnet needs to have an entry for every possible destination,

whereas a virtual-Circuit subnet just needs an entry for each virtual
circuit.

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Quality of service

Virtual circuits have some advantages in guaranteeing quality of service

and avoiding congestion within the subnet because resources (e.g.,
buffers, bandwidth, and CPU cycles) can be reserved in advance, when
the connection is established. Once the packets start arriving, the
necessary bandwidth and router capacity will be there. With a datagram
subnet, congestion avoidance is more difficult.

Vulnerability

Virtual circuits also have a vulnerability problem. If, a router crashes

and loses its memory, even if it comes back a second later, all the virtual
circuits passing through it will have to be aborted. In contrast, if a
datagram router goes down, only those users whose packets were
queued in the router at the time will suffer, and maybe not even all
those, depending upon whether they have already been acknowledged.
The loss of a communication line is fatal to virtual circuits using it but
can be easily compensated for if datagrams are used.

Traffic balance

Datagrams also allow the routers to balance the traffic throughout the
subnet, since routes can be changed partway through a long sequence of
packet transmissions. A brief comparison between a virtual circuit
subnet and a datagram subnet is given in Table 2. Students should refer
to Reference 1 for further discussion.

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Table 2: Comparison between Virtual Circuit and Datagram Subnets

(Source: Ref. [1])

SELF ASSESSMENT EXERCISE I

Give right choice for the following:

1) Connection-oriented service is sometimes called a network

service.

(a) Reliable
(b) Unreliable

2) ………………………….is a connection-oriented protocol.

(a) UDP
(b) TCP
(c) IP

3) Why are connection oriented services known as reliable services?

Explain briefly.

3.4 Addressing

Network addresses identify devices separately or as members of a

group. Addressing is performed on various layers of the OSI model.
Thus, schemes used for addressing vary on the basis of the protocol used

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and the OSI layer. On this basis, internetwork addresses can be

categorised into three types. These are:

(a) Data link layer addresses

(b) Media Access Control (MAC) addresses
(c) Network layer addresses.

a) Data Link Layer Addresses

Data-link layer addresses sometimes are referred to as physical or

hardware addresses, uniquely identify each physical network
connection of a network device. Usually data-link addresses have a pre-
established and fixed relationship to a specific device.

End systems generally have only one physical network connection and
thus, have only one data-link address. Routers and other internetworking
devices typically have multiple physical network connections and
therefore, have multiple data-link addresses.

b) Media Access Control (MAC) Addresses

Media Access Control (MAC) addresses are used to identify network

entities in LANs that implement the IEEE MAC addresses of the data
link layer. These addresses are 48 bits in length and are expressed as 12
hexadecimal digits.

MAC addresses are unique for each LAN interface. These address
consist of a subset of data link layer addresses. Figure 4 illustrates the
relationship between MAC addre,5ses, data-link addresses, and the
IEEE sub-layers of the data link layer.

Figure 4: MAC addresses, data-link addresses, and the IEEE Sub-layer,

of the data link layer are all related

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c) Network Layer Addresses

Network addresses are sometimes called virtual or logical addresses.

These addresses are used to identify an entity at the network layer of the
OSI model. Network addresses are usually hierarchical addresses.

3.4.1 Hierarchical vs. Flat Address

Usually Internetwork addresses are of two types:

(i) Hierarchical address

Hierarchical addresses are organised into a number of subgroups, each

successively narrowing an address until it points to a single device as a
house address.

(ii) Flat address

A flat address space is organised into a single group, such as. your
enrolment no. Hierarchical addressing offers certain advantages over
flat-addressing schemes. In hierarchical addressing, address sorting and
recalling is simplified using the comparison operation. For example,
“India” in a street address eliminates any other country as a possible
location. Figure 5 illustrates the difference between hierarchical and flat
address spaces.

Figure 5: Hierarchical and flat address spaces differ in comparison

operations

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3.4.2 Static vs. Dynamic Address

In networking, the address to a device can be assigned in either of these

two ways:

(i) Static address assignment

Static addresses are assigned by a network administrator according to a

preconceived internetwork addressing plan. A static address does not
change until the network administrator changes it manually.

(ii) Dynamic addresses

Dynamic addresses are obtained by devices when they are attached to a

network, by means of some protocol-specific process. A device using
dynamic address often has a different address each time it connects to
the network.

3.4.3 IP Address

IP address is a unique address i.e., no two machines on the Internet can

have same IP address. It encodes it's network number and host number.
Every host and router, in a internetwork has an IP address.

The format of an IP address is a 32-bit numeric address written as four

numbers separated by periods. Each number can be zero to 255. For
example, 1.160.10.240 could be an IP address. These numbers defines
three fields:

(i) Class type: Indicate the IP class, to which the packet belongs:

(ii) Network identifier (netid): Indicates the network (a group of

computers). Networks with different identifiers can be
interconnected with routers.

(iii) Host identifier (hostid): Indicates a specific computer on the

network.

Class type Netid Hostid

Figur.6: IP address

You will read more details on IP address in unit 4.

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3.5 Concept of Congestion

In the network layer, when the number of packets sent to the network is
greater than the number of packets the network can handle (capacity of
network), a problem occurs that is known as congestion. This is just like
congestion on a road due to heavy traffic. In networking, congestion
occurs on shared networks when, multiple users contend for access to
the same resources (bandwidth, buffers, and queues).

When the number of packet sent into the network is within the limits,
almost all packets are delivered, however, the traffic load increases
beyond the network capacity. As a result the system starts discarding
packets.

Figure 7 shows congestion in a network due to too much traffic.

Figure 7: Congestion

Because routers receive packets faster than they can forward them, one
of these two things may happen in case of congestion:

The subnet may prevent additional packets from entering the

congested region until those already present can be processed, or

The congested routers can discard queued packets to make room

for those that are arriving currently.

Congestion Control

Congestion control refers to the network mechanism and techniques

used to control congestion and keep the load below the networks
capacity.

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Congestion handling can be divided into the following:

Congestion recovery: Restore the operating state of the network

when demand exceeds capacity.

Congestion avoidance: Anticipate congestion and avoid it so

that congestion never occurs.

By storing content closer to users i.e., caching can be the best

congestion control scheme. In this manner, majority of the traffic could
be obtained locally rather than being obtained from distant servers along
routed paths that may experience congestion.

Some basic techniques to manage congestion are:

1) End-system now control

This is not a congestion control scheme. It is a way of preventing the

sender from overrunning the buffers of the receiver.

2) Network congestion control

In this scheme, end systems throttle back in order to avoid congesting

the network. The mechanism is similar to end-to-end flow controls, but
the intention is to reduce congestion in the network, not at the receiver's
end.

3) Network-based congestion avoidance

In this scheme, a router detects that congestion may occur and attempts
to slow down senders before queues become full.

4) Resource allocation

This technique involves scheduling the use of physical circuits or other

resources, perhaps for a specific period of time. A virtual circuit, built
across a series of switches with a guaranteed bandwidth is a form of
resource allocation. This technique is difficult, but can eliminate
network congestion by blocking traffic that is in excess of the network
capacity.

3.6 Routing Concept

Suppose, you need to go from location (A) to another location (B) in

your city and more than one routes are available for going from location
A to location B. In this case, first you decide the best route for going

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from location A to B. This decision may be based on a number of

factors such as distance (route with minimum traffic distance), time
(route with minimum traffic jam), cost etc. After deciding the best route
you start moving on that route. The same principle is at work here, in
computer networks also. While transferring data packets in a packet
switched network the same principle is applied, and this is known as
routing. Now, we can say that routing is the act of moving do to packets
in packet-switched network from a source to a destination. Along the
way, several intermediate nodes typically are encountered.

Routing occurs at Layer 3 (the network layer) in OSI reference model. It

involves two basic activities:

Determining optimal routing paths.

Forwarding packets through a subnet. In this section, we will
look at several issues related to routing.

3.6.1 Main Issues in Routing

Routing in a network typically involves a rather complex collection of

algorithms that work more or less independently mainly due to the
environment in which it works and yet support each other by
exchanging services or information. The complex is due to a number of
reasons. First, routing requires coordination between all the nodes of the
subnet rather than just a pair of modules as, for example, in data link and
transport layer protocols. Second, the routing system must cope with
transmission link and router failures, requiring redirection of traffic
resetting up of new VC and an update of the routing tables databases
maintained by the system. Third, to achieve high performance, the
routing algorithm may need to modify its routes when some areas within
the network become congested.

There are two main performance measures that are substantially affected
by the routing algorithm -throughput (quantity of service) and latency
(average packet delay when quality of service is required). The
parameter throughput refers to the number of packets delivered in the
subnet. Routing interacts with flow control in determining these
performance measures by means of a feedback mechanism shows in
Figure 8 When the traffic load offered by the external resources to the
subnet is within the limits of the carrying capacity of the subnet, it will
be fully accepted into the network, that is,

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Figure 8: interaction of routing and now control

Network throughput = offered packets

But, when the offered load exceeds the limit, the packet will be rejected
by the flow control algorithm and

Network Throughput = offered packets -rejected packets

The traffic accepted into the network will experience an average delay
per packet that will depend on the routes chosen by the routing
algorithm.

However, throughput will also be greatly affected (if only indirectly) by

the routing algorithm because typical flow control schemes operate on
the basis of striking a balance between throughput and delay. Therefore,
as the routing algorithm is more successful in keeping delay low, the
flow control algorithm allows more traffic into the network, while the
precise balance between delay and throughput will be determined by
flow control, the effect of good routing under high offered load
conditions is to realise a more favourable delay-throughput curve along
which flow control operates, as shown in Figure 9.

Throughput
(Source Ref [2])
Figure 9: Throughput .s. delay graph

Let US take an example to understand the intencacy. In the network of

Figure 10, all links have a capacity of 1Q units. There is a single
destination (R6) and two origins (R1 and R2). The offered pockets from
each ofRl and R2 to R5 and R6 is 5 units. Here, the offered load is light

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and can easily be accommodated with a short delay by routing along the
leftmost and rightmost paths, 1-3-6 and 2-5-6, respectively. If instead,
however, the routes 1-4-6 and 2-4-6 are used, the flow on link (4,6) with
equal capacity, resulting in very large delays.

(Source ref [2])

Figure 10: Example a sub network

Observe Figure 10 once again. All links have a capacity of 10 units. If,
all traffic is routed through the middle link (R4,R6), congestion occurs.
If, instead, paths (RI -RJ-R6) and (R2-R5-R6) are used, the average
delay is shorter/lesses.

In conclusion, the effect of good routing is to increase throughput for the

same value of average delay per packet under high offered load
conditions and decrease average delay per packet under low and
moderate offered load conditions. Furthermore, it is evident as low as
possible for any given level of offered load. While this is easier said
than done, analytically. Students are requested to refer to (Ref 2) for
further discussion. You are requested to further enhance your knowledge
by reading [Ref 2].

1.7.2 Classification of Routing Algorithm

Routing can be classified into the following types:

(i) Adaptive Routing

In adaptive routing; routing decisions are taken for each packet

separately i.e., for the packets belonging to the same destination, the
router may select a new route for each packet. In it, routing decisions are
based on condition or the topology of the network.

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(ii) Non-adaptive Routing

In non-adaptive routing; routing decisions are not taken again and again
i.e., once the router decides a route for the destination, it sends all
packets for that destination on that same route. In it routing decisions are
not based on condition or the topology of the network.

4.0 CONCLUSION

In this unit, you have been introduced to cocnetps pertaining to the

network layer functionalities. You have also been introduced to the
important services provided by the network layer. It is therefore
expected that by now after going through this unti you will be able to
differentiate between them and also describe how they are to the
implemented.

You have also learnt the concept of ranting and congestion as well as the
interaction between ranting and flow control.

5.0 SUMMARY

In this unit, we looked at the two types of end-to-end delivery services

in computer networks i.e., connection oriented service and connection
less service. Connection oriented service is a reliable network service,
while connection-less service is unreliable network service. Then we
studied the concept of addressing. A network addresses identifies
devices separately or as members of a group. Internetwork addresses can
be categorised into three types i.e., data link layer addresses, media
access control (MAC) addresses and network layer addresses. After this,
we studied a problem that occurs at the network layer level i.e.,
congestion. It is a problem that occurs due to overload on the network.
Then, we discussed routing. It is the act of moving data packets in
packet-switched network, from a source to a destination. We also
examined the relationship between routing and flow control through an
example and diagrams.

6.0 TUTOR-MARKED ASSIGNMENT

1) What are three types of internet work addresses? Explain in brief.

2) Differentiate between following:

(i) Hierarchical address and Flat address

(ii) Static and Dynamic address.

3) What is congestion in the network? Explain in brief.

4) Explain various congestion control schemes.

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5) What is routing? What are various activities performed by a

router?
6) Differentiate between adaptive and non-adaptive routing.

7.0 REFERENCES/FURTHER READINGS

A, S, Tarenbaum, (2002). Computer Network, 4th edition, Prentice Hall

of India, New Delhi.

Dmitri Berteskas and Robert Galleger, (1997). Data Network, Second

edition, Prentice Hall of India, New Delhi.

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UNIT 2 ROUTING ALGORITHMS

CONTENTS

1.0 Introduction
2.0 Objectives
3.0 Main Content
3.1 Flooding
3.2 Shortest Path Routing Algorithm
3.3 Distance Vector Routing
3.3.1 Comparison
3.3.2 The Count-to-infinity Problem
3.4 Link State Routing
3.5 Hierarchical Routing
3.6 Broadcast Routing
3.7 Multicast Routing
4.0 Conclusion
5.0 Summary
6.0 Tutor-Marked Assignment
7.0 References/Further Readings

1.0 INTRODUCTION

As you have studied earlier, the main function of the network layer is to
find the best route from a source to a destination. In routing, the route
with the minimum cost is considered to be the best route. For this
purpose, a router plays an important role. On the basis of cost of a each
link, a router tries to find the optimal route with the help of a good
routing algorithm. There are a large number of routing algorithms.
These algorithms are a part of the network layer and are responsible for
deciding on which output line an incoming packet should be transmitted.
Some of these routing algorithms are discussed in this unit.

2.0 OBJECTIVES

After going through this unit, you should be able to:

understand how the shortest path routing algorithm works

draw a spanning tree
understand the functioning of distance vector routing and link state
routing
understand and implement multicast routing.

3.0 MAIN CONTENT

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3.1 Flooding

Consider an example of any network topology (VC subnet) in which,

there are some link failures or in which, a few routers are not
operational. These failures will cause changes in the network typology
which have to be communicated to all the nodes in the network. This is
called broadcasting. These could be many such examples of
broadcasting in which the message has to be passed on to the entire
network.

A widely used broadcasting method, known as flooding, operates in the

following manner. The source node sends its information in the form of
a packet to those nodes in a subnet to which it is directly connected by a
link. These nodes relay it further to their neighbours who are also
directly connected, and so on, until the packet reaches all nodes in the
network. For example, in the Figure 1(a), RI will send its packets to R2
and R3. R2 will send the packet to R5 and R4. Two additional rules are
also applied in order to limit the number of packets to be transmitted.
First, a node will not relay the packet back to the node from which the
packet was obtained. For example, R2 will not send the packet back to
Rl if, it has received it from RI. Second, a node will transmit the packet
to its neighbours at most once; this can be ensured by including on the
packet the 10 number of the origin node and a sequence number, which
is incremented with each new packet issued by the origin node. By
storing the highest sequence number received for each node, and by not
relaying packets with sequence numbers that are less than or equal to the
one stored, a node can avoid transmitting the same packet more than
once, on each of its incident links. On observing these rules, you will
notice that, links need not preserve the order of packet transmissions; the
sequence numbers can be used to recognise the correct order. The
following figure gives an example of flooding and illustrates how, the
total number of packet transmission pet packet broadcast lies between
Land 2L, where L is the number of bi-directionallinks of the network. In
this Figure 1 (a) Packet broadcasting from router RI to all other nodes
by using flooding [as in Figure 1(a)] or a spanning tree [as in Figure 1
(b)]. Arrows indicate packet transmissions at the time shown. Each
packet transmission time is assumed to be one unit. Flooding requires at
least as many packet transmissions as the spanning tree method and
usually many more. In this example, the time required for the broadcast
packet to reach all nodes is the same for the two methods. In general,
however, depending on the choice of the spanning tree, the time
required for flooding may be less than for the spanning tree method. The
spanning tree is used to avoid the looping of packets in the subnet.

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Figure 1(a): Flooding Figure 1(b): Spanning Tree

Figure I: Broadcasting (Source: Ref [2J)

Student should refer to [2] for further reading on this topic.

SELF ASSESSMENT EXERCISE 1

1) Following statements are True or False

(i) Dijkstra algorithm divides the node into two sets i.e., tentative
and permanent. T F
(ii) Flooding generates lots of redundant packets. T F
(iii) Flooding discovers only the optimal routes T F

2) What is a spanning tree?

3.2 Shortest Path Routing Algorithm

Shortest path routing algorithm is a simple and easy to understand

technique. The basic idea of this technique is to build a graph of the
subnet, with each node of the graph representing a router and each arc of
the graph representing a communication line i.e., link. For finding a
route between a given pair of routers, the algorithm just finds the
shortest path between them on the graph. The length of a path can be
measured in a number of ways as on the basis of the number of hops, or
on the basis of geographic distance etc.

There are a number of algorithms for computing the shortest path

between two nodes of a graph. One of the most used algorithm is the
Dijkstra algorithm. This is explained below:

In this algorithm, each node has a label which represents its distance
from the source node along the best known path. On the basis of these
labels, the algorithm divides the node into two sets i.e., tentative and

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permanent. As in the beginning no paths are known, so all labels are

tentative. The Algorithm works in the following manner:

1) First mark source node as current node (T -node)

2) Find all the neighours of the T -node and make them tentative.
3) Now examine all these neigbour.
4) Then among all these node, label one node as permanent (i.e.,
node with the lowest weight would be labeled as permanent) and
mark it as the T -node.
5) If, the designation node is reached or tentative list is empty then
stop, else go to step 2.

An example of Dijkstra routing algorithm is explained in Figure 2: In

this example, we want to find the best route between A and E. Here, we
will show permanent nodes with filled circles and T -nodes with the -->
symbol.

1) As shown in the Figure below, the source node (A) has been
chosen as T-node, and so its label is permanent.

2) In this step, as you see B, C are the tentative nodes directly linked
to T -node (A). Among these nodes, since B has less weight, it
has been chosen as T -node and its label has changed to
permanent.

3) In this step, as you see D, E are the tentative nodes directly linked
to T –node (B). Among these nodes, since D has less weight, it
has been chosen as T -node and its label has changed to
permanent.

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4) In this step, as you see C, E are the tentative nodes directly linked
to T -node(D). Among these nodes, since E has less weight, it has
been chosen as T -node and its label has changed to permanent.

5) E is the destination node. Now, since the destination node (E) has
been, reached so, we stop here, and the shortest path is A -8 -0
-E.

Figure 2: Dijkstra's algorithm to compute the shortest path routing

3.3 Distance Vector Routing

Nowadays, computer networks generally use dynamic routing

algorithms rather than the static ones described above because, static
algorithms do not take the current network load into account. Distance
vector routing and link state routing are two main dynamic
algorithms. In this section, we will go through the distance vector
routing algorithm. It is also known as Belman-Ford routing algorithm.

Bellman-Ford Algorithm

The Bellman-Ford algorithm can be stated as follows: Find the shortest

paths from a given source node subject keeping in mind the constraint
that, the paths contain at most one link; then, find the shortest paths,
keeping in mind a constraint of paths of at most two links, and so on.
This algorithm also proceeds in stages. The description of the algorighm
is given below.

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s = source node
w(i,j) = link cost from node i to node j; w(i,j) = 00 if the two nodes are
not directly connected; w(i,j) > 0 if the two nodes are directly connected.

h = maximum number of links in a path at the current stage of the

algorithm

Lh(n) = cost of the least-cost path from node s to node n under the
constraint of no more than h links

1. [Initialisation]

L0(n) = ∞, for all n≠ s

Lh(S) = 0, for all h

2. [Update]

For each successive h > 0:

For each n ≠s, compute

min
Lh+1(n) = [Lh (j) = w(j,n)]
j

Connect n with the predecessor node j that achieves the minimum, and
eliminate any connection of n with a different predecessor node formed
during an earlier iteration. The path from s to n terminates with the link
from j to n.

For the iteration of step 2 with h = K, and for each destination node n,
the algorithm compares potential paths from s to n of length K + 1 with
the path that existed at the end of the previous iteration. If the previous,
shorter path has less cost, then that path is retained. Otherwise a new
path with length K + 1 is defined from s to n; this path consists of a path
of length K from s to some node j, plus a direct hop from node j to node
n. In this case, the path from s to j that is used is the K-hop path for j
defined in the previous iteration.

Table 1 shows the result of applying this algorithm to a public switched

network, using s = 1. At each step, the least-cost paths with a maximum
number of links equal to h are found. After the final iteration, the least-
cost path to each node and the cost of that path has been developed. The
same procedure can be used with node 2 as the source node, and so on.
Students should apply Dijkstra's algorithm to this subnet and observe
that the result will eventually be the same.

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3.3.1 Comparison

Now, let us compare the two algorithms in terms of what information is

required by each node to find out the optional path in the Bellman-Ford
algorithm. In step 2,the calculation for node n involves knowledge of the
link cost to all neighboruing nodes to node n [i.e., w(j., w(j, n)] plus the
total path cost to each of those neighbouring nodes from a particular
source node s (i.e., Lh(j)]. Each node can maintain a set of costs and
associated paths for every other node in the network and, exchange this
information with its direct neighbours from time to time. Each node can
therefore, use the expression in step 2 of the Bellman-Ford algorithm,
based only on information from its neighbours and knowledge of its link
costs, to update it costs and paths. On the other hand, consider Dijkstra's
algorithm. Step 3, it appears, required that each node have complete
topological information about the network. That is, each node must
know the link costs of all links 'in the network. Thus, for this algorithm,
information must be exchanged with all other nodes.

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In general, an evaluation of the relative merits of the two algorithms

should consider the processing time of the algorithms and the amount of
information that must be collected from other nodes in the network or
internet. The evaluation will depend on the implementation approach
and the specific implementation.

A final point: Both algorithm are known to converge under static

conditions of topology, and link costs and will converge to the same
solution. If the link costs change over time the algorithm will attempt to
catch up with these changes. However, if the link cost depends on
traffic, which in turn depends on the routes chosen, then a feedback
condition exists, that could result in instabilities.

3.3.2 The Count-to-Infinity Problem

One of the serious drawbacks of the Bellman-Food algorithm is that it

quickly responds 10 a path will a shorter delay but, responds slowly to a
path with a longer delay. This is also known as count to infinity
problem. Consider a subnet in which a router, whose best route to
destination X is large. If, on the next exchange neighbour, A suddenly
reports a short delay to X, the router just switches over to using line A to
send traffic to X. In one vector exchange, the good news is processed.

To see how fast good news propagates, consider the five-node (linear)
subnet of the following figure. (Figure 4), where the delay metric is the
number of hops. In the Figure 4 (a) there are five routers Ra, Rb, Rc, Rd
and Re linked to each other linearly. Suppose, a router Ra is down
initially and all the other routers know this. In other words, they have all
recorded the delay to Ra as infinity.

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We will describe this problem in the following stages: (i) when router
Ra is up, and (ii) when router Ra is down. Now let us take the first stage.
When Ra is up, the other routers in the subnet learn about it via the
information (vector) exchanges. At the time of the first exchange, Rb
learns that its left neighbour has zero delay to Ra Rb now makes an
entry in its routing table that Ra is just one hop away to the left. All the
other routers still think that Ra is down. At this point, the routing table
entries for Ra are as shown in the second row of Figure 4(b). On the
next exchange, Rc learns that Rb has a path of length 1 to A, so it
updates its routing table to indicate a path of length 2, but Rd and Re do
not hear the good news until later. Clearly, the good news is spreading at
the rate of one hop per exchange. In a subnet whose longest path is of
length N hops, within N exchanges everyone will know about the
newly-revived lines and routers.

Now, let us consider the second stage Figure 4(b), in which all the lines
and routers are initially up. Routers Rb Rc Rd and Re are at a distance of
1,2,3 and 4 from A. Suddenly, A goes down, or alternatively, the line
between A and B is cut, which is effectively the same thing from B's
point of view.

At the first packet exchange, Rb does not hear anything from Ra.
Fortunately, Rc says: Do not worry; 1 have a path to A of length 2. Little
does B know that C's path runs through Rb itself. For all Rb knows, Rc
might have ten lines all with separate paths to Ra of length 2. As a
result, Rb thinks it can reach Ra via Rc, with a path length of 3. Rd and
Re do not update their entries on the first exchange.

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On the second exchange, C notices that each of its neighbours are

claiming a path to Ra of length 3. It picks one of them at random and
makes its new distance to Ra 4, as shown in the third row of Figure
4(b). Subsequent exchanges produce the history shown in the rest of
Figure 4(b).

Form Figure 4, it should be clear why bad news travels slowly: no

router ever has a value higher than the minimum of all its neighbours.
Gradually, all routers work their way up to infinity, but the number of
exchanges required depends on the numerical value used for, infinity.
For this reason, it is wise to set infinity to the longest path plus I. If the
metric time is delay, there is no well-defined upper bound, so a high
value is needed to prevent a path with a long delay from being treated as
down. Not entirely surprisingly, this problem is known as the count-to-
infinity problem. The core of the problem is that when X tells Y that it
has a path somewhere, Y has no way of knowing whether it itself is on
the path.

3.4 Link State Routing

As explained above distance vector routing algorithm has a number of
problems like count to infinity problem. For these reasons, it was
replaced by a new algorithm, known as the link state routing.

Link state routing protocols are like a road map. A link state router
cannot be fooled as easily into making bad routing decisions, because it
has a complete picture of the network. The reason is that, unlike
approximation approach of distance vector, link state routers have first
hand information from all their peer routers. Each router originates
information about itself, its directly connected links, and the state of
those links. This information is passed around from router to router,
each router making a copy of it, but never changing it. Link-state
involves each router building up the complete topology of the entire
network (or at least of the partition on which the router is situated), thus,
each router contains the same information. With this method, routers
only send information to of all the other routers when there is a change
in the topology of the network. The ultimate objective is that every
router should have identical information about the network, and each
router should be able to calculate its own best path independently.
Independently calculate its own best paths.

In contrast to the distance-vector routing protocol, which works by

sharing its knowledge of the entire network with its neighbours, link-
state routing works by having the routers inform every router in the
network about its nearest neighbours. The entire routing table is not
distributed any router but, the part of the table containing its neighbours
is:

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Link-state is also known as shortest path first.

Link State Packet

When a router floods the network with information about its

neighbourhood, it is said to be advertising. The basis of this advertising
is a short packet called a link state packet (LSP). An LSP usually
contains four fields: the ID of the advertiser, the ID of the destination
network, the cost, and the ID of the neighbour router. The structure of a
LSP is shown in Table 2.
Table 2: Link sille packel (LSP)

How Link State Routing Operates

The idea behind link state routing is simple and can be stated in five
parts as suggested by Tanenbaum [Ref. I]. Each router must do the
following:

1) Neighbour discovery

The Router has to discover its neighbours and learn their network
addresses. As a router is booted, its first task is to learn who its
neighbours are.
The Router does this by sending a special HELLO packet on each point-
to-point line. The router on the other end is expected to send a reply
disclosing its identity. These names must be globally unique. If two or
more routers are connected by a LAN, the situation becomes slightly
more complicated one way of modeling the LAN is to consider it as a
node itself. Please see reference [I] for further explanation through a
diagram.

2) Measure delay

Another job that a router needs to perform is to measure the delay or

cost to each of its neighbours. The most common way to determine this
delay is to send over the line a special ECHO packet that the other side
is required to send back immediately. By measuring the round-trip time
and dividing it by two, the sending router can get a reasonable estimate
of the delay. For even better results, the test can be conducted several
times and the average used.

This method implicitly assumes that delays are symmetric, which may
not always be the case.

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3) Building link state packets

After collecting the information needed for the exchange, the next step
for each router is to build a link state packet containing all the data. This
packet starts with the identity of the sender, followed by a sequence
number and age, and a list of neighbours. For each neighbour, the delay
to that neighbour is given.

As an example, let's consider the subnet given in Figure 5 with delays

shown as labels on the lines. For this network, the corresponding link
state packets for all six routers are shown in the Tabte 3.

Figure 5: A subnet for link state routing

Building the link state packets is easy.. The hard part is determining
when to build them. One possibility, is to build them periodically, that
is, at regular intervals. Another possibility is to build them when some
significant event occurs, such as a line or neighbour going down or
coming back up again or changing its properties appreciably.

4) Distribute the packets

Let us describe the basic algorithm in distributing the link state packet.
The fundamental concept here is flooding to distribute the packets. But
to keep the number of packets flowing in the subnet under control, each
packet contains a sequence number that is incremented for each new
packet delivered. When a new link state packet arrives, it is checked
against the list of packets already scene by a router. It is discarded in
case the packet is old; otherwise it is forwarded on all lines except the

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one it arrived on. A router discards an obsolete packet (i.e., with a lower
sequence) in case it has seen the packet with a highest sequence number.

The age of a data packet is used to prevent corruption of the sequence

number from causing valid data to be ignored. The age field is
decremented once per second by the routers which forward the packet.
When it hits zero it is discarded. How often should data be exchanged?

5) Compute shortest path tree

After accumulating all link state packets, a router can construct the
entire subnet graph because every link is represented. In fact, every link
is represented twice, once for each direction. The two values can be
averaged or used separately.

Now, an algorithm like Dijkstra's algorithm can be run locally to

construct the shortest path to all possible destinations. The results of this
algorithm can be installed in the routing tables, and normal operation
resumed.

Problems in Link State Routing

In link state protocol, the memory required to store the data is

proportional to k* n, for n routers each with k neighbors and the
time required to compute can also be large.

In it bad data e.g., data from routers in error will corrupt the
computation.

3.5 Hierarchical Routing

As you see, in both link state and distance vector algorithms, every
router has to save some information about other routers. When the
network size grows, the number of routers in the network increases.
Consequently, the size of routing tables increases, as well, and routers
cannot handle network traffic as efficiently. We use hierarchical routing
to overcome this problem. Let's examine this subject with an example:

We use distance vector algorithms to find best routers between nodes. In

the situation depicted below in Figure 6, every node of the network has
to save a routing table with 17 records.

Here is a typical graph and routing table (Table 4) for A:

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Figure 6: Network graph

In hierarchical routing, routers are classified in groups known as regions

(Figure 7). Each router has only the information about the routers in its
own region and has no information about routers in other regions. So
routers just save one record in their table for every other region. In this
example, we have classified our network into five regions as shown
below.

Table 5: A's Routing table for Hierarchical! Routing

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Figure 7: Hierarchical routing

If A wants to send packets to any router in region 2 (D, E, F or G), it

sends them to 8, and so on. As you can see, in this type of routing, the
tables sizes are reduced so, network efficiency improves. The above
example shows two-level hierarchical routing. We can also use three or
four level hierarchical routing as well.

In three-level hierarchical routing, the network is classified into a

number of clusters. Each cluster is made up of a number of regions, and
each region contains a number of routers. Hierarchical routing is widely
used in Internet routing and makes use of several routing protocols.

3.6 Broadcast Routing

Up to now we were discussing about sending message from a source to

a destination. Sometimes a host needs to send messages all other hosts.
This type of transmission i.e., to send a message to all destinations

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simultaneously is known as broadcasting. There are a no. of methods

for broadcasting. These are:

Send /I distinct packet to each destination

This is a very simple method, in which a source sends a distinct packet

to each destination. Major disadvantages of this method are:

a) It wastes bandwidth.
b) In this method source needs to have a complete list of all
destinations.

Because of this reason this method is the least desirable of the other
methods.

Flooding

This is also a very simple method of broadcasting. In this method every

incoming packet is sent out on every outgoing line except the line from
which it arrived. This algorithm is very simple to implement. But the
major disadvantage of this algorithm is that it generates lots of
redundant packets, thus consumes too much bandwidth.

Multidestination routing

In this method each packet contains either a list of destinations or a bit

map indicating the desired destinations. When a packet arrives at a
router, router determines the set of output lines that would be required
by checking all the destinations. Router only chooses those output lines
which are the best route to at least one of the destinations. After this
router creates a new copy of the packet for each output line to be used
and in each packet it includes only those destinations that are to use the
line. Therefore, the destination set is partitioned among the output lines.
In this, after a sufficient number of hops, each packet will carry only one
destination and can be treated as a normal packet.

Using a spanning tree

A spanning tree is a subset of graph that includes all the nodes (of
graph) but contains no loops. This method uses the spanning tree,
therefore, each router knows which of its lines belong to the spanning
tree. When a packet arrives at a router, it copies onto all the spanning
tree lines except the one it arrived on.

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Advantage of this method is that it makes excellent use of bandwidth

and generates only the minimum number of packets required to do the
job.

In this method each router must have knowledge of some spanning tree.
Sometimes this information is available (e.g., with link state routing) but
sometimes it is not (e.g., with distance vector routing), this is the major
disadvantage of this method.

Reverse path forwarding

Our last broadcast algorithm is an attempt to approximate the behaviour

of the previous one, even when the routers do not know anything at all
about spanning trees. The idea, called reverse path forwarding, is
remarkably simple once it has been pointed out.

In this method, when a broadcast packet arrives at a router, the router

checks whether the packet arrived on the line that is normally used for
sending packets to the source of the broadcast or not.

If the packet arrived on the line that is normally used for sending packets
to the source of the broadcast then Router forwards copies of it onto all
lines except the one it arrived on.

Else (i.e., packet arrived on a line other than the preferred one for
reaching the source)

Router discards the packet as a likely duplicate.

3.7 Multicast Routing

In many cases, you need to send same data to multiple clients at the
same time. In this case, if, we use unicasting then the server will connect
to each of its clients again and again, but each time it will send an
identical data stream to each client. This is a waste of both server and
network capacity. If, we use broadcasting in this case, it would be
inefficient because sometimes receivers are not interested in the message
but they receive it nonetheless, or sometimes they are interested but are
not supposed to see the message.

In such cases i.e., for sending a message to a group of users (clients), we

use another technique known as multicasting. The routing algorithm
used for multicasting, is called multicast routing.

Group management is the heart of multicasting. for group management,

we require some methods to create and destroy a group and to allow

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processes to join and leave a group. When a router joins a group, it

informs its host of this fact. For routing, routers mainly want to know
which of their hosts belong to which group. For this, either the host must
inform their router about changes in the group membership, or routers
must query their hosts periodically. On receiving this information,
routers tell their neighbours, so the informations propagated through the
subnet.

Now, we will learn the working of multicasting through an example. In

our example (as shown in Figure 8), we have taken a network
containing two groups i.e., group 1 and 2. Here, some routers are
attached to hosts that belong to only one of these groups and some
routers are attached to hosts that belong to both of these groups.

Figure 8: Network containing two groups i.e., 1 and 2

To do multicast routing, first, each router computes a spanning tree

covering all other routers. For example, Figure 9 shows spanning
tree for the leftmost router.

Figure 9: Spanning tree for the leftmost router

Now, when a process sends a multicast packet to a group, the first

router examines its spanning tree and prunes it. Pruning is the task of

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removing all lines that do not lead to hosts that are members of the
group. For example, Fig. 10 shows the pruned spanning tree for
group 1 and Fig. 11 shows the pruned spanning tree for group 2.
There are a number of ways of pruning the spanning tree. One of the
simplest ones that can be used, if link state routing is used and each
router is aware of the complete topology, including the hosts that
belong to those groups. Then, the spanning tree can be pruned,
starting at the end of each path, working toward the root, and
removing all routers that do not belong to the group under
consideration. With distance vector routing, a different pruning
strategy can be followed. The basic algorithm is reverse path
forwarding. However, whenever a router with no hosts interested in a
particular group and no connections to other routers, receives a
multicast message for that group, it responds with a PRUNE
message, thus, telling the sender not to send it any more multicasts
for that group. When a router with no group members among its own
hosts has received such a message on its lines, it, too, can respond
with a PRUNE message.

In this way, the subnet is recursively pruned.

Figure 10: A pruned spanning multicast tree for group 1

Figure 11: A pruned spanning multicast tree for group 2

After pruning, multicast packets are forwarded only along the

appropriate spanning tree. This algorithm needs to store separate pruned
spanning tree for each member of each group. Therefore, this would not
be good for large networks.

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4.0 CONCLUSION

In this unit, you have learnt about ranting algorithms like broadcasting
and flooding. You have also learnt about the shortest path ranting,
distance vector costing.

5.0 SUMMARY

In this unit, we first studied different routing algorithms. First, we

looked at finding the route between a given pair of routers. The
algorithm finds the shortest path between them on the graph. A number
of algorithms for computing the shortest path between two nodes of a
graph are known. Here, we have studied the Dijkstra algorithm.

Next, we studied flooding. In flooding, every incoming packet is sent

out on every outgoing line except the line from which it arrived. This
algorithm is very simple to implement, but it generates lots of redundant
packets. It discovers all routes, including the optimal one, therefore this
is robust and gives high performance.

Next, we studied the Belman-Ford routing algorithm. In this algorithm

each host maintains a routing table. This routing table has an entry for
every other router in the subnet. These tables are updated by exchanging
information with the neighbours.

Next, we studied the link state routing algorit4m. In thIS algorithm, each
router originates information about itself, its directly connected links,
and the state of those links. This information is passed around from
router to router, each router making a copy of it, but never changing it.
The ultimate objective is that every router has identical information
about the network, and each router will independently calculate its own
best paths.

Next, we discussed hierarchical routing algorithm. In hierarchical

routing, routers are classified in groups known as regions. Each router
has only the information about the routers in its own region and has no
information about routers in other regions.

Next, we studied broadcasting i.e., the send a message to all destinations

in a network simultaneously. There are a number of methods for
broadcasting such as, flooding, muitidestination routing, reverse path
forwarding etc. In this unit we discussed all these methods in brief.

Finally, we discussed multicasting i.e., to send a message to a group of

users in a network. In multicasting, each router first computes a
spanning tree covering all other router. Now, when a process sends a

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multicast packet to a group, the first router examines its spanning tree
and prunes it. Then, packets are forwarded only along the appropriate
spanning tree.

6.0 TUTOR-MARKED ASSIGNMENT

1) Which of the following statements are True or False.

(i) Distance vector routing is a static routing algorithm. T 0 F 0

(ii) Dijkstra's algorithms can he run locally in link state routing to
construct the shortest path. TO F 0

2) Answer the following questions briefly.

(i) What are the problems with distance vector routing algorithm? .
(ii) What is LSP?

3) Which of the following statements are True or False.

(i) In hierarchical routing, each router has no information about

routers in other regions. TO FO
(ii) A spanning tree is a subset of a graph that includes some of the
nodes of that graph. TO FO
(iii) Sending a message to a group of users in a network is known as
broadcasting. TO F 0

4) Answer the following questions in brief.

(i) Explain reverse path forwarding in brief.

(ii) What is Pruning?

7.0 REFERENCES/FURTHER READINGS

S. Tanenbaum, (2002).Computer Nelwork, 4”' edition, Prentice Hall of

India, New Delhi.

Dmitri Berteskas and Robert Galleger, (1997). Data Network. Second

edition, Prentice Hall of India, New Delhi.

William Stalling, Data and Computer Communication. Pearson

Education, 2bdEdition, Delhi.

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UNIT 3 CONGESTION CONTROL IN PUBLIC

SWITCHED NETWORK

CONTENTS

1.0 Introduction
2.0 Objectives
3.0 Main Content
3.1 Reasons for Congestion in the network
3.2 Congestion Control vs. Flow Control
3.3 Congestion Prevention Mechanism
3.4 General Principles of Congestion Control
3.5 Open Loop Control
3.5.1 Admission Control
3.5.2 Traffic Policing and its Implementation
3.5.3 Traffic Shaping and its Implementation
3.5.4 Difference between Leaky Bucket Traffic Shaper
and Token Bucket Traffic Shaper
3.6 Congestion Control in Packet-switched Networks
4.0 Conclusion
5.0 Summary
6.0 Tutor-Marked Assignment
7.0 References/Further Readings

1.0 INTRODUCTION

Congestion occurs when the number of packets being transmitted

through the public switched networks approaches the packet handling
capacity of the network. When the number of packets dumped into the
subnet by the hosts, is within its carrying capacity, all packets are
delivered (except for a few that are afflicted with transmission errors).
The networks get overloaded and start dropping the packet, which leads
to congestion in the network. Due to the dropping of packets, the
destination machine may demand the sources to retransmit the packet,
which will result in more packets in the network and this leads to further
congestion. The net result is that the throughput of the network will be
very low as, illustrated in the Figure 1.

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2.0 OBJECTIVES

After going through this unit, you should be able to:

define congestion
list the factors for the occurrence of congestion in the Network
differentiate between congestion control and flow control
outline the general principles of congestion Control
discuss congestion prevention mechanism.

3.0 MAIN CONTENT

3.1 Reasons for Congestion in the Network

Tanenbaum [Ref 1] has mentioned several reasons for the occurrence of

congestion in the network:

1) Sudden arrival of a packet on a particular output line from

multiple input source, leading to the formation of a queue and
dropping of a packet in case of an insufficient memory in a router
to hold these packets. Nagle has pointed out that, even if, there is
a huge memory at the router level, there is no improvement in
congestion, rather, it get worse because of time out of the packet.

2) Slow processors can also cause congestion.

3) Low bandwidth channels can also cause congestion. If, we

increase the bandwidth without a fast processor or vice-versa,
will be of little help.
3.2 Congestion Control Vs Flow Control

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The differences between congestion and flow control are whether

mentioning as they are related terms. There is another term, related to
these two, called error control. Congestion Control ensures that the
subnet is able to carry the offered traffic and that it is not overloaded.
Flow control has to do with ensuring that the fast sender does not
overload packets from the noisy channels receiver. Error control deals
with algorithms that recover or conceal the effects from packet losses.
The goal of each of these control mechanisms are different, but, the
implementation can be combined.

The following Table differentiates between Congestion Control and

Flow Control:

Table 1: Congestion Control vs. Flow Control

The reason for comparing congestion and flow control is that, some
congestion control algorithms operate by sending messages back to the
senders to slow down incase, the network is congested. In case, the
receiver is overloaded, the host will get a similar message to slow down.

3.3 Congestion Prevention Mechanism

The purpose of this section is to examine various mechanisms used at

the different layers to achieve different goals. But, from the congestion
control point of view, these mechanism are not very effective. We will
start with data link layer first. Go back N and Selection Repeat are flow
control mechanism available at the data link layer. Incase, there is any
error with the packet, Go back N retransmits all the packets up to the
packet where the error occurred. For example, there is an error in 5th
packet, it means that it will retransmit 1,2,3,4, and 5 which create extra
load on the network, thereby, leading to congestion. Selective repeat
retransmits only that packet. With respect to congestion control,
selective repeat is clearly better than go back N.

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The following table provides the detail:

Table 2: Mechanism Affecting Congestion

Acknowledgement mechanism also affects congestion. If, each packet

is acknowledged immediately then it will generate extra traffic.
However, if acknowledgement is piggybacked onto reverse traffic along,
extra timeouts and retransmissions may happen which will cause
congestion. A flow control scheme with a small window size reduces
the data rate and thus, helps reduce congestion.

At the network good routing algorithm can help avoid congestion by

distributing the traffic over all the lines, whereas a bad one can send too
much traffic over already congested lines. Finally, packet lifetime
management deals with the duration a packet may live before being
discarded. If, it is too long, lost packets may reside in the network a long
time, but if, it is too short, packets may sometimes time out before
reaching their destination, thus, inducing retransmissions. Therefore, we
require good routing algorithm and optimal packet life time.

Between transport and data link layer there are common issues (Flow
Control, acknowledge mechanism) with respect to Congestion Control
mechanism but at the transport layer, the extra problem is related to
determining time out internal across the network, which is a difficult
problem.

3.4 General Principles of Congestion Control

From our earlier discussions it appears that congestion problem is not

very easy to solve. Typically, the solution depends on the type of
requirements for the application (e.g., Q. S, high bandwidth, fast
processing). Like routing algorithm, congestion control algorithms have
been classified into two types:

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Open Loop
Closed Loop.

Open loop solutions attempt to solve the problem with a good design,
that ensures that congestion does not occur in the network. Once having
network is running midcourse corrections are not made. Open loop
algorithm works on two basic mechanisms: i) Admission Control ii)
Resource Reservation. Admission control is a function performed by a
network to accept or reject traffic flow. Therefore, the purpose of open
loop solution is to ensure that the traffic generated by the source will not
lower the performance of network below the specified Q. S. The
network will accept traffic till QoS parameters are satisfied otherwise, it
rejects the traffic.

In contrast, closed loop solutions are based on the concept of a feedback

loop. These algorithms are called closed loop because the state of the
network has to be fed up to the source that regulates traffic. Closed loop
algorithms follow dynamic approach to the solution of congestion
problems. It reacts during the congestion occurrence period or when the
congestion is about to happen. A variety of metrices have been proposed
to monitor the state of a subnet in order to observe congestion. These
are:

Queue length
The number of retransmitted packets due to timeout
Percentage of rejected packets due to shortage of the router's
memory
Average packet delay.

To prevent congestion from occurring, this mechanism monitors the

system to detect when and where congestion occurs, pass is this
information to places wi]ere action can be taken usually at the source
and finally adjusts the systems operation to correct the problem.

The presence of congestion means that the offered load in the network is
(temporarily) greater than the resources (routers) can handle. Two
straight forward solutions are to increase the resources or decrease the
load. To increase the resources the following mechanism may be used
as suggested in Tanenbaum [Ref 1].

i) Higher bandwidth may be achieved by increasing transmission

power of a satellite.

ii) Splitting traffic on multiple routers instead of a single best rout.

iii) Use of temporary dial-up telephone line between certain points.

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However, sometimes it is not possible to increase the capacity or it has

already been increased to the limit. But, if the network has reached the
maximum limit, the alternative is to reduce the load, The following
mechanism may be used (i) Denying service to some users (ii)
Degrading services to some or all users.

For subnets that use virtual circuits internally, these methods can be
used at the network layer. In the next section, we will focus on their use
in the network layer. We will also discuss the open loop control
mechanism in detail. The closed loop mechanism will be discussed in
Block 4 Unit 2 as a part of TCP Protocol.

3.5 Open Loop Control

As mentioned earlier Open Loop Control algorithm prevent the

occurrence of from Congestion occurrence rather than dealing with it
after it has occurred. It does not rely on feedback information to regulate
the traffic. Thus, this technique is based on the assumption that once the
packets are accepted from a particular source, the network will not get
overloaded. In this section, we will examine several such techniques and
its implementation. Learners are requested to Leon Garcia's book [Ref
2].

3.5.1 Admission Control

This is a widely used technique in virtual circuit network. The technique

is very simple and straight forward. Once congestion has occurred, no
more virtual circuits are to be set up. This is similar to a telephone
system in which there is no dial tone in case the source gets overloaded.
When a source wants to establish a connection, admission control
mechanism examines QoS parameters of the connections initiated by the
source. If it is OK, the connection (YC) is established otherwise, it is
rejected. In order to initiate a connection setup, a source specifies its
traffic flow indicating a set of parameters called traffic descriptor,
which includes peak rate, average rate, and maximum traffic burst
size. (Maximum length of time the traffic is generated at the peak rate)
and so on. Based on the characteristic of traffic flow, admission control
mechanism reserves the bandwidth (which usually lies between peak
rate and average rate).

3.5.2 Traffic Policing and its Implementation

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Leon Garcia [Ref2] has defined traffic policing as tbe process of

monitoring and enforcing the traffic flow of packets during the
connection period. The network may drop or mark the packet as
noncompliant and give low priority to traffic in case, it does not obey
the agreed upon parameters values during the initial connection setup
phase. Most implementations of traffic policing is done through the
Leaky Bucket algorithm. In this algorithm the bucket is considered as a
network and traffic flow is considered as water being poured into a
bucket. The following assumptions are made:

The bucket has certain depth to hold water just like a network can
accept a certain number of packets.

The bucket leaks at a certain rate (if there is water is the bucket)
no matter at what rate water enters the bucket. In terms of
computer networks, it should be interpreted as follows: No matter
at what rate the packets arrive at the input lines of a routers,
routers in a subnet passes to its outgoing link at a fixed rate.

If the bucket does not overflow when the water is poured into the
bucket, then the bucket of water is said to be conforming. In
terms of network, if the traffic is within the agreed norms, all
packets will be transferred.

The bucket will spillover if, it is full and if, additional water is
poured into it, if it gets more packets than it can handle, it will
lead to congestion and then the network due to which the
additional packets will be lost.

If, we expect the traffic flow to be very smooth, then the bucket has to
be of a shallow type. In case, the flow is bursty in nature, the bucket
should be deeper. In summary, what we want to observe is whether the
outflow of packets corresponds to the arrival rate of packets or not?
Implementation of a leaky bucket is similar to queue data structure
implementation. When a packet arrives, if there is space left in the
queue, it gets appended to the queue otherwise, it gets rejected.

3.5.3 Traffic Shaping and its Implementation

Leon Garcia [Ref2] has defined traffic shaping as the process of

altering traffic flow to another flow. It is mainly used for smoothening
the traffic. Consider an example, where a host is generating data at 30
kbps, which, it can transmit to the network in several ways (as shown in
the following Figure 2).
It can transmit at the rate of 100 kbps for 0.3 Second
It can transmit at the rate of75 kbps for 0.4 Second

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Figure 2: Possible traffic patterns at the average rate of 30 Kbps

You can make observation from the Figure 2 that the Figure 2 (a)
shows the smoothened pattern will create less stress on the network but
the destination machine may not want to wait for 1 Second to retrieve 30
kbps data at each period. Now, we will look at its implementation. There
are two mechanisms:

Leaky bucket traffic Shaper

Token bucket traffic Shapero

Leaky Bucket Traffic Shaper

It is a very simple mechanism in which data stored at the senders buffer,

is passed on at a constant interval to smoothen traffic as shown in
Figure 3. The buffer is used to store bursty traffic. This size defines the
maximum burst that can be accommodated.

Figure 3: A leaky bucket traffic shaper

This mechanism is different from a leaky bucket algorithm which was

used in traffic policing. The bucket in traffic policing is just a counter
whereas, a bucket is traffic shaper is a buffer that stores the packets.

Token Bucket Traffic Shaper

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The leaky bucket traffic shaper has a very restricted approach. Since, the
output pattern is always constant no matter how bursty traffic is. Many
applications produce variable rate traffic; sometimes bursty but
sometimes normal. If, such traffic is allowed to pass through a leaky
bucket traffic shaper, it may cause a very long delay. One such
algorithm that deals with such situations is the token bucket algorithm.

The following are the features of token bucket traffic shaper:

Token is used here, as a permit to send a packet. Unless there is a

token, no packet can be transmitted.

A Token bucket holds tokens which are generated periodically at

a constant rate.

New tokens are discarded, incase, the token buckets are full.

A packet can be transmitted only if, there is a token in the token

buffer. For example; in the Figure 4 there are two tokens in the
token buffer and five packets to be transmitted. Only two packets
will be transmitted and the other three will wait for tokens.

Traffic burstiness is proportional to the size of a token bucket.

Now, let us discuss the operation of this algorithm;

Just assume that the token bucket is empty and the numbers of packets
have arrived in the buffer. Since, there is no token in the token buffer,
the packets have to wait until the new packet is generated. Since, tokens
are generated periodically, the packet will be also transmitted
periodically at the rate at which the tokens arrive. In, the next section,
we will compare between the leaky bucket traffic shaper and token

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bucket traffic shaper. Students are also requested to see question 2 of

Check Your Progress 2.

3.5.4 Difference between Leaky Bucket Traffic Shaper and

Token Bucket Traffic Shaper

The following tables differentiate between two types of traffic shapers:

Table 3: Leaky Bucket Traffic Shaper and Token Bucket Traffic Shaper

3.6 Congestion Control in Packet-Switched Networks

Several control mechanism for Congestion Control in packet switched

network have been explored and published. William Stalling [Ref 3]
has presented the following mechanism to handle congestion:

1) Send a control packet (choke packet) from a node where

congestion has occurred to some or all source nodes. This choke
packet will have the effect of stopping or slowing the rate of
transmission from sources and therefore, it will reduce total load
on the network. This approach requires additional traffic on the
network during the period of congestion.

2) Make use of an end- to-end probe packet. Such a packet could be

time stamped to measure the delay between two particular
endpoints. This has the disadvantage of adding overhead to the
network.

3) Allow packet-switching nodes to add congestion information to

packets as they go by. There are two possible approaches here. A
node could add such information to packets moving in the
direction opposite to the congestion. This information reaches the

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source node quickly, and this reduces the flow of packets into the
network. Alternatively, a node could add such information to
packets moving in the same direction as the congestion. The
destination either asks the source to adjust the load or returns the
signal to the source in the packets (or acknowledgements)
moving in the reverse direction.

4.0CONCLUSION

This unit has dealt exclusively with the problem of congesting control in
public switched network. You have therefore learnt the difference
between congestion control and flow control, general principles of
congestion control and congestion control mechanism.

5.0 SUMMARY

In this unit, we examined several aspects of congestion i.e., what is

Congestion? How does it occur? We also differentiated between
Congestion Control and flow Control. Then, we gave two broad
classification of Congestion control; open loop and closed loop. At the
end, we touched upon issues related to congestion control in packet
switched network.

6.0 TUTOR MARKED ASSIGNMENT

1) Differentiate between Congestion Control and Flow Control.

2) What ape the differences between open loop and closed loop
solutions to congestion?
3) What are different approaches to open loop control?
4) What is the difference between leaky bucket traffic shaper and
token bucket traffic shaper?

7.0 REFERENCES/FURTHER READINGS

A.S. Tanenbaum, Computer Networks. 4th Edition, Prentice Hall of

India, New Delhi.

Leon Garcia and Indra Widjaja, Communication Networks fundamental

concepts and key architecture, Tata McGraw Hill, New Delhi.

William Stallings, Data and Computer Communication, 6th edition,

Pearson Edition, New Delhi.

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UNIT 4 INTERNETWORKING

CONTENTS

1.0 Introduction
2.0 Objectives
3.0 Main Content
3.1 Internetworking
3.1.1 How does a Network differ?
3.1.2 Networks Connecting Mechanisms
3.1.3 Tunneling and Encapsulation
3.2 Network Layer Protocols
3.2.1 IP Datagram Formats
3.2.2 Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP)
3.2.3 OSPF: The Interior Gateway Routing Protocol
3.2.4 BGP: The Exterior Gateway Routing Protocol
4.0 Conclusion
5.0 Summary
6.0 Tutor-Marked Assignment
7.0 References/Further Readings

1.0 INTRODUCTION
There are many ways in which one network differs from another. Some
of the parameters in which a network differs from another network are
packet length, quality of services, error handling mechanisms, flow
control mechanism, congestion control mechanism, security issues and
addressing mechanisms. Therefore, problems are bound to occur when
we require interconnection between two different networks. Different
mechanisms have been proposed to solve this problem: Tunneling is
used when the source and destination are the same type of network but,
there is a different .network in-between, Fragmentation may be used for
different maximum packet sizes of different networks. The network
layer has a large set of protocols besides IP. Some of these are OSPF
and BOP and ICMP. In this unit, we will discuss some of these
protocols as well as some internetworking mechanisms.

2.0 OBJECTIVES
After going through this unit, you should be able to:

list how are network differs from another

list the components of a network layer
define tunneling and fragmentation concepts
discuss the field format ofIP datagram, IP addressing
describe internet routing protocols, such OSPF and BOP
introduce Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP).

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3.0 MAIN CONTENT

3.1 Internetworking

The Internet is comprised of several networks, each one with different

protocols. There are many reasons for having different networks (thus
different protocols):

Many personal computers use TCP/IP,

Many larger business organisations still use IBM mainframes
with SNA Protocol.
Some PCs still run on Novell's NCP/IPX or Appletalk.
Wireless Network will have different protocols.
A large number of Telecommunication companies provide A TM
facilities.

In this section, we will examine some issues that arise when two or more
networks are interconnected. The purpose of interconnecting is to allow
any node or any network (e.g., Ethernet) to access data to any other node
on any other network. (e,g., A TM). Users should not be aware of the
existence of multiple networks.

3.1.1 How does a Network differ?

Tanenbaum [Ref. 1] has defined several features (Kindly refer to Table

1) that distinguishes one network from another. These differences have
be resolved while internetworking. All these features are defined at the
network layer only, although, the network differs at the other layers too.
They might have different encoding techniques at the physical layer,
different frame formats at the data link layer, and different QoS at the
transport layer etc.
Table I: Different type of Networks

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3.1.2 Networks Connecting Mechanisms

We have been addressing the problems of connecting network in the

earlier blocks also. Let us revisit these topics again. Networks can be
connected by the following devices:

Repeaters or Hubs can be used to connect networks at the

physical layer. The purpose of these devices is to move bits from
one network to another network. They are mainly analog devices
and do not understand higher layer protocols.

At data link layer, bridges and switches were introduced to

connect multiple LANs. They work at the frame level rather than
bits level. They examine the MAC address of frames and forward
the frames to different LANs. They may do little translation from
one protocol (e.g., Token ring, Ethernet) to another MAC Layer
Protocol. Routers were used at the network layer, which also does
translation incase the network uses different network layer
protocols.

Finally, the transport layer and application layer gateways deal with
conversion of protocols at the transport and application layer
respectively, in order to interconnect networks.

The focus of the section is to introduce mechanism internetworking at

the network layer. Therefore,; we have to understand the difference
between the switching that operates at the data link layer and routing
that operate at the network layer.

The main difference between the two operations is that, with a switch,
the entire frame is forwarded to a different LAN on the basis of its MAC
address. With a router, the packet is extracted and encapsulated in a
different kind of a frame and forwarded to a remote router on the basis
of the IP address in the packet. Switches need not understand the
network layer protocol to switch a packet, whereas, a router requires to
do so. Tanenbaum [Ref 1] has described two basic mechanisms of
internetworking: Concatenated virtual circuit and connectionless
internetworking. In the next sections we will talk about them.

Concatenated Virtual Circuit

This scheme is similar to the implementation of a connection-oriented

service in which, a connection from the source router to the destination
router must be established before any packet can be forwarded. This
type of a connection is called a virtual circuit, keeping with the analogy
of the physical circuits set up by the telephone system and the subnet is

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called a Virtual Circuit Subnet. The idea behind a Virtual Circuit is to

avoid choosing a new route for every packet to be forwarded. A route
selected as a part of the connection setup is stored in tables inside the
routers.

The essential feature of this mechanism is that a series of Virtual

Circuits is setup from the source machine on one network to the
destination machine on another network through one or more gateways.
Just like a router, each gateway maintains tables, indicating the virtual
circuits that are to be used for packet forwarding. This scheme works
when all the networks follow the same QoS parameters. But, if only
some networks support reliable delivery service, then all the schemes
will not work. In summary, this scheme has the same advantage and
disadvantage of a Virtual Circuit within a subnet.

Datagram Model

Unlike the previous model there is no concept of virtual circuits,

therefore, there is no guarantee of packet delivery. Each packet contains
the full source and destination address and are forwarded independently.
This strategy uses multiple routes and therefore, achieves higher
bandwidth.

A major disadvantage of this approach is that, it can be used over

subnets that do not use Virtual Circuit inside. For example, many LAN
and some mobile networks support this approach.

In summary, approach to internetworking is the same as datagram

subnets: Congestion proves robustness in case of router failures.

3.1.3 Tunneling and Encapsulation

It is used when the source and destination networks are the same but the
network, which lies in-between, is different. It uses a mechanism called
encapsulation where, a data transfer unit of one protocol is enclosed
inside a different kind of protocol. Tunneling allows us to carry one kind
of frame that uses a particular network but uses, a different kind of
frame.

Suppose two hosts located very far away from each other wants to
communicate and both have access to the Internet link. It means that
both of them are running TCP/IP based protocol. The carrier (WAN)
which lies between the two hosts is based at X.25. Its format is different
from TCP/IP. Therefore, the IP datagram forwarded by the host one will
be encapsulated in X.25 network layer packet and will be transported to

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the address of the router of the destination host, when it gets there. The
destination router removes the IP packet and sends it to host 2. WAN
can be considered as a big tunnel extending from one router to another.
[Ref l]. The packet from host J travels from one end of a X.25 based
tunnel to another end of the tunnel encapsulated properly. Sending and
receiving hosts are not concerned about the process. It is done by the
concerned router at the other end.

3.2 Network Layer Protocols

In the network layer, the internet can be viewed as a collection of

subnetworks or Autonomous systems that are interconnected. End
systems are not usually directly attached to each other via a single
communication link. Instead, they are directly connected to each other
through intermediate switching devices known as routers. A router takes
a chunk of information arriving on, one of its incoming links and
forwards that chunk of information on one of its outgoing
communication channels. Routing and communication links are a part of
Internet service providers. To allow communication among Internet
users and to allow users to access worldwide internet content, these
lower tier ISPs are interconnected through national and international
upper tier ISPs. An upper tier ISP consists of high speed routers
interconnected with high speed fiber-optic channels [Ref 5]. Each [SP
network whether upper tier or lower tier, is managed independently and
runs the JP Protocol which holds the whole internet together and
provides a best-efforts (not guaranteed) service to forward information
(datagrams) from source to destination without regards to where the
machines are located. In this section, we will introduce several network
layer protocols. The following Figure 1 shows the network layer with
these major components [Ref 5]:

(i) IP
(ii) ICMP
(iii) RIP, OSPF and BGP

Figure 1: Network layer protocols

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(i) IP: The first component is IP Protocol, which defines the

followings:

Fields in IP datagram
Address formats
Action taken by routers and end systems on a IP datagram
based on the values in these fields.

(ii) ICMP: The Second Component of the network layer is ICMP

(Internet Control Message Protocol) used by the hosts, routers
and gateways to communicate network layer information to each
other. The most typical use of ICMP is for error reporting.

(iii) RIP, OSPF and BGP: The third component is related to routing
protocols: RIP and OSPF are used for Intra-AS routing, whereas,
BOP is used as exterior gateway routing protocol.

Now we will describe each component separately.

3.2.1 IP Datagram Formats

An IP datagram consists of a header part and a data part. The header has
a 20-byte fixed part and a variable length optional part as shown in the
Figure2(a). The header format is shown in Figure 2(b). It is transmitted
in big-endian order: from left to right, with the high-order bit of the
Version field going first. On little endian machines, software conversion
is required on both the transmission header as well as the reception
header. The key fields in the IPv4 Internet Protocol version 4 datagram
headers are the followings.

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Figure 2 (b): IP address formats

The Version field specifies the IP version of the protocol, the datagram
belongs to. By including the version in each datagram, the router can
determine/interpret the reminder of the IP datagram.

Header length (4 bits)

The field defines the length of the header in multiples of four bytes. The
four bytes can represent a number between 0 and 15, which when
multiplied by 4, results in a 60 bytes. A typical IP datagram has 20 byte
header only, because most IP datagram do not contain options.

The Type of service (8 bits) defines how the datagram should be

handled. It defines bits to specify priority, reliability, delay, level of
throughput to meet the different requirements. For example, for digitised
voice, fast delivery, beats accurate delivery. For file transfer, error-free
transmission is more important than fast transmission.

The Total length includes everything in the datagram both header and
data. The maximum length is 65,535 bytes. At present, this upper limit
is tolerable, but with future gigabit networks, larger datagrams may be
needed.

The Identification filed is used in fragmentation. A datagram when

passing through different networks may be broken into several
fragments to match the network frame size. Once the fragmentation
occurs, each fragment is identified with a sequence number to this field.

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Surprisingly, the IPV. does not permit the fragmentation of the IP

datagram at the routers level.

Next, comes an unused bit and then two I-bit fields. DF stands for Don't
Fragment. It is an order to the router not to fragment the datagram
because, the destination is incapable of putting the pieces back together
again.

MF stands for More Fragments. All fragments except the last one have
this bit set. It is needed to know when all fragments of a datagram have
arrived.

The Fragment offset (13 bits) depicts the location of that the current
datagram, this fragment belongs to. All fragments except, the last one in
a datagram, must be multiple of 8 bytes, the elementary fragment unit.
Since.13 bits are provided, there is a maximum of 8192 fragments per
datagram, with a maximum datagram length of 65,536 bytes, one more
than the Total length field.

The Time to live (8 bit) field is a counter used to limit packet lifetimes. It
is supposed to count time in seconds allowing a maximum lifetime
of255 sec. It must be decremented on each hop and is supposed to be
decremented multiple times when queued for a longtime in the router. In
practice, it just counts hops. When it hits zero, the packet is dropped and
a warning packet is sent back to the source host. This feature, prevents
datagrams from wandering around forever, something that otherwise
might happen if the routing tables become corrupted.

Protocol (8 bits) is used when IP reaches its final destination. When, the
network layer has assembled a complete datagram, it needs to know
what to do with it. The Protocol field identifies the transport protocol
the network layers needs to give it to. TCP is one possibility, but so are
UDP and some others. The numbering of protocols is global across the
entire Internet.

The Header checkum verifies the header only. Such a checkum is useful
for detecting errors generated by bad memory words inside a router. this
algorithm is more robust than a normal add. Note, that the Header
checksum must be recomputed at each hop because, at least one field
always changes (the time to live field), but tricks can be used to speed up
the computation.

The Source address and Destination IP address: These fields carry the
32 bit IP addresses of the source and destination address. One portion of
the IP address indicates the network and the other portions indicate the

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host (or router) on the network. The IP addresses will be described in the
next section.

The Option filed (32 bits): This field allows an IP header to be extended
to be more functional. It can carry fields that control routing, timing and
security.

IP Addressing

All IP addresses are 32 bits long and are used in the Source address and
Destination address fields of IP packets.

In addition, to the physical addresses (contained on NICs) that identify

individual devices, the Internet requires an additional addressing
convention, an address that identifies the connection of a host to its
network. Before discussing the IP addressing, let us discuss, a host and a
router. A router is, fundamentally different from a host whose job is
receive a datagram on an incoming link from a host and forward it on
some outgoing link. Both router and a host are connected to a link
through an interface. 4 Routers has multiple interfaces whereas, a host
has a single interface. Because every host and a router is capable of
sending and receiving IP datagram, IP requires each host and router
interface to have its own IP address. Thus, an IP address is technically
associated with an interface rather1han with the host or a router.

For several decades, IP addresses were divided into the five categories
given in the Figure. The different classes are designed to cover the
needs of different types of organisations.

The three main address classes are class A, class B, and class C. By
examining the first few bits of an address, IP software can quickly
determine the class, and therefore, the structure, of an address. IP
follows these rules to determine the address class:

Class A

If, the first bit of an IP address is 0, it is the address of a class A

network. The first bit of a class A address identifies the address class.
The next 7 bits identify the network, and the last 24 bits identify the
host. There are fewer than 128 class A network numbers, but each class
A network can be composed of millions of hosts.

Class B

If, the first 2 bits of the address are 10, it is a class B network address.
The first 2 bits identify class; the next 14 bits identify the network, and

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the last 16 bits identify the host. There are thousands of class B network
numbers and each class B network can contain thousands of hosts.

Class C

If, the first 3 bits of the address are 110, it is a class C network address.
In a class C address, the first 3 bits arc class identifiers; the next 2] bits
are the network address, and the last 8 bits identify the host. There are
millions of class C network numbers, but each class C network is
composed of fewer than 254 hosts.

Class D

If, the first 4 bits of the address are 1110, it is a multicast address. These
addresses are sometimes called class D addresses, but they don't really
refer to specific networks. Multicast addresses are used to address
groups of computers together at moment in time. Multicast addresses,
identify a group of computers that share a common application, such as
a video conference, as opposed to a group of computers that share a
common network.

Class E

If, the first four bits of the address are 1111 it is a special reserved
address. These addresses are called class E addresses, but they don't
really refer to specific networks. No numbers are currently assigned in
this range.
IP addresses are usually written as four decimal numbers separated by
dots (periods). Each of the four numbers is in the range 0-255 (the
decimal values possible for a single byte). Because the bits that identify
class are contiguous with the network bits of the address, we can lump
them together and look at the address as composed of full bytes of
network address and full bytes of host address. If the value of the first
byte is:

Less than 128, the address is class A; the first byte is the network
number, and the next three bytes are the host address.

From 128 to 191, the address is class B; the first two bytes
identify the network, and the last two bytes identify the host.

From 192 to 223, the address is class C; the first three bytes are
the network address, and the last byte is the host number.

From 224 to 239, the address is multicast. There is no network

part. The entire address identifies a specific multicast group.

Greater than 239, the address is reserved.

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The following table depicts each class range with other details.

Table 2: IP address classes in dotted decimal formal with their range.

The IP address, which provides, universal addressing across all the

networks of the Internet, is one of the great strengths of the TCP/IP
protocol suite. However, the original class structure of the IP address
has weaknesses. The TCP/IP designers did not envision the enormous
scale of to day's network. When TCP/IP was being designed, networking
was limited to large organisations that could afford substantial computer
systems. The idea of a powerful UNIX system on every desktop did not
exist. At that time, a 32-bit address seemed so large that it was divided
into classes to reduce the processing load on routers, even though
dividing the address into classes sharply reduced the number of host
addresses actually available for use. For example, assigning a large
network a single class B address, instead of six class C addresses,
reduced the load on the router because the router needed to keep only
one route for that entire organisation. However, an organisation that was
given the class B address probably did not have 64,000 computers, so
most of the host addresses available to the organisa~ion 'were never
assigned.

The class-structured address design was critically strained by the rapid

growth of the Internet. At one point it appeared that all class B addresses
might be rapidly exhausted. To prevent this, a new way of looking at IP
addresses without a class structure was developed.

Subnet Masks and CIDR Networks (Classless IP Addresses)

IP addresses are actually 32-bit binary numbers. Each 32-bit IP address

consists of two subaddresses, one identifying the network and the other
identifying the host to the network, with an imaginary boundary
separating the two. The location of the boundary between the network
and host portions of an IP address is determined through the use of a
subnet mask. A subnet mask is another 32-bit binary number, which acts

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like a filter when applied to the 32-bit IP address. By comparing a

subnet mask with an IP address, systems can determine the portion of
the IP address that relates to the network, and the portion that relates to
the host. Wherever, the subnet mask has a bit set to “I”, the underlying
bit in the IP address is part of the network address. Wherever the subnet
mask is set to “0”, the related bit in the IP address is part of the host
address. For example, assume that the IP address
11000000101010000000000100010100 has a subnet mask of
11111111111111111111111100000000. In this example, the first 24
bits of the 32-bit IP addresses are used to identify the network, while the
last 8 bits are used to identify the host OD that network.

The size of a network (i.e., the number of host addresses available for
use on it) is a function of the number of bits used to identify the host
portion of the address. If, a subnet mask shows that 8 bits are used for
the host portion of the address block, a maximum of 256 possible host
addresses are available for that specific network. Similarly, if a subnet
mask shows that 16 bits are used for the host portion of the address
block, a maximum of 65,536 possible host addresses are available for
use on that network.

If a network administrator needs to split a single network into multiple

virtual networks, the bit-pattern in use with the subnet mask can be
changed to allow as many networks as necessary. For example, assume
that we want to split the 24-bit 192.168.10.0 network (which allows for
8 bits of host addressing, or a maximum of 256 host addresses) into two
smaller networks. All we have to do in this situation is, change the
subnet mask of the devices on the network so that they use 25 bits for
the network instead of 24 bits, resulting in two distinct networks with
128 possible host addresses on each network. In this case, the first
network would have a range of network addresses between
192.168.111.0 -192.168.10.127, while the second network would have a
range of addresses between 192.168.10.128 -192.168.10.255.

Networks can also be enlarged through the use of a technique known as

“supernetting,” which works by extending the host portion of a subnet
mask to the left, into the network portion of the address. Using this
technique, a pair of networks with 24-bit subnet masks can be turned
into a single large network with a 23-bit subnet mask. However, this
works only if you have two neighbouring 24-bit network blocks, with
the lower network having an even value (when the network portion of
the address is shrunk, the trailing bit from the original network portion
of the subnet mask should fall into the host portion of the new subnet
mask, so the new network mask will consume both networks). For
example, it is possible to combine the 24-bit 192.168.10.0 and .
192.168.1 1.0 networks together since the loss of the trailing bit from

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each network (00001010 vs. 00001011) produces the same 23-bit subnet
mask (000001x), resulting in a consolidated 192.168.10.0 network.
However, it is not possible to combine the 24-bit 192.168.11.0 and
192.168.12.0 networks, since the binary values in the seventh bit
position (00001011 vs. 00001100) do not match when the trailing bit is
removed.

Classless Inter-Domain Routing

In the modem networking environment defined by RFC 1519 [Classless

Inter-Domain Routing (CIDR)], the subnet mask of a network is
typically annotated in written form as a “slash prefix” that trails the
network number. In the subnetting example in the previous paragraph,
the original 24-bit network would be written as 192.168.10.0/24, while
the two new networks would be written as 192.168.10.0/25 and
192.168.10.128/25. Likewise, when the 192.168.10.0/24 and
192.168.11.0/24 networks were joined together as a single supernet, the
resulting network would be written as 192.168.10.0/23. Note, that the
slash prefix annotation is generally used for human benefit;
infrastructure devices still use the 32-bit binary subnet mask internally
to identify networks and their routes. All networks must reserve host
addresses (made up entirely of either ones or zeros), to be used by the
networks themselves. This is so that, each subnet will have a network-
specific address (the all-zeroes address) and a broadcast address (the all-
ones address). For example, a /24 network allows for 8 bits of host
addresses, but only 254 of the 256 possible addresses are available for
use. Similarly, /25 networks have a maximum of7 bits for host
addresses, with 126 of the 128 possible addresses available (the all-ones
and all-zeroes addresses from each subnet must be set aside for the
subnets themselves). All the systems on the same subnet must use the
same subnet mask in order to communicate with each other directly. If,
they use different subnet masks they will think they are on different
networks, and will not be able to communicate with each other without
going through a router first. Hosts on different networks can use
different subnet maks, although the routers will have to be aware of the
subnet masks in use on each of the segments.

Subnet masks are used only by systems that need to communicate with
the network directly. For example, external systems do not need to be
aware of the subnet masks in use on your internal networks, since those
systems will route data to your network by way of your parent network's
address block. As such, remote routers need to know only the provider's
subnet mask. For example, if you have a small network that uses only a /
28 prefix that is, a subset of your ISP's /20 network, remote routers need
to know only about your upstream provider's /20 network, while your
upstream provider needs to know your subnet mask in order to get the

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data to your local /28 network. The rapid depletion of the class B
addresses showed that three primary address classes were not enough:
class A was much too large and class C was much too small. Even a
class B address was too large for many networks but was used because it
was better than the other alternatives.

The obvious solution to the class B address crisis was to force

organisations to use multiple class C addresses. There were millions of
these addresses available and they were in no immediate danger of
depletion. As is often the case, the obvious solution is not as simple as it
may seem. Each class C address requires its own entry within the
routing table. Assigning thousands or millions of class C addresses
would cause the routing table to grow so rapidly that the routers would
soon be overwhelmed. The solution requires a new way of assigning
addresses and a new way of looking at addresses.

Originally network addresses were assigned in more or less sequential

order as they were requested. This worked fine when the network was
small and centralised. However, it did not take network topology into
account. Thus, only random chance would determine if the same
intermediate routers would be used to reach network 195.4.12.0 and
network 195.4.13.0, which makes it difficult to reduce the size of the
routing table. Addresses can only be aggregated if they are contiguous
numbers and are reachable through the same route. For example, if
addresses are contiguous for one service provider, a single route can be
created for that aggregation because that service provider will have a
limited number of routes to the Internet. But if one network address is in
France and the next contiguous address is in Australia, creating a
consolidated route for these addresses will not work.

Today, large, contiguous blocks of addresses are assigned to large

network service providers in a manner that better reflects the topology
of the network. The service providers then allocate chunks of these
address blocks to the organisations to which they provide network
services. This alleviates the short-term shortage of class B addresses
and, because the assignment of addressees reflects the topology of the
network, it permits route aggregation. Under this new scheme, we know
that network 195.4.12.0 and network 195.4.13.0 are reachable through
the same intermediate routers. In fact, both these addresses are in the
range of the addresses assigned to Europe, 194.0.0.0 to
195.255.255.255. Assigning addresses that reflect the topology of the
network enables route aggregation, but does not implement it. As long
as network 195.4.12.0 and network 195.4.13.0 are interpreted as
separate class C addresses, they will require separate entries in the
routing table. A new, flexible way of defining addresses is therefore,
needed.

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Evaluating addresses according to the class rules discussed above limits

the length of network numbers to 8, 16, or 24 bits -1, 2, or 3 bytes. The
IP address, however, is not really byte-oriented. It is 32 contiguous bits.
A more flexible way to interpret the network and host portions of an
address is with a bit mask. An address bit mask works in this way: if a
bit is on in the mask, that equivalent bit in the address is interpreted as a
network bit; if a bit in the mask is off, the bit belongs to the host part of
the address. For example, if address 195.4.12.0 is interpreted as a class
C address, the first 24 bits are the network numbers and the last 8 bits
are the host addresses. The network mask that represents this is
255.255.255.0, 24 bits on and 8 bits off. The bit mask that is derived
from the traditional class structure is called the default mask or the
natural mask.

However, with bit masks we are no longer limited by the address class
structure. A mask of 255.255.0.0 can be applied to network address
195.4.0.0. This mask includes all addresses from 195.4.0.0 to
195.4.255.255 in a single network number. In effect, it creates a network
number as large as a class B network in the class C address space. Using
bit masks to create networks larger than the natural mask is called
supernetting, and the use of a mask instead of the address class to
determine the destination network is called Classless Inter-Domain
Routing (CIDR).

Specifying both the address and the mask is cumbersome when writing
out addresses. A shorthand notation has been developed for writing
CIDR addresses. Instead of writing network 172.16.26.32 with a mask
of 255.255.255.224, we can write 172.16.26.32/27. The format of this
notation is address/prefix-length, where prefix-length is the number of
bits in the network portion of the address. Without this notation, the
address 172.16.26.32 could easily be interpreted as a host address. RFC
1878 list all 32 possible prefix values. But little documentation is needed
because the CIDR prefix is much easier to understand and remember
than address classes. I know that 10.104.0.19 is a class A address, but
writing it as 10.104.0.19/8 shows me that this address has 8 bits for the
network number and therefore, 24 bits for the host number. I don't have
to remember anything about the class A address structure.

Internet-layer Versus Private Addressing

Although the pool of IP addresses is somewhat limited, most companies

have no problems obtaining them. However, many organisations have
already installed TCP/IP products on their internal networks without
obtaining “legal” addresses from the proper sources. Sometimes these
addresses come from example books or are simply picked at random

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(several firms use networks numbered 1.2.3.0, for example).

Unfortunately, since they are not legal, these addresses will not be
usable when these organisationg attempt to connect to the Internet.
These firms will eventually have to reassign Internet-legal IP addresses
to all the devices on their networks, or invest in address-translation
gateways that rewrite outbound IP packets so they appear to be coming
from an Internet-accessible host.

Even if an address-translation gateway is installed on the network, these

firms will never be able to communicate with any site that is a registered
owner of the IP addresses in use on the local network. For example, if
you choose to use the 36.0.0.0/8 address block on your internal network,
your users will never be able to access the computers at Stanford
University, the registered owner of that address block. Any attempt to
connect to a host at 36.x.x.x will be interpreted by the local routers as a
request for a local system, so those packets will never leave your local
network.

Not all firms have the luxury of using Internet-legal addresses on their
hosts, for any number of reasons. For example, there may be legacy
applications that use hardcode addresses, or there may be t09 many
systems across the organisation for a clean upgrade to be successful. If
you are unable to use Internet-legal addresses, you should at least be
aware that there are groups of “private” Internet addresses that can be
used on internal networks by anyone. These address pools were set-
aside in RFC 1918, and therefore, cannot be “assigned” to any
organisation. The Internet's backbone routers are configured explicitly
not to route packets with these addresses, so they are completely useless
outside an organisation's internal network. The address blocks available
are listed in Table3.

Table 3: Private Addresses Provided in RFC 1918

Since these addresses cannot be routed across the Internet, you must use
an address-translation gateway or a proxy server in conjunction with
them. Otherwise, you will not be able to communicate with any hosts on
the Internet.

An important note here is that, since, nobody can use these addresses on
the Internet, it is safe to assume that anybody who is using these
addresses is also utilising an address-translation gateway of some sort.

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Therefore, while you will never see these addresses used as destinations
on the Internet, if your organisation establishes a private connection to a
partner organisation that is using the same block of addresses that you
are using, your firms will not be able to communicate on the Internet.
The packets destined for your partner's network will appear to be local
to your network, and will never be forwarded to the remote network.

There are many other problems that arise from using these addresses,
making their general usage difficult for normal operations. For example,
many application-layer protocols embed addressing information directly
into the protocol stream, and in order for these protocols to work
properly, the address-translation gateway has to be aware of their
mechanics. In the preceding scenario, the gateway has to rewrite the
private addresses (which are stored as application data inside the
application protocol), rewrite the UDP/TCP and IP checksums, and
possibly rewrite TCP sequence numbers as well. This is difficult to do
even with simple and open protocols such as FTP, and extremely
difficult with proprietary, encrypted, or dynamic applications (these are
problems for many database protocols, network games, and voice-over-
IP services, in particular). These gateways almost never work for all the
applications in use at a specific location.

It is always better to use formally-assigned, Internet-legal addresses

whenever possible: even if, the hosts on your network do not necessarily
require direct Internet access. In those cases in which your hosts are
going through a firewall or application proxy of some sort, the use of
Internet-legal addresses causes the least amount of maintenance trouble
over time. If, for some reason this is not possible, use one of the private
address pools described in Table 3. Do not use random, self-assigned
addresses if you can possibly avoid it, as this will only cause
connectivity problems for you and your users.

Fragmentation

Fragmentation is process of breaking bigger IP datagrams into smal1er

fragments. Each network imposes some maximum size on .its packets.
Maximum payloads range from 48 bytes (A TM cells) to 65,5 I 5 bytes
(IP packets), although the payload size in higher layers is often bigger.

What happens if the original host sends a source packet which is too
large to be handled by the destination network? The routing algorithm
can hardly bypass the destination.

Basically, the only solution to the problem is to allow routers to break

up packets into fragments.

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The data in the IP datagram is broken among two or more smaller IP

datagrams and these smaller fragments are then sent over the outgoing
link.

The real problems in the fragmentation process is reassembly of

fragments into a single IP datagram before sending it to the transport
layer. If it is done at the network level, it will decrease the performance
of a router. Therefore, to keep the network layer simple. IP V. designer
has left it to be done at the receiver level. When the destination host
receives a series of fragments from the same host, it examines the
identification number of a fragment, its flag number (the flag bit is set
100 for the last fragment whereas it is a set to 1 for all the other
fragments). This is required because one or more fragments may never
reach because IP provides best efforts service. Offset field is used to
determine where the fragment fits within the original IP datagram
[Rej5]. When all the packets have arrived, the destination host
reassembles them and sends it to the transport layer. The following table
illustrates an example of 5000 bytes (20 bytes of IP header plus 4980
bytes of IP Payload arrives at a router which must be forwarded to the
outgoing link 'with a maximum transfer unit of 1500 bytes (equivalent to
Ethernet frame size).

Table 4: Fragmentation Table

This means that 4,980 data bytes in the original datagram must be
allocated to four separate segments (each of which are also IP
datagram). The original datagram has been stamped with an
identification number 999. It is desirable to have a minimum number of
fragments because fragmentation and reassembling creates extra
overheads or a network system and a host. This is done by limiting the
size of UDP and TCP segments to small size.

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3.2.2 Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP)

It is a protocol used by hosts and routers to send notification of

datagram problems. The most typical use of ICMP is for error reporting.
We have encountered errors such as, “Destination network unreachable”
while running a telnet, FTP or HTTP session. This type of error
reporting is done by ICMP [Ref5]. As we are aware, IP is an unreliable
and connection less protocol, due to which, very often, a datagram may
not reach the destination because of to a link failure, congestion etc.
ICMP does reporting of such cases to the sender.

ICMP is often considered part of I P but architecturally lies just above

IP as ICMP messages are carried inside IP packets. Similar to TCP and
UDP segments which are carried as IP payloads, ICMP messages are
also carried as IP payloads. Note, that, a datagram carries only the
addresses of the original sender and the final destination. It does not
know the addresses of the previous router (s) that passed a message. For
this reason, ICMP can send messages only to the source and not to an
intermediate router. Student are required to refer to Reference [1] & [5]
for details of message types.

3.2.3 OSPF: The Interior Gateway Routing Protocol

Open Shortest Path First (OSPF) has become standard interior gateway
routing protocol. It supports many advanced features [Ref! and Ref5] to
meet a long list of requirements.

The protocol specification should be publicly available. O in

OSPF stands for open. It means that OSPF is not a proprietary
protocol.

It is a dynamic algorithm one that adapts to changes in the

topology automatically and quickly.

Load distribution: When multiple paths to a destination have the

same cost OSPF allows multiple paths to be used.

Support for hierarchy within a single routing domain. By 1988,

the internet had grown so large that no router was expected to
know the entire topology. OSPF was designed so that no router
would have to do so.

Security: All exchanges between OSPF routers are authenticated

and allows only trusted routers 1,0 participate. OSPF supports
three kinds of connections and networks [Ref l]

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(i) Point-to-point lines between two routers only.

(ii) Multi-access networks with broadcasting (e.g., LANs).
(iii) Multi-access networks without broadcasting (e.g., Packet
Switched WANs).

OSPF identifies four types of routers:

(i) Internal routers (within one area).

(ii) Area border routers (connects two or more areas).
(iii) Backbone routers (performs routing within the backbone).
(iv) AS boundary routers (exchanges routing information with routers
in other ASes).

OSPF allows a longer AS to be divided into smaller areas. Topology and

details of one area is not visible to others. Every AS has a backbone area
(called Area 0) as shown in Figure3.

Figure 3: Working domain of OSPF

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All areas are connected to the backbone possibly by a tunnel, so it is

possible to move from one area to another area through a backbone. The
primary role of the backbone area is to route traffic between the other
areas in the AS. Inter area routing within the AS requires the follows
movement of packets as shown below by arrows.

Host internal router of an area area border router of a source

area backbone area border router of a destination area
internal router of a destination area final destination

After having described all the components of OSPF, let us now conclude
the topic by describing its operation.

At its heart, however, OSPF is a link state protocol that uses flooding of
link state information and Dijkstra's Least-Cost path algorithm. Using
flooding each router informs all other routers in its area of its neighbours
and costs. This information allow each router to construct the graph for
its area (s) and computers the shortest path using Dijkstra's algorithm.
This is done by backbone routers also. In addition backbone routers
accept information from the area border routers in order to compute the
best route from each backbone router to every other router. This
information is propagated back to area border routers, which advertise it
within their areas. In this manner, the optimal route is selected.

3.2.4 BGP: Tbe Exterior Gateway Routing Protocol

The purpose of Border Gateway Protocol is to enable two different ASes

to exchange routing information so that, IP traffic can flow across the
AS border. A different protocol is needed between the ASes because the
objectives of an interior gateway and exterior gateway routing protocol
are different. Exterior gateway routing protocol such as BOP is related
to policy matters.. BOP is fundamentally a distance vector protocol but,
it is more appropriately characterised as path vector protocol [Ref 5].
Instead of maintaining just the cost to each destination, each BOP router
keeps track of the path used [Ref]]. Neighbouring BGP routers, known
as BGP peers exchange detailed information along with the list of ASes
on a path to a given destination rather than record cost information.

The main advantage of using BOP is to solve the count to infinity

problem which is illustrated in the following Figure 4.

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Figure 4: Solution to Count to infinity problems in BGP

In this Figure 4 there are A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J and K routers. Now

consider G's routing table. G uses G C D K path to forward a packet to
K. As discussed earlier whenever a router gives any routing information,
it provides a complete path.

For ex. From A, the path used to send a packet to K is ABCDK

From B-the path used is BCDK
From C-the path used is CGJK
From E-EFGJK
From H-HIJK.

After receiving all the paths from the neighbours, 0 will find the best
route available. It will outright reject the path from C and E, since they
pass through 0 itself. Therefore, the choice left is between a route
announced by Band H. BOP easily solves count to infinity problems.
Now, suppose C crashes or the line B-C is down. Then if B receives,
two routes from its 2 neighbours: ABCDK and FBCDK, then these
which can be rejected because it passes through C itself. Other distance
vector algorithms make the wrong choice because, they cannot tell
which of their neighbours have independent routes to their destination or
not.

4.0 CONCLUSION

In this concluding unit of this module you have learnt about

internetworking protocols. It has also taken you through tunneling and
encapsulation concepts.

5.0 SUMMARY

In this unit, we defined, a large number of concepts and protocols.

Tunneling is used when the source and destination networks are
identical but the network, which lies in between, is different. A subnet
allows a network to be split into several parts for Internet use but still
acts like a single network to the outside world. It makes management of
IP addresses simpler. Another reason for creating a subnet is to establish

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security between different work groups. Internet is made of a large

number of autonomous regions controlled by a different organisation
which can, use its own routing algorithm inside. A routing algorithm
within an autonomous region (such as LAN, WAN) is called an interior
gateway protocol, an algorithm for routing between different
autonomous regions are called exterior gateway routing protocols.

6.0 TUTOR-MARKED ASSIGNMENT

1) List the important features in which one network differs from

another.
2) What are the mechanisms for interconnecting networks?
3) Where is tunneling used?
4) What are the important categories of Network layer protocols?
5) List the important OSPF routes and their purposes.
6) How is BOP different from other distance vector routing
protocols?

7.0 REFERENCES/FURTHER READINGS

A.S. Tanenbaum, Computer Networks, 4” Edition, Prentice Hall of

India, New Delhi.

Leon Garcia and Indra Widjaja, Communication Networks fundamental

concepts and key architecture, Tata McGraw Hill, New Delhi.

Behrouz A. Forouzan, Data Communication and Networking, 2nd

edition, Tata McGraw Hill, New Delhi.

Timothy S Ramteke, Networks, 2nd Edition, Pearson edition, New

Delhi.

James F. Kurose and Keith W. Ross. Computer Networking A Top down

Approach featuring the Internet, Pearson Edition, New Delhi.

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MODULE 4 TRANSPORT LAYER AND

APPLICATION LAYER SERVICES

Unit 1 Transport Services and Mechanism

Unit 2 TCP/UDP
Unit 3 Network Security I
Unit 4 Network Security II

UNIT 1 TRANSPORT SERVICES AND MECHANISM

CONTENTS

1.0 Introduction
2.0 Objectives
3.0 Main Content
3.1 Transport Services
3.1.1 Types of Services
3.1.2 Quality of Service
3.1.3 Data Transfer
3.1.4 Connection Management
3.1.5 Expedited Delivery
3.2 Elements of Transport Layer Protocols
3.2.1 Addressing
3.2.2 Multiplexing
3.2.3 Flow Control and Buffering
3.2.4 Connection Establishment
3.2.5 Crash Recovery
4.0 Conclusion
5.0 Summary
6.0 Tutor-Marked Assignment
7.0 References/Further Readings

1.0 INTRODUCTION

The transport layer is the core of the OSI model. It is not just another
layer but the heart of the whole protocol hierarchy. Protocols at this
layer oversee the delivery of data from an application program on one
device to an application program on another device. It is the first end-to-
end layer in the OSI model. It provides its services to the upper layer to
use the services of the network layer and other lower layer protocols.

You must be aware that an Internet is comprised of several physica1

networks such as the LANs, MANs, and WANs that are connected
together through a variety of media (wired as well wireless) to facilitate
the transfer of data from a computer on one network to another

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computer on another network. As a transmission moves from one

network to another, the data on the way may be transformed i.e., it may
be encapsulated in different types and lengths of packets.

The upper-layer protocols are unaware of the intricacy of the physical

networks the transport layer. To the upper layers, the individual physical
networks are a simple homogeneous network that somehow takes data
and delivers it to its destination, reliably. For example, even if an
Ethernet in the LAN part of internet is replaced by a FDOI, the upper
layers remain unaware of it. To them, the Internet is a single and
essentia1ly unchanging network. The transport layer provides this
transparency.

Examples of transport layer protocols are Transmission Control Protocol

(TCP) and User Datagram Protocol (UDP).

In this unit, we will first discuss types of services we might expect from
a transport layer. Next, we will examine several mechanisms to support
these services.

2.0 OBJECTIVES

After going through this unit, you ‘should be able to:

list and describe transport services

list and describe transport mechanisms.

3.0 MAIN CONTENT

3.1 Transport Services

We begin by looking at the kinds of services that a transport protocol

can or should provide to upper layer protocols. Figure J outlines the
environment for transport services. There is a transport entity that
provides services to the upper layer users, which might be an application
process such as http, telnet etc. This local transport entity communicates
with some remote-transport entity, based on the services provided by the
network layer.

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Figure I: Transport entity environment

As discussed earlier the general service provided by a transport protocol

is the end-to-end transport of data in a way that shields the upper layer
user from the details of the underlying networks infrastructure. The
following categories of services are generally used for describing the
services provided by the transport layers.

Types of services
Quality of service
Data transfer
Connection management
Expedited delivery

3.1.1 Types of Services

There are generally two basic types of services: (i) Connection-oriented

and (ii) Connectionless, or datagram services provided by the Internet. A
connection-oriented service is the most common type of protocol service
available. It provides the establishment, maintenance, and termination of
a logical connection between users. This is also called handshaking
procedures. The connection-oriented service generally implies that the
service is reliable which includes features such as flow control, error
control and sequence delivery. Flow control makes sure that neither side
of a connection overwhelms the other side by sending toomal\Y pockets
too quickly.

Connection-Oriented

The Internet connection oriented service is accomplished using TCP

(Transmission Control Protocol). Reliable transport, flow control and
congestion control are types of services that are provided to an

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application by TCP. These services are acknowledged. The TCP’s

congestion control mechanism is used to maintain throughput.

Connectionless Service

There is no handshaking here before sending the packet. There are also
no flow control and congestion control mechanisms. Since there is no
handshaking procedure, data can be transferred faster. But there is no
reliable data transfer either as these services are acknowledged. The
Internets connectionless service is called UDP (User Datagram
Protocol). Some of the applications of connection less service are
internet telephony and video conferencing.

The connection-oriented transport service is similar to the connection

oriented network service. So the question is, why do we require two
different layers to provide the same type of service. The answer to this
question is that the transport code runs on the user’s machine whereas
the network layer runs mostly on the routers, which are controlled by the
carrier which provide poor service. Therefore, the only possibility is to
put another layer on top of the network layer, that improves the quality
of service.

It is due to the transport layer that application programmers can write

programs according to standard sets of library procedure calls and have
these programs run on networks without worrying about dealing with
different subnet interfaces and unreliable transmission.

Thus, there is a place at the transport level for both a connection-

oriented and a connection less type of service.

3.1.2 Quality of Service

The transport protocol entity should allow the upper layer protocol users
to specify the types of quality of transmission service to be provided.
Based on these specifications the transport entity attempts to optimise
the use of the underlying link, network, and other resources to the best
of its ability, so as to provide the collective requested services. But these
services are limited to the internet capabilities of the network layer
services.

Examples of services that might be requested are:

Expedited delivery of packet

Acceptable error and loss levels of packet
Desired average and maximum delay in transmission of a packet
Desired average and minimum throughout
Priority levels.

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You are aware that IP is a standard protocol for the network layer. IP
does provide a quality-of-service parameter such as priority as well as a
binary specification for normal or low delay, normal or high throughput,
and normal or high reliability. Thus, the transport entity can make a
request to the internetwork entity. The network may alter flow control
parameters and the amount of network resources allocated on a virtual
circuit to achieve desired throughput. The transport layer may also split
one transport connection among multiple virtual circuits to enhance
throughput. This will be explained in section 3.2.2.

You must be aware that different applications may require different

quality of services. For example:

A file transfer protocol might require high throughput. It may

also require high reliability to avoid retransmissions at the file
transfer level.

A transaction protocol (e.g., web browser-web server) may

require low delay.

An electronic mail protocol may require multiple priority levels.

One approach to providing a variety of qualities of service is to include

a quality-of-service facility within the protocol; the transport protocols
typically follow the same approach. An alternative is to provide a
different transport protocol for different classes of traffic; this is to some
extent the approach taken by the ISO-standard family of transport
protocols:

An application layer protocols need from the Transport layer [Ref.2].

These are:

(i) Reliable data transfer

(ii) Bandwidth
(iii) Timing/delay.

(i) Reliable data transfer

By reliable data transfer means that there is not a single bit of loss of
data during transmission. There are certain types of application, which
does not tolerate any loss of data, such as financial applications. In
particular, a loss of file data, or data in a financial transaction, can have
devastating consequences (in the latter case, for either the bank or the
customer). Other applications in the category are transfer of web
documents, electronic mail, file transfer and remote host access. But
there are some applications which can tolerate some amount of data loss.

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For example, multimedia applications such as real-time audio/video. In

these multimedia applications, lost data might result in a small glitch
while playing the audio/video, the effects of such ‘a loss on application
quality and actual amount of tolerable packet loss, will depend strongly
on the application and the coding scheme used.

(ii) Bandwidth

The concept of bandwidth has be~ explained in the first block. Just to
recall, higher the bandwidth more the channel capacity. There are
certain applications, which are bandwidth sensitive. For example, the
Internet telephony, requires a given amount of bandwidth. But there are
some other types of application called elastic application which can
make use of as much or as little bandwidth as happens to be available.
Electronic mail, file transfer, and Web transfers are all elastic
application [Ref.2] of course; the more bandwidth, and the better would
be transport capacity.

(iii) Timing/delay

The final service requirement is that of timing. There are certain

applications, which require tight timing constraints on data delivery in
order to be effective. For example, interactive real-time applications,
such as Internet telephony, virtual environments, teleconferencing, and
multiplayer games. Many of these applications require that end-to end
delays be on the order of a few hundred milliseconds or less. Long
delays in Internet telephony, and a long delay between taking an action
and judging the response from the environment in a multiplicity game
tends to result in unnatural pauses in the conversation.

3.1.3 Data Transfer

The whole purpose, of course, of a transport protocol is to transfer data

between two transport entities. Both user data and control data must be
transferred from one end to the other end either on the same channel or
separate channels. Full-duplex service must be provided. Ha]f-duplex
and simplex modes may also be offered to support peculiarities of
particular transport users.

Here, you may ask the question if the network layer does a similar task,
why it is necessary at the transport layer. The network layer overseas the
hop by hop delivery of the individual packet but does not see any
relationship between those packets even those belonging to a single
message. Each packet is treated as an independent entity. The transport
layer on the other hand makes sure that not just a single packet but the
entire sequence of packets.

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3.1.4 Connection Management

When connection-oriented service is provided, the transport entity is

responsible for establishing and terminating connections. Both
symmetric and asymmetric procedure for connecting establishment may
be provided.

Connection termination can be either abrupt or graceful. With an abrupt

termination, data in transmit may be lost. A graceful termination
prevents either side from shutting down until all data has been delivered.

3.1.5 Expedited Delivery

A service similar to that provided by priority classes is the expedited

delivery of data. Some data submitted to the transport service may
supersede data submitted previously. The transport entity will endeavour
to have the transmission facility transfer the data as rapidly as possible.
At the receiving end, the transport entity will interrupt the transport
service user to notify it of the receipt of urgent data. Thus, the expedited
data service is in the nature of an interrupted mechanism, and is used to
transfer occasional urgent data, such as a break character from a
terminal or an alarm condition. In contrast, a priority service might
dedicate resources and adjust parameters such that, on average, higher
priority data are delivered more quickly.

3.2 Elements of Transport Layer protocols

The services provided by the transport layer are implemented by the

transport layer protocols such as TCP and UDP. We will talk about them
in the next unit. In this section, we will take up important components of
the transport layer for discussion. A transport layer deals with hop-by-
hop processes.

3.2.1 Addressing

The issue concerned with addressing is simply this-how a user process

will set up a connection to a remote user process? How the address of a
remote process should be specified? The method generally used is to
define transport address to which the process can listen for connection
requests. In Internet jargon these end points are called port or TSAP
(Transport Services Access Points). Similarly, these end points at the
network layer are then called NSAP (Network Services Access Points).
The following illustration (Figure 2) shows the connection between a
user processes as host 1 with a remote process (server) as host 2.

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Figure 2: Transport connections between a client and a server

The following steps may be needed for establishing a transport

connection [Ref. 1]:

1) Just assume that an application process running on I wants to find

out the next day’s weather forecast, so, it issues a CONNECT
request specifying its transport connection point number TSAP
XXXX as well as the TSAP number XXYY of the weather
forecasting server which will establish transport connection with
the destination. This action ultimately results in a transport
connection between the application process on host I and a server
1 on host 2.

2) Assume that a weather forecasting server is attached to a

transport connection at XXYY.

3) The application process then sends a request for the next 10 days
weather report.

4) The weather server process responds with the current weather

report.

5) The transport connection is then released.

The question, that needs to be addressed: How does the host user know
that the address of the destination server process is attached to a
particular transport connection. To resolve this issue various strategies
are suggested [Refer 1]:

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1) Initial connection protocol: In the scheme a process server acts

as a proxy server for less heavily used servers. Instead of every
server listening at a well known port address waiting for a
connection request; a process server listens to sets of ports at the
same time and informs a particular server to act upon getting a
connecting request to perform the required work.. The new server
then does the request work, while the process server goes back to
listening for new request. Therefore, through a process server a
rarely used server should not be listening to ports all the time.

2) Some commonly used services are assigned “well-known

address” (for example, time sharing and word processing).

3) A name server or sometimes a directory server is provided. The

Transport Service user requests a service through some generic or
global name. The request is sent to the name server, which does a
directory lookup and returns an address. The transport entity then
proceeds with the connection. This service is useful for
commonly used applications that change location from time to
time. It is also used for those stations in which services do exist
independently of a process server. For example, a file server that
needs 10 run on a special hardware (a machine with disk) that
cannot be created dynamically when someone want to talk to it
[Ref. 1].

3.2.2 Multiplexing

The transport entity may also perform a multiplexing function with

respect to the network services that it uses. There are two types of
multiplexing techniques that define upward multiplexing as the
multiplexing of multiple transport connections on a single network
connection, and downward multiplexing as the splitting of a single
transport connection among multiple lower-level connections. This is
illustrated in Figure 3.

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Transport Connections Transport Connections

Figure 3: Multiplexing

Consider, for example, a transport entity making use of an X25 service.

X.25 is a network layer protocol like IP. Why should the transport entity
employ upward multiplexing? There are, after all, 4905 virtual circuits
available. In the typical case, this is a more than enough to handle all
active Transport Service user. However most X.25 networks base part of
their charge on virtual-circuit connect time, as each virtual circuit
consumes some node buffer resources. Thus, if a single virtual circuit
provides sufficient throughput for multiple TS users, upward
multiplexing may be used [Figure 3].

On the other hand, downward multiplexing or splitting might be used

to provide more bandwidth than a single Virtual Circuit can manage. A
way out is 10 open multiple network connections and distribute traffic
among them on a round-robin basis, as indicated in Figure (3b). This
modus operandi is called downward multiplexing. With network
connections open, the effective bandwidth is increased by a factor of k.
A common example of downward multiplexing occurs with home users
who have an ISDN line. This line provides for two separate connections

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of 64 kbps each. Using both of them to call an Internet provider and

dividing the traffic over both lines makes it possible to achieve an
effective bandwidth of 128 kbps.

3.2.3 Flow Control and Buffering

There are similarities as well as differences between data link layer and
transport layer in order to support flow control mechanism. The
similarity is in using the sliding window protocol. The main difference
is that a router usually has relatively few lines, whereas a host may have
numerous connections. Due to this reason it is impractical to implement
the data link buffering strategy in the transport layer.

Whereas flow control is a relatively simple mechanism at the data link

layer, it is a rather complex mechanism at the transport layer, for two
main reasons:

Flow control at the transport level involves the interaction of

three components: TS users, transport entities, and the network
service.

The transmission delay between transport entities is variable and

generally long compared to actual transmission time.

The following delay may arise during the interaction of the two
transport entities A and B:

(i) Waiting time to get permission from its own transport entity
(interface flow control).
(ii) Waiting time by A to have permission to send the data to B.
(iii) Waiting time as network layer services.

In any case, once the transport entity has accepted the data, it sends out a
segment. Some time later, it receives an acknowledgement that the data
has been received at the remote end. It then sends a confirmation to the
sender.

Now let us come to the flow control problem.

First, we present two ways of coping with the flow control requirement
[Ref.3] by using a fixed sliding-window protocol and by using a credit
scheme.

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The first mechanism is already familiar to us from our discussions of

data link layer protocols. The key ingredients are:

The use of sequence numbers on data units.

The use of a window of fixed size.
The use of acknowledgements to advance the window.

This scheme really works well. For example, consider a protocol with a
window size of 3. Whenever the sender receives an acknowledgement
from a particular segment, it is automatically authorised to send the
succeeding seven segments. (Of course, some may already have been
sent). Now, when the receiver’s butter capacity comes down to 7
segments, it can withhold acknowledgement of incoming segments to
avoid overflow. The sending transport entity can send, at most, seven
additional segments and then must stop. Because the underlying network
service is reliable, the sender will not time-out and retransmit. Thus, at
some point, a sending transport entity may have a number of segments
outstanding, for which no acknowledgement has been received. Because
we are dealing with a reliable network, the sending transport entity can
assume that the segments will come through and that the lack of
acknowledgement is a flow control tactic. Such a strategy would not
work well in an unreliable network, as the sending transport entity
would not know whether the lack of acknowledgement is due to flow
control or a lost segment.

The second alternative, a credit scheme, provides the receiver with a

greater degree of control over data flow.

The credit scheme decouples acknowledgement from flow control. In

fixed sliding-window protocols, used as the data Line layer, the two are
synonymous. In a credit scheme, a segment may be acknowledged
without granting a new credit, and vice versa. Figure 4 illustrates the
protocol. For simplicity, we have depicted data flow in one direction
only. In this example, data segments are numbered sequentially module
8 (e.g., SN 0 = segment with sequence number O). Initially, through the
connection-establishment process, the sending and receiving sequence
numbers are synchronised, and A is granted a credit allocation of 7. A
advances the trailing edge of its window each time that it transmits, and
advances the leading edge only when it is granted a credit.

Figure 4 shows a view of this mechanism from the sending and

receiving sides; of course, both sides take both views because data may
be exchanged in both directions.

From the receiving point of view, the concern is for received data and
for the window of credit that has been allocated. Note that the receiver is

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not required to immediately acknowledge incoming segments, but may

wait and issue a cumulative acknowledgement for a number of
segments; this is true for both TCP and the ISO transport protocol.

In both the credit allocation scheme and the sliding window scheme, the
receiver needs to adopt some policy concerning the amount of data it
permits the sender to transmit. The conservative approach is only to
allow new segments up to the limit of available butter space.

A conservative flow control scheme may limit the throughput of the

transport connection in long-delay situations. The receiver could
potentially increase throughput by optimistically granting credit for
space it does not have. This is called dynamic butter allocation scheme.
For example, if a receiver’s butter is full but it anticipates that it can
release space for two segments within a round-trip propagation time, it
could immediately send a credit of 2. If the receiver can keep up with
the sender, this scheme may increase throughput and can do no harm. If
the sender is faster than the receiver, however, some segments may be
discarded, necessitating a retransmission. Because retransmissions are
not otherwise necessary with a reliable network service, an optimistic
flow control scheme will complicate the protocol.

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The optimum trade-off between source buffering and destination

buffering depends on the type of traffic carried out by the connection.
For low bandwidth bursty traffic, such as that produced by an interactive

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terminal. It is better not to dedicate any buffers, but rather to acquire

them dynamically at both ends. Since the sender cannot be sure the
receiver will be able to acquire a buffer, the sender must retain a copy of
the TPDU (Transport Protocol Data Unit) until it is acknowledged. On
the other hand, for file transfer and other high bandwidth traffic, it is
better if the receiver dedicates a full window of buffers, to allow the data
to flow at maximum speed. Thus, for low-bandwidth bursty traffic, it is
better to buffer at the sender, and for high-bandwidth smooth traffic, it is
better to buffer at the receiver.

As connections are opened and closed and as the traffic pattern changes,
the sender and receiver needs to dynamically adjust their buffer
allocations. Consequef1tly, the transport protocol should allow a
sending host to request buffer space at the other end. Buffers could be
allocated per connection, or collectively, for all the connections running
between the two hosts. Alternatively, the receiver, knowing its buffer
station (but not knowing the offered traffic) could tell the sender “I have
reserved X buffers for you”. If the number of open connections should
increase, it may be necessary for an allocation to be reduced, so the
protocol should provide for this possibility.

In summary, a reasonably general way to manage dynamic buffer

allocation is to decouple the buffering from the acknowledgements, in
contrast to the sliding window protocols of data link layer.

3.2.4 Connection Establishment

End-to-end delivery can be accomplished in either of two modes:

connection-oriented or connectionless. Of these two, the connection-
oriented mode is the more commonly used. A connection-oriented
protocol establishes a virtual circuit or pathway through the Internet
between the sender and receiver. All of the packets belonging to a
message are then sent over this same path. Using a single pathway for
the entire message facilities, the acknowledgement process and
retransmission of damaged or lost frames. Connection-oriented services,
therefore, are generally considered reliable.

Connection-oriented transmission has three stages: connection

establishment, data transfer, and connection termination.

The network is generally unreliable and congested. Even with a reliable

network service, there is a need for connection establishment and
termination -procedures to support connection-oriented service.
Connection establishment serves three main purposes:

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It allows each end to assure that the other exists.

It allows negotiation of optional parameters (e.g., minimum

segment size, maximum window size, quality of service).

It triggers allocation of transport entity resources (e.g., buffer

space, entry in connection table).

To solve the problems arising out of unreliable and congested networks

3-way handshake procedure is used to establish transport connection,
which is generally comprised of three steps.

(i) Connection initiation requirement

(ii) Connection confirmation
(iii) Acknowledgement of confirmation and data transfer.

3.1.5 Crash Recovery

Similar to the database this is an important issue in computer network.

In a network a host as well as a router can crash. Therefore, the issue is
its recovery. In case of the loss of Virtual Circuit (In case the network
layer provides connection oriented service) due to a crash delivery, a
new virtual circuit may be established then probing the transport entity
to ask which TPDU it has received and which one it has not received so
that the latter can be retransmitted. In case of datagram subnet, the
frequency of the lost TPDU is high but the network layer knows how to
handle that. The real problem is the recovery from the host crash.
Students are requested to read Computer Network by Tanenbaum on this
method and also to relate to how a similar problem is resolved in the
database (MCS-043).

4.0 CONCLUSION

In this unit you have learnt about transport services mechanism which
comprise types of transport services, quality of service data transfer
mechanism, connection establishment, multiplexing and finally flow
control and buffering.

5.0 SUMMARY

In this unit, we have discussed two important components with respect

to transport layer namely, transport services and the elements of
transport layer protocols. As a part of transport services we discussed
type of services, quality of services, connection mechanism. We also
outlined three types of services provided by the transport layer through
the applications layer. We listed the various types of protocols

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(applications layer) and the kind of services. We also differentiated

between the data link layer and transport layer with respect to flow
control mechanism. Similarly, we also differentiated between two types
of multiplexing mechanism at the transport layer.

6.0 TUTOR-MARKED ASSIGNMENT

1) List the three types of services provided by Transport layer to

Applications layer.
2) Describe the presence of data loss and time sensitiveness for the
following applications:

(a) File Transfer

(b) E-mail
(c) Web surfing
(d) Stored audio/video.

3) List the important multiplexing mechanism at the Transport

Layer and also U explain how they are different from each other.
4) Describe the similarities as well as differences between Data Link
Layer and Transport Layer in order to support Flow Control
mechanism.

7.0 REFERENCES/FURTHER READINGS

A. S. Tanenbaum, Computer Networks, 4th Edition. Prentice Hall of

India, New Delhi, 2002.

James Kurose and Keith W. Ross, Computer Networking. A Top down

approach featuring the Internet, Pearson education, New Delhi.

William Stallings, Data and Computer communication. 6th Edition,

Pearson Education, New Delhi.

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UNIT 2 TCP/UDP

CONTENTS

1.0 Introduction
2.0 Objectives
3.0 Main Content
3.1 Services Provided by Internet Transport Protocols
3.1.1 TCP Services
3.1.2 UDP Services
3.2 Introduction to UDP
3.3 Introduction to TCP
3.4 TCP Segment Header
3.5 TCP Connection Establishment
3.6 TCP Connection Termination
3.7 TCP Flow Control
3.8 TCP Congestion Control
3.9 Remote Procedure Call
4.0 Conclusion
5.0 Summary
6.0 Tutor-Marked Assignment
7.0 References/Further Readings

1.0 INTRODUCTION

In the previous unit, we discussed the fundamentals of the transport

layer which covered topics related to the quality of services, addressing,
multiplexing, flow control and buffering. The main protocols which are
commonly used such as TCP (Transmission Control Protocol and UDP
(User Diagram Protocol) were also discussed. TCP is the more
sophisticated protocol of the two and is used for applications that need
connection establishment before actual data transmission. Applications
such as electronic mail, remote terminal access, web surfing and file
transfer are based on TCP.

UDP is a much simpler protocol than TCP because, it does not establish
any connection between the two nodes. Unlike TCP, UDP does not
guarantee the delivery of data to the destination. It is the responsibility
of application layer protocols to make UDP as reliable as possible.

In this unit we will go into details on these two protocols.

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2.0 OBJECTIVES

After going through this unit, you should be able to:

list and explain the various services provided by the Transport Layer
establish and release TCP connections
describe TCP and UDP header formats
describe TCP Flow Control mechanism and how it is different from
data link layer
discuss the Congestion mechanism in TCP.

3.0 MAIN CONTENT

3.1 Services Provided By Internet Transport Protocols

The Internet provides two service models: TCP and UDP. The selection
of a particular service model is left to the application developers. TCP is
a connection oriented and reliable data transfer service whereas UDP is
connectionless and provides unreliable data transfer service.

3.1.1 TCP Services

When an application invokes TCP for its transport protocol, the

application receives the following services from it:

Connection oriented service

Reliable transport service
Congestion-control mechanism.

Now let us describe these services in brief:

Connection-oriented service

As you are aware from your understanding of the previous unit that the
connection oriented service is comprised of the handshake procedure
which is a full duplex connection in that, two processes can send
messages to each other over the connection at the same time. When the
application has finished sending the message, it must remove the
connection. The service is referred to as a “connection oriented” service.
We are also aware from the discussion on the network layer that this
service is implemented through the virtual circuit mechanism.

Reliable Transport Service

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Communicating processes can rely on TCP to deliver all the data that is
sent, without error and in the proper order. When one side of the
application passes a stream of bytes into a socket, it can count on TCP to
deliver the same stream of data to the receiving socket, with no missing
or duplicate bytes. Reliability in the Internet is achieved with the use of
acknowledgement and retransmissions.

Congestion-control mechanism: TCP also includes a congestion-control

mechanism for the smooth functioning of Internet processes. When the
packet load offered to the network exceeds its handling capacity
congestion builds up.

One point to be noted is that, although, the Internet connection oriented

service is bundled with suitable data transfer, flow control and
congestion control mechanisms, they are not the essential components of
the Connection oriented service [Ref. 2].

A connection oriented service can be provided with bundling these

services through a different type of a network.

Now we will look at the services TCP does not provide? Some of these
are:

i) It does not guarantee a minimum transmission rate,

ii) It does not provide any delay guarantee. But it guarantees
delivery of all data.

However, it provides no guarantee to the rate of data delivery.

3.1.2 UDP Services

Some of the important features of UDP are as follows:

i) UDP is connection less, so there is no hand shaking before the

two processes start communications.

ii) It provides unreliable data transfer service therefore, there is no

guarantee that the message will reach. Due to this, the message
may arrive as the receiving process at a random time.

iii) UDP does not provide a congestion-control service. Therefore,

the sending process can pump data into a UDP socket at any rate
it pleases. Then why do we require such a protocol at the
transport layer? There are certain types of applications such as
real time. Real-time applications are applications that can tolerate
some loss but require a minimum rate. Developers of real-time

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applications often choose to run their applications over the UDP

because their applications cannot wait for acknowledgements for
data input. Now coming back to TCP, since it guarantees that all
the packets will be delivered to the host, many application
protocols, layer protocols are used for these services. For
example, SMTP (E-mail), Telnet, HlTP, FTP exclusively uses
TCP whereas NFS and Streaming Multimedia may use TCP or
UDP. But Internet telephony uses UDP exclusively.

3.2 Introduction to UDP

So you might have guessed from the previous section, that UDP is and
unreliable transport protocol. Apart from multiplexing/demultiplexing
and some error correction UDP adds little to the IP protocol. In this
section, we take a look at UDP, at how it works and at what it does.

In case, we select UDP instead of TCP for application development,

then the application is almost directly talking to the IP layer. UDP takes
messages from the application process, attaches the source and
destination port number fields for the multiplexing/demultiplexing
service, adds two other small fields, and passes the resulting segment to
the network layer. Without establishing handshaking between sending
and receiving transport-layer entities, the network layer encapsulates the
segment into an IP datagram and then makes a best-effort attempt to
deliver the segment to the receiving host. If the segment arrives at the
receiving host, UDP uses the destination port number to deliver the
segment’s data to the desired application process.

So you might ask a question then why is UDP required? TCP should be
the choice for all types of application layer/protocol. DNS stands for
domain name system. It provides a directory service for the internet. It is
commonly used by other application protocols (HTTP, FTP etc.) to
translate user given host names to IP address. But before we answer
your question let-us look at another application called the DNS, which
runs exclusively in UDP only but unlike other protocols DNS is not an
application with which users interact directly. Instead DNS is a core
Internet function that translates the host name to IP addresses. Also
unlike other protocols, DNS typically uses UDP. When the DNS
application in a host wants to make a query, it constructs a DNS query
message and passes the message to the UDP. Without performing any
handshaking with the UDP entity running on the destination end system,
UDP adds header fields to the message and passes the resulting segment
to the network layer. The network layer encapsulates the UDP segment
into a datagram and sends the datagram to a name server. The DNS
application at the querying host then waits for a reply to its query. If it
doesn’t receive a reply (possibly because the underlying network lost the

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query or the reply), either it tries sending the query to another name
server, or it informs the invoking application that it can’t get a reply.

Like DNS, there are many applications, which are better suited for UDP
for the following reasons [Ref2]:

No Connection Establishment

Since UDP does not cause any delay in establishing a connection, this is
a probably the principal reason why DNS runs over UDP rather than
TCP-DNS which would be much slower if it runs over TCP. H1’TPuses
TCP rather than UDP, since reliability is critical for Web pages with
text.

More Client support

TCP maintains connection state in the end systems. This connection

state includes receiving and sending buffers, congestion-control
parameters, and sequence and acknowledgement number parameters.
We will see in Section 3.5 that this state information is needed to
implement TCP’s reliable data transfer service and to provide
congestion control. UDP, on the other hand, does not maintain
connection state and does not track any of these parameters. A server
devoted to a particular application can typically support many more
active clients when the application runs over UDP rather than TCP.
Because UDP, (unlike TCP) does not provide reliable data service and
congestion control mechanism, therefore, it does not need to maintain
and track the receiving and sending of buffers (connection states),
congestion control parameters, and sequence and acknowledgement
number parameters.

Small packet header overhead. The TCP segment has 20 bytes of

header over-head in every segment, whereas UDP has only eight
bytes of overhead.

Now let us examine the application services that are currently using the
UDP protocol. For example, remote file server, streaming media,
internet telephony, network management, routing protocol such as RIP
and, of course, DNS use UDP. Other applications like e-mail, remote
terminal access web surfing and file transfer use TCP. Please see
reference [2] for further details.

Before discussing the UDP segments structure, now, let us try to answer
another question. Is it possible to develop a reliable application on
UDP? Yes, it may be possible to do it by adding acknowledgement and
retransmission mechanisms, at the application level. Many of to day’s

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proprietary streaming applications do just this -they run over UDP, but
they have built acknowledgements and retransmissions into the
application in order to reduce packet loss. But you understand that it will
lead to complete application software design.

UDP Segment Structure

UDP is an end to end transport level protocol that adds only port
addresses, checksum error control and length information to the data
from the upper layer.

The application data occupies the data field of the UDP segment. For
example, for DNS, the data field contains either a query message or a
response message. For a streaming audio application, audio samples fill
the data field. The packet produced by UDP is called a user datagram.

Figure 1: UDP segment structure

The UDP header has only four fields, each consisting of two bytes
[Figure 1]. Let us discuss each field separately:

Source port address

It is the address of the application program that has created the message.

Destination port address

It is the address of the application program that will receive the

message.

Total length

It specifies the length of UDP segment including the header in bytes.

Checksum: The checksum is used by the receiving host to check

whether errors have been introduced into the segment. In truth,
the checksum is also calculated over a few of the fields in the IP
header in addition to the UDP segment.

3.3 Introduction to TCP

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TCP is designed to provide reliable communication between pairs of

processes (TCP users) across a variety of reliable and unreliable
networks and Internets. TCP is stream oriented (Connection Oriented).
Stream means that every connection is treated as stream of bytes. The
user application does not need to package data in individual datagram as
it is done in UDP. In TCP a connection must be established between the
sender and the receiver. By creating this connection, TCP requires a VC
at IP layers that will be active for the entire duration of a transmission.
The data is placed in allocated buffers and transmitted by TCP in
segments. In addition, TCP provides two useful facilities for labelling
data, push and urgent:

[When the PSH (data push) bit is set, this is an indication that the
receiver should pass the data to the upper layer immediately. The URG
(Urgent) bit is used to indicate that there is data in this segment that the
sending side upper layer entity has marked as urgent. The location of the
last byte of this urgent data is indicated by the 16 bit urgent data pointer
field 7).

Both IP and UDP treat multiple datagrams belongings to a single

transmission as entirely separate units, un-related to each other. TCP on
the other hand is responsible for the reliable delivery of entire segments.
Every segment must be received and acknowledged before the VC is
terminated.

3.4 TCP Segment Header

TCP uses only a single type of protocol data unit, called a TCP segment.
The header is shown in Figure 2. Because one header must perform all
protocol mechanisms, it is rather large, with a minimum length of 20
octets. A segment beginning with 9 fixed format 20 byte headers may be
followed by header option [Ref. I]. After the options, if any, up to
65,535 -20 (IP header) -(TCP header) = 65,445 data bytes may follow.
A Segment with no data is used, for controlling messages and
acknowledgements.

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Figure 2: TCP header format

The fields are:

Source port (16 bits)

Source service access points and identify local end points of connection.

Sequence number (32 bits)

Sequence number of the first data octet in this segment except when
SYN is present. IfSYN is present, it is the initial sequence number
(ISN), and the first data octet is ISN + 1.

Acknowledgement number (32 bits)

A piggybacked acknowledgement contains the sequence number of the

next byte that the TCP entity expects to receive and not for last byte
correctly received. Separate number field and acknowledgement number
fields are used by the TCP sender and the receiver has to implement a
reliable data service.

Data offset (4 bits)

Number of 32-bit, words in the header.

Reserved (6 bits)

Reserved for future use.

Flags (6 bits):

URG: Used to indicate that there is data in this segment which sends the
at the upper layer has marked urgent. The location of the last byte of this
urgent data is indicated by the 16 bit urgent data pointer field.
ACK: Acknowledgement field indicates that the value carried in the
ACK field is valid.

PSH: Push function. The receiver is represented to deliver the data to the
application upon arrival, and not butter it until a full butter has been
received.
RST: Reset the connection due to host crash or some other reason.

SYN: Synchronise the sequence numbers.

FIN: No more data from sender.

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Receive Window (16 bits)

Used for credit based flow control scheme, in bytes. Contains the
number of data bytes beginning with the one indicated in the
acknowledgement field that the receiver is willing to accept.

Checksum (16 bits)

It provides extra reliability. It Checksums the header, the data and

conceptual pseudo header. The Checksum algorithm simply adds up all
the 16 bit words in one’s complement and then takes one’s complement
of the sum. As a consequence, when the receiver performs calculations
on the entire segment including the checksum field, the result should be
0 [Ref. 1].

Urgent data pointer (16 bits)

Points to the octet following the urgent data; this allows the receiver to
know how much urgent data is coming.

Options (Variable)

At present, only one option is defined, which specifies the maximum

segment size that will be accepted.

Several of the fields in the TCP header warrant further elaboration. The
source port and destination port specify the sending and receiving users
of TCP. As with IP, there are a number of common users of TCP that
have been assigned numbers; these numbers should be reserved for that
purpose in any implementation. Other port numbers must be arranged by
agreement between communicating parties.

3.5 TCP Connection Establishment

Before data transmission a connection must be established. Connection

establishment must take into account the unreliability of a network
service, which leads to a loss of ACK, data as well as SYN. Therefore,
the retransmission of these packets have to be done. Recall that a
connection establishment calls for the exchange of SYNs.

Figure 3 illustrates typical three-way [Ref. 3] handshake operations.

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1) Transport entity A (at the sender side) initiates the connection to

transport to entity B by setting SYN bit.

2) Transport entity B (at the receiver side) acknowledges the request

and also initiates a connection request.

3) A acknowledges to connection request of B and B sends a

retransmission and B retransmits.

Now, let us test how this mechanism handles delayed SYN and ACK
packets. It is shown that old SYN X arrives at B after the close of the
relevant connection as shown in Figure 3 (b). B assumes that this is a
fresh request and responds with SYN j, ACK i When A receives this
message, it realises that it has not requested a connection and therefore,
sends an RST, ACKj. Note that the ACKj portion of the RST message is
essential so that an old duplicate RST does not abort a legitimate
connection establishment. The final example Figure 3 (c) shows a case
in which an old SYN, ACK arrives in the middle of a new connection
establishment Because of the use of sequence numbers in the
acknowledgements, this event causes no harm.

Sender A indicates a connection

SYNi

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(c) Delayed SYN and ACK

Figure 3: Three-way handshake mechanism

The three-way handshake procedure ensures that both transport entities

agree on their initial sequence number, which must be different. Why do
we need different sequence numbers? To answer this, let us assume a
case, in which, the transport entities have picked up the same initial
sequence number. After a connection is established, a delayed segment
from the previous connection arrives at B, which will be accepted
because the initial sequence number turns out to be legal. If a segment
from the current connection arrives after some time, it will be rejected
by host B, thinking that it is a duplicate. Thus host B cannot distinguish
a delayed segment from the new segment.

3.6 TCP Connection Termination

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TCP adopts a similar approach to that used for connection

establishment. TCP provides for a graceful close that involves the
independent termination of each direction of the connection. A
termination is initiated when an application tells TCP that it has no more
data to send. Each side must explicitly acknowledge the FIN parcel of
the other, to be acknowledged. The following steps are required for a
graceful close.

The sender must send FINj and receive an ACKj

It must receive a FINj and send an ACKj
It must wait for an interval of time, to twice the maximum
expected segment lifetime.

Acknowledgement Policy

When a data segment arrives that is in sequence, the receiving TCP

entity has two options concerning the timing of acknowledgment:

Immediate: When data are accepted, immediately transmit an

empty (no data) segment containing the appropriate
acknowledgment number.

Cumulative: When data are accepted, record the need for

acknowledgment, but wait for an outbound segment with data on
which to piggyback the acknowledgement. To avoid a Jong
delay, set a window timer. If the timer expires before an
acknowledgement is sent, transmit an empty segment containing
the appropriate acknowledgement number.

3.7 TCP Flow Control

Flow Control is the process of regulating the traffic between two end
points and is used to prevent the sender from flooding the receiver with
too much data. TCP provides a flow control service to its application to
eliminate the possibility of the sender overflowing. At the receivers
buffer TCP uses sliding window with credit scheme to handle flow
control. The scheme provides the receiver with a greater degree of
control over data flow. In a credit scheme a segment may be
acknowledged without the guarantee of a new credit and vice-versa.
Whereas in a fixed sliding window control (used at the data link layer),
the two are interlinked (tied).

Now, let us understand this scheme with the help of a diagram.

Assume that the sender wants to send application data to the receiver.
The receiver has 4 K byte buffer which is empty as shown below:

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0 4 Kbyte
1) Initially buffer size= Empty

2) Sender transmits 2 K byte segment (data) with sequence number

0 as shown below:

Data = 2 K, Sequence No. = 0

Sender Receiver

3) The packet is examined at the receiver. After that it will be

acknowledged by it. It will also specify the credit value (windows
size) of the receiver. Until the application process running at the
receiver side removes some data from buffer, its buffer size
remains fixed at 2048. Therefore, credit value (window size) is
2048 byte.

Receivers
Buffer = [2 K data Empty

ACK = 2048. Sequence No. = 2048 Credit = 2048

Sender Receiver

4) Now the sender transmits another 2048 bytes, which is

acknowledged, but the advertised window (credit) is 0.

Receivers
Buffer = Full

Data = 2048. Sequence No. = 2048

Sender Receiver

5) The sender must stop sending data until the application process
on the receiving host has removed some data from the buffer, at
which time TCP can advertise, a large window (credit value).

Receivers Application
Buffer = has read 2 K 2K
byte data

ACK = 4096. Credit = 2048

Sender Receiver

When the credit size is zero, normally there is no transmission from the
sender side except in two situations:

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(i) Urgent data requires to be sent

(ii) Sender wants to know the credit size and the next byte expected
by the receiver.

Both senders and receivers can delay me transmission from their side to
resources. If a sender knows that the buffer capacity of a receiver
window is 8 K and currently it has received just 2 K, then it may buffer
it at the sender side till it gets more data from the application process.
Similarly, the receiver has to send some data to the sender it can delay
the acknowledgement till its data is ready for that the acknowledgement
can be piggybacked. Therefore, the basic reason of delaying the
acknowledgement is to reduce the bandwidth.

Let us consider an example of a log-in session, for example, Telnet

Session in which the user types one character at a time and the server
(log-in server) reacts to every keystroke. You will notice that one
character requires four exchanges of IP packets between the log-in
session client and a Telnet server which is illustrated below:

Assume that TCP and IP header are 20 bytes each).

1st exchange (at the sender side)

- Whenever application data comes to TCP sender, it creates

20 bytes of a segment, which it gives to IP to ~reate a IP
datagram.

Total no. of bytes sent = 20 bytes (TCP) + 20 bytes (IP) + I byte

for a character (a key stroke) = 41 byte.

2nd exchange (at the receiver side)

- The receiver (Telnet a log-in server) immediately sends an

acknowledgement to the sender.

Total no. of bytes sent by the server = 20 bytes (TCP) +20 byte
(IP) = 40 bytes No extra byte is required for an
acknowledgement.

3rd exchange (From the log-in server)

- Window update-related message which moves to window

one byte right.

Total no of byte sent -20bytes (TCP) + 20byte (IP) = 40 bytes.

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4th exchange (From the log-in server)

- Echos Character back to the client

Total no. bytes -20 bytes (TCP) + 20 byte (IP) + 1 byte (0 char) =
41 bytes.

Therefore, the total number of bytes exchanged = 41 + 40 + 40 + 41 =

162 bytes.

So what is the solution to reduce the wastage of bandwidth? The

solution has been proposed by Nagle and is known as Nagle’s
algorithm.

The algorithm works as follows: When data comes the sender one byte
at a time, just send the first byte and buffer all the rest until the
outstanding byte is acknowledged. In the meantime, if the application
generates some more characters before the acknowledgement arrives,
TCP will not transmit the character but buffer them instead. After the
acknowledgement arrives TCP transmits all the characters that have
been waiting in the buffer in a single segment.

Nagle’s algorithm is widely used for the TCP implementation). But in

certain cases, the algorithm might not be applicable. For example, in
highly interactive applications where every keystroke or a curser
movement is required to be sent immediately.

Another problem that wastes network bandwidth is when the sender has
a large volume of data to transmit and the receiver can only process its
receiver buffer a few bytes at a time. Sooner or later the receiver buffer
becomes full. When the receiving application reads a few bytes from the
receive buffer, the receiving TCP sends a small advertisement window
to the sender, which quickly transmits a small segment and fills the
receiver buffer again. This process goes on and on with many small
segments being transmitted by the sender for a single application
message. This problem is called the silly window syndrome. It can be
avoided if the receiver does not advertise the window until the
window size is at least as large as half of the receiver buffer size or
the maximum segment size. The sender side can cooperate by
refraining from transmitting small segments.

To summarise, the silly window syndrome can be explained stepwise as:

Step I: Initially the receiver buffer is full

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Step II: Application process reads one byte at the receiver side.

Step III: The TCP running at the receiver sends a window update to
the sender.

Step IV: The TCP sender sends another byte.

Step V: The receiver buffer is filled up again.

Steps III, IV and V continue forever. Clark’s solution is to prevent the

receiver from sending a window update for I byte. In the solution the
receiver window is forced to wait until it has a sufficient amount of
space available and then only advertise. Specifically, the receiver should
not send a window update until it can handle the maximum segment size
it advertised when the connection was established, or its buffer half
empty, whichever is smaller.

Nagle’s algorithm and Clark’s solution to the silly window syndrome

are complementary. Both solutions are valid and can work together. The
goal is for the sender not to send small segments and the receiver not to
ask for them. Nagle was trying to solve the problem caused by the
sending application delivering data to TCP a byte at a time. Clark was
trying to solve the problem of the receiving application.

3.8 TCP Congestion Control

As discussed in the previous section, TCP provides many services to the

application process. Congestion Control is one such service. TCP uses
end-to-end Congestion Control rather than the network supported
Congestion Control, since the IP Protocol does not provide Congestion
released support to the end system. The basic idea of TCP congestion
control is to have each sender transmit just the right amount of data to
keep the network resources utilised but not overloaded. You are also
aware that TCP flow control mechanism uses a sliding-window protocol
for end-to-end flow control. This protocol is implemented by making the
receiver advertise in its acknowledgement the amount of bytes it is
willing to receive in the future, called the advertised window to avoid
the receiver’s buffer from overflow. By looking at the advertised
window, the sender will resist transmitting data that exceeds the amount
that is specified in the advertised window. However, the advertised
window does not prevent the buffers in the intermediate routers from
overflowing due to which routers get overloaded. Because IP does not
provide any mechanism to control congestion, it is up to the higher layer
to detect congestion and take proper action. It turns out that TCP
window mechanism can also be used to control congestion in the
network.

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The protocols designers have to see that the network should be utilised
very efficiently (i.e., no congestion and no underutilisation). If the
senders are too aggressive and send too many packets, the network will
experience congestion. On the other hand, if TCP senders are too
conservative, the network will be underutilised. The maximum amount
of bytes that a TCP sender can transmit without congesting the network
is specified by another window called the congestion window. To avoid
network congestion and receiver buffer overflow, the maximum amount
of data that the TCP sender can transmit at any time is the minimum of
the advertised window (receiver window) and the congestion window.
Thus, the effective window is the minimum of what the sender thinks is
OK and what the receiver thinks is OK. If the receiver advertises for 8 K
window but the sender sends 4 K size of data if it thinks that 8 K will
congest the network, then the effective windows size is 4K.

The approach used in TCP is to have each sender limit the rate of data
traffic into the network as a function of perceived network congestion. If
a TCP sender perceives that there is small congestion along the path,
then it increases its send rate otherwise it reduce it

The TCP congestion control algorithm dynamically adjusts the

congestion window according to the network state. The algorithm is
called slow start. The operation of the TCP congestion control algorithm
may be divided into three phases: slow start, congestion avoidance
and congestion occurrence. The first phase is run when the algorithm
starts or restarts, assuming that the network is empty. The technique,
slow start, is accomplished by first setting the congestion window to
one maximum-size segment. Each time the sender receives an
acknowledgement from the receiver, the sender increases the congestion
window by one segment. After sending the first segment, if the sender
receives an acknowledgement before a time-out, the sender increases the
congestion window to two segments. If these two segments are
acknowledged, the congestion window increases to four segments, and
so on. As shown in the Figure 4, the congestion window size grows
exponentially during this phase. The reason for the exponential increase
is that slow start needs to fill an empty pipe as quickly as possible. The
name “slow start” is perhaps a misnomer, since the algorithm ramps up
very quickly.

Slow start does not increase the congestion window exponentially

forever, since the network will be filled up eventually. Specifically, slow
start stops when the congestion window reaches a value specified as the
congestion threshold, which is initially set to 65,535 bytes. At this
point a congestion avoidance (2nd phase) phase takes over. This phase
assumes that the network is running close to full utilisation. It is wise for

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the algorithm to reduce the rate of increase so that it will not overshoot
excessively. Specifically, the algorithm increases the congestion
window linearly rather than exponentially when it tries to avoid
congestion. This is realised by increasing the congestion window by one
segment for each round-trip time.

Obviously, the congestion window cannot be increased indefinitely. The

congestion window stops increasing when TCP detects that the network
is congested. The algorithm now enters the third phase.

Number of transmissions

Figure 4: Dynamics of TCP congestion window

At this point the congestion threshold is first set to one-half of the

current window size (the minimum of the congestion window and the
advertised window, but at least two segments). Next the congestion
window is set to one maximum-sized segment. Then the algorithm
restarts, using the slow start technique.

How does TCP detect network congestion? There are two approaches:

i) Acknowledgement does not arrive before the timeout because of

a segment loss.

ii) Duplicate acknowledgement is required.

The basic assumption the algorithm is making is that, a segment loss is

due to congestion rather than errors. This assumption is quite valid in a
wired network where the percentage of segment losses due to

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transmission errors is generally low (less than 1 per cent). Duplicate

ACK can be due to either segment reordering or segment loss. In this
case the TCP decreases the congestion threshold to one-half of the
current window size, as before. However, the congestion window is not
reset to one. If the congestion window is less than the new congestion
threshold, then the congestion window is increased as in slow start.
Other wise, the congestion window is increased as in congestion
avoidance. However, the assumption may not be valid in a wireless
network where transmission errors can be relatively high.

The Figure 4 illustrates the dynamics of the congestion window as time

progresses. Thus, assumes that maximum segment size is 1024,
threshold to 32K and congestion window to I K for the first
transmission. The congestion window then grows exponentially (slow
start phase) until it hits the threshold (32 K). After that it grows linearly
(congestion avoidance phase I). Now, when congestion occurs, the
threshold is set to half the current window (20 K) and slow start initiated
all over again. In case there is no congestion, the congestion window
will continue to grow.

In short, TCP’s congestion control algorithm operates as follows:

1) When the Congestion Window is below the threshold, the sender

uses for slow start phase and congestion window grows
exponentially.

2) When the congestion window is above the threshold the sender is

in the congestion avoidance phase and congestion window grows
linearly.

You may wish to refer the references [1], [2] and [4] for further
clarification on the subject.

3.9 Remote Procedure Call

In this section we will look at two other files access mechanisms such as
Network File System and Remote Procedure Call used for accessing
files from a server at the client machine. These two mechanism allow
programs to call procedures located on remote machines.

Network File System (NFS)

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The network file system (NFS) is a file access protocol. FTP and TFTP
transfer entire files from a server to the client host. A file access service,
on the other hand, makes file systems on a remote machine visible,
though they were on your own machine but without actually transferring
the files. NFS provides a number of features:

(1) NFS allows you to edit a file on another machine exactly as you
would if it were on your own machine.

(2) It even allows you to transfer files from the server to a third host
not directly connected to either of you.

Remote Procedure Call (RPC)

NFS works by invoking the services of a second protocol called remote

procedure call (RPC). Figure 5 shows a local procedure call (in this
case, a C program calls the open function to access a file stored on a
disk).

Figure 5: Concept of local procedure call

RPC transfers the procedure call to another machine. Using RPC, local
procedure calls are mapped onto appropriate RPC function calls. Figure
6 illustrates the process: a program issues a call to the NFS client
process. The NFS client formats the call for the RPC client and passes it
along. The RPC client transforms the data into a different format and
provides the interface with the actual TCP/IP transport mechanisms. At
the remote host, the RPC server retrieves the call, reformats, and passes
it to the NFS server. The NFS server relays the call to the remote disk,
which responds as if to a local call and opens the file to the NFS server.

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The same process is followed in reverse order to make the calling

application believe that the file is open on its own host.

Figure 6: Concept of remote procedure call

There are three independent components in NFS protocol:

(i) NFS itself

(ii) General purpose RPC
(iii) Data representing format (DRF).

In order to make the NFS computer independent what can be done is to

use RPC and DRF in other software, (including application), programme
by dividing a program into a client side and a server side that use RPC
as the chief transport mechanism. On the client side, the transfer
procedures may be designated as remote, forcing the compiler to
incorporate RPC code into those procedures, On the server side, the
desired procedures are implemented by using other RPC facilities to
declare them as a part of a server. When the executing client program
calls one of the remote procedures, RPC automatically collects values
for arguments, from a message, sends the message to the remote server,
awaits a response, and stores returned values in the designated
arguments. In essence, communication with the remote server occurs
automatically as a side-effect of a remote call. The RPC mechanism
hides all the details of protocols, making it possible for programmers
who know little about the underlying communication protocols but who
can write distributed application programs.

4.0 CONCLUSION

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This unit has taken you through the various services provided by the
Transport layer as well as how to establish and release TCP connections.
You have also learnt how the TCP Flow Control mechanism and how it
is different from data link layer as well as congestion mechanism in
TCP.

5.0 SUMMARY
In this unit, we discussed the two transport layer protocols (TCP &
UDP) in detail.
The transport port can be light weight (very simple) which provide very
little facility. In such cases, the application directly talks to the IP. UDP
is an example of a transport protocol, which provides minimum facility,
with no control, no connection establishment, no acknowledgement and
no congestion handling feature. Therefore, if the application is to be
designed around the UDP, then such features have to be supported in the
application itself. On the other hand, there is another protocol- TCP
which provides several feature such as reliability, flow control,
connection establishment to the various application services.
Nevertheless, the services that the transport layer can provide often
constrain the network layer protocol.

We had a close look at the TCP connection establishment, TCP flow

control, TCP congestion handling mechanism and finally UDP and TCP
header formats. With respect to congestion control, we learned that
congestion control is essential for the well-being of the network.
Without congestion control the network can be blocked.

6.0 TUTOR-MARKED ASSIGNMENT

1) Is it true that if IP is the network layer protocol, so TCP must be
the transport layer 1?
2) There are two protocols at the transport layer, which of the two is
better?
3) What is the difference between FTP and NFS?

4) What is a flow control problem? What is the basic mechanism at

the transport layer to handle flow control problem?
7.0 REFERENCES/FURTHER READINGS

A.S Tanebaum, (2003). Computer Networks, 4th Edition, PHI, New

Deihi.

J. F. Kurose & K. W. (2003). Computer Networking, A top down

approach featuring the Internet, Ross, Pearson Edition, New
Delhi.

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William Stallings, (2002). Data and Computer Communication, 6th

Edition, Pearson Education, New Delhi.

Leon Garcia, and Widjaja, (2000). Communications Networks, Tata

McGraw Hill.

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UNIT 3 NETWORK SECURITY

CONTENTS

1.0 Introduction
2.0 Objectives
3.0 Main Content
3.1 Cryptography
3.2 Public Key Cryptography
3.3 Public Key Cryptography
3.3.1 RSA Public Key Algorithm
3.3.2 Diffie-Hellman
3.3.3 Elliptic Curve Public Key Cryptosystems
3.3.4 DSA
3.4 Mathematical Background
3.4.1 Exclusive OR
3.4.2 The Modulo Function
4.0 Conclusion
5.0 Summary
6.0 Tutor-Marked Assignment
7.0 References/Further Readings

1.0 INTRODUCTION

Cryptography plays an important role in network security. The purpose

of cryptography is to protect transmitted information from being read
and understood by anyone except the intended recipient. In the ideal
sense, unauthorised individuals can never read an enciphered message.

Secret writing can be traced back to 3,000 B.C. when it was used by the
Egyptians. They used hieroglyphics to conceal writing from unintended
recipients. Hieroglyphics is derived from the Greek word hieroglyphica,
which means “sacred carvings”. Hieroglyphics evolved into hieratic,
which was easier to use script. Around 400 B.C., military cryptography
was employed by the Spartans in the form of strip of papyrus or
parchment wrapped around a wooden rod. This system is called a
Scytale. The message to be encoded was written lengthwise down the
rod on the wrapped material. Then, the material was unwrapped and
carried to the recipient. In unwrapped form, the writing appeared to
random characters, and to read again the material was rewound on a rod
of the same diameter and length.

During 50 B.C., Julius Caesar, the emperor of Rome, used a substitution

cipher to transmit messages to Marcus Tullius Cicero. In this, letters of
the alphabets are substituted for other letters of the same alphabet.
Since, only one alphabet was used, this is also called monoalphabetic

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substitution. This particular cipher involved shifting the alphabet by

three letters and substituting those letters. This is sometimes known as
C3 (for Caesar shifting three places).

In this unit, we provide details of cryptography and its needs. In section

3.2 we define cryptography, Section 3.3 presents a brief review of
symmetric cryptography. In section 3.4 we discuss the Asymmetric
Cryptography. We summarise the unit in section 3.6 followed by the
Solutions/Answers.

2.0 OBJECTIVES

After going through this unit, you should be able to:

learn about the principles and practice of cryptography

various symmetric and public key algorithms.

3.0 MAIN CONTENT

3.1 Cryptography

Cryptography is the science of writing in secret code and is an ancient

art; the first documented use of cryptography in writing dates back to
circa 1900 B.C. when an Egyptian scribe used non-standard
hieroglyphics in an inscription. Some experts argue that cryptography
appeared simultaneously sometime after writing was invented, with
applications ranging from diplomatic missives to war-time battle plans.
The new form of cryptography emerges with the widespread
development of computer and communications technologies.
Cryptography is a key technology when communicating over any un-
trusted medium, particularly the Internet. Rivest defines cryptography as
simply “Communication in the presence of adversaries”. Modem
cryptographic techniques have many uses, such as access control, digital
signatures, e-mail security, password authentication, data integrity
check, and digital evidence collection and copyright protection.

Cryptographic systems are generically classified among three

independent dimensions:

Types of Operation

All encryption algorithms are based on two general principles:

substitution and transposition. The fundamental requirements are that no
information is lost and all operations are reversible.

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Key Used

If both sender and the receiver use the same key, then it is referred to as
symmetric, single-key, secret-key, or conventional encryption. And if
the encryption and decryption key are different, the system is
asymmetric key, two-key, or public key encryption.

Within the context of any application-to-application communication,

there are some specific security requirements: (1) Authentication, (2)
Privacy/ confidentiality, (3) Integrity, and (4) Non-repudiation. There
are, in general, three types of cryptographic schemes typically used to
accomplish these goals: (I) secret key (or symmetric) cryptography, (2)
public key (or asymmetric) cryptography, and (3) hash functions, each
of which is described in the subsequent subsections.

3.2 Symmetric Key Cryptography

About twenty years ago, cryptography was the art of making and
breaking codes. The codes were used to transfer messages over an
unsecured channel. The channel should be protected from intruders who
read, insert, delete or modify, messages, as depicted in Figure I. The
transmission of a message is done using an encryption function E that
converts the message or plaintext using the key into a cipher teXt. The
receiver does the reverse of this operation, using the decryption function
D and a decryption key to recover the plaintext from the cipher text. The
key is distributed in advance over a secure channel, for example by
courier.

Normally, the encryption and decryption function, but not the key, are
considered known to the adversary, so the protection of the information
depends on the key only. If the enemy knows the key, the whole system
is useless until a new key is distributed. In secret Key Cryptography, a
single key is used for both encryption and decryption, as shown in
Figure I. The main difficulty with this approach is the distribution of the
key.

Secret key cryptography schemes are generally categorised as being

either stream ciphers or block ciphers. Stream ciphers operate on a
single byte (or computer word) at a time, and implement some form of
feedback mechanism so that the key is constantly changing. Block
cipher scheme encrypts one block of data at a time using the same key
on each block.

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Figure I: Secret Key Cryptography

The most common secret key cryptography scheme is Data Encryption

Standard (DES), designed by IBM in I 970s and adopted by the National
Bureau of Standard (NBS) of USA [now the National Institute for
Standards and Technology (NIST)] in 1977 for commercial and
unclassified government applications. DES is a block-cipher employing
a 56-bit key operating on 64 bit blocks of data. DES has a complex set
of rules and transformations designed basically for fast hardware
implementation and slow software implementation. The latter point is
significant in today’s context, as the speed of CPU is several orders of
magnitude faster than twenty years ago. IBM also proposed a 112-bit
key for DES in the 1990s, which was never implemented seriously.

In 1997, NIST initiated the task of developing a new secure

cryptosystem for U.S government applications. This effort has resulted
in AES (Advanced Encryption Standard). AES became the official
successor to DES in December 2001. AES is based on Rjndael
Algorithm and employs a 128-, 192-, or 256-bit key.

The following terminology is often used when symmetric ciphers are

examined:

Block Ciphers

A block of cipher transforms n-bit plaintext blocks to n-bit ciphertext

blocks on the application of a cipher key k. The key is generated at
random using various mathematical functions as shown in Figure 2.

Figure 2: Block cipher

A stream cipher consists of a state machine that outputs at each state

transition one bit of information. This stream of output bits is called the
running key. Just XORring the running key to the plaintext message can

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implement the encryption. The state machine is a pseudo-random

number generator. For example, we can build one from a block cipher
by encrypting repeatedly its own output. Typically, more elaborate
constructions (for high speed) are used for stream ciphers. Some of the
more well-known stream ciphers are RC4 and SEAL. Several stream
ciphers are based on linear-feedback shift registers (LFSR) (Figure 3),
such as A5/] used in the GSM. These have the benefit of being very fast
(several times faster than usual block ciphers).

Figure 3: Stream cipher linear feedback shift register (LFSR)

SSSC (Self-Synchronising Stream Ciphers)

The class of self-synchronsing stream ciphers has property that it

corrects the output stream after the bit flips or even drops bits after a
short time. SSSCs ‘can be constructed using block ciphers in a CFB-
related way. Assume, that we have already encrypted” bits of the
message and know that much of the ciphertext (where n denotes the
block length of the cipher). Then we produce a new running key bit by
encrypting ‘the n ciphertext bits. Take one bit of the output of the cipher
to be the new running key bit. Now moving one bit further we can
iterate this procedure for the whole length of the message.

One bit error in a ciphertext cannot affect the decrypted plaintext after n
bits. This makes the cipher self-synchronisirig.

The block cipher used should have sufficiently large block size to avoid
substitution attacks.

Substitution and Transposition

A substitution (Figure 4) means replacing symbols or group of symbols

by other symbols or groups of symbols. Transposition (Figure 5), on the
other hand, means permuting the symbols in a block. Neither of these
operations alone provides sufficient security, but strong ciphers can be
built by combining them. A Substitution-Permutation Network (SPN)
means a cipher composed of a number of stages, each involving
substitutions and permutations. The prominent examples of SPNs 3re
DES andCAST-128.

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Figure 5: Transition

S-Boxes

Lookup tables that map n bits to m bits, where n and m are often equal.
There are several ways of constructing and measuring good S-boxes for
ciphers.

a) S-boxes, which are resistant against well known attacks, can be

created using rigorous mathematical approach by applying bent
functions (or related).

b) Other designers apply heuristic approaches that result in S-boxes

that are more difficult to handle in mathematical proofs, but can
have additional benefits.

The S-box may even be the only non-linear part of the cipher (e.g.,
DES) and thus, may be considered as the single most important part of
the cipher. In fact, DES’s S-boxes are so good that it is used in many
other ciphers design (for example, Serpent).

Feistel Networks

The original idea was used in the block cipher, Lucifer, invented by
Horst Feistel. Several variations have been devised from the original
version. A Feistel network (Figure 6) is a general way of constructing
block ciphers from simple functions. The standard Feistel network takes
a function from n bits to n bits and produces an invertible function from
2n bits to 2n bits. The structure of Fiestel network is based on round
function. The essential property of Feistel networks that makes them so
useful in cipher design is that the round function need not be invertible,
but always is the resulting function. If the round function depends on,

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say, k bits of a key, then the Feistel cipher requires rk bits of the key
where r is the number of rounds used. The security of the Feistel
structure is not obvious. It is compulsory that a Feistel cipher has
enough number of rounds, but just adding more rounds does not always
guarantee security.

The process of taking the user key and expanding it into rk bits for the
Feistel rounds is called key scheduling. This is often a non-linear
operation and hence does not directly provide any information about the
actual user key. There are many ciphers that have this basic structure;
Lucifer. DES, and Twofish etc.

Figure 6: Feistal’ Cipher

Expansion, Permutation

They are linear operations, and thus, not sufficient to guarantee security.
They are common tools in mixing bits in a round function and when
used with good non-linear B-boxes (as in DES) they are vital for the
security because they propagate the non-linearity uniformly over all bits.

Bitslice Operations (Bitwise Logic Operations XO~ AND, OR, NOT

and Bit Permutations)

The idea of bitslice implementations of block ciphers is due to Eli

Biham. It is common in vector machines to achieve parallel operation.
However, Biham applied it on serial machines by using large registers as
available in modern computers. The term “bitslice” has been the
contribution of Matthew Kwan.

All block ciphers can be designed in bitslice manner, but this could
affect the speed of operations such as addition and multiplication they
may become very slow. On the other hand, permutations are almost free
as they only require a renaming of the registers and this can be done at
the coding level. Thus, for example, in DES exhaustive key search using
bitslice techniques, one can increment the current key in, a fraction of a
time than is usually needed for key scheduling.

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The AES finalist Serpent is designed to be implemented using bitslice

operations only. This makes it particularly efficient on modern
architectures with many registers.

Modes of Operation

Block ciphers are the most commonly used cipher. Block ciphers
transform a fixed-size block of data (usually 64 bits) into another fixed-
size block (possibly 64 bits wide again) using a function selected by the
key. If the key, input block and output block have all n bits, a .block
cipher basically defines a one-to-one mapping from n-bit integers to
permutations of n-bit integers.

If the same block is encrypted twice with the same key. the resulting
ciphertext blocks are also the same (this mode of encryption is called
electronic code book, or ECB). This information could be useful for an
attacker. For identical plaintext blocks being encrypted to different
ciphertext blocks, three standard modes are generally used:

1) CBC (Cipher Block Chaining)

First XORing the plaintext block with the previous ciphertext block
obtains a ciphertext block, and then the resulting value needs to be
encrypted. In this, leading blocks influence all trailing blocks, which
increases the number of plaintext bits one ciphertext bit depends on, but
this may also leads to synchronisation problems ifone block is lost. The
Process of Cipher Block Chaining shown in Figure 7. In this Figure m”
m” m) are messages and C1, C2 and C3 are ciphertexts.

Figure 7: Cipher block chaining

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2) CFB (Cipher Feedback)

In this the kth ciphertext block is obtained by encrypting the (k-l)th

ciphertext block and XORing the result onto the plaintext. The CFB
mode possess self-synchrcnising property: A CFB feedback loop can
also be used as a pseudo-random number generator if one simply feeds
one block of true random data with trailing blocks of zeroes into the
encryption routine (although the expected period of this PRNG would be
only about r where n is the block size of the cipher). CFB is shown in
Figure 8.

Figure 8: Cipber feedback model

3) OFB (Output Feedback Block)

It is used as a synchronous key-stream generator, whose output is

XORed with the plaintext to obtain ciphertext, block by block. The key-
stream is generated by riterative encryption, starting with an
initialisation vector (IV) which, along with the key, is agreed upon
beforehand. OFB is shown in Figure 9.

Each data block Si is derived from encryption provision data block Si

Ci=mi Si mi=Ci Si Si=Ek (Si-1)

Figure 9: Output feedback block

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The One-Time Pad

The one-time pad (OTP) is the only cipher that has been proven to be
unconditionally ‘secure, i.e., unbreakable in practice. Further, it has
been proven that any unbreakable, unconditionally secure cipher must
be a one-tin1e pad.

The Vernam cipher (invented by G. Vernam in 1917) in onetime pad

and is very simple: take a stream of bits that contain the plaintext
message, and a key, which is the secret random bit-stream of the same
length as the plaintext. [To encrypt the plaintext with the key,
sequentially exclusive-or each pair of key bit and plaintext bit to obtain
the ciphertext bit]. If the key is truly random, the attacker or adversary
has no means of deciding whether some guessed plaintext is more likely
than any other when, only the ciphertext and no knowledge of the
plaintext is available.

The main practical problem is that the key does not have a small
constant length, but the same length as the message, and one part of a
key should never be used twice (or the cipher can be broken). However,
this cipher has allegedly been in widespread use since its invention, and
even more since the security proof by C. Shannon in 1949. Although,
admittedly the security of this cipher had been conjectured earlier, it was
Shannon who actually found a formal proof for it.

DES

The Data Encryption Standard (DES) is an algorithm developed in the

mid-l 970s and turned into a standard by the US National Institute of
Standards and Technology (NIST), and was also adopted by several
other governments worldwide. It was and still is widely used, especially
in the financial industry.

DES is a block cipher with a 64-bit block size. It uses 56-bit keys. This
makes it suspectible to exhaustive key search with modem computing
powers and special-purpose hardware. DES is still strong enough to
keep most .random hackers, adversaries and individuals out, DES is
easily breakable with special hardware by, government, criminal
organizations etc. DES is getting too weak, and should not be used in
new applications. NIST proposed in 2004 to withdraw the DES
standard.

A variant of DES, Triple-DES (also 3DES) is based on using DES three

times (normally in an encrypt-decrypt-encrypt sequence with three
different, unrelated keys). The Triple-DES is arguably much stronger

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than (single) DES, however, it is rather slow compared to some new

block ciphers.

Although, at the time of DES’s introduction, its design philosophy was

held secret. Some information has been published about its design, and
one of the original designers, Don Coppersmith, has said that they
discovered ideas similar to differential crypt analysis while designing
DES in 1974. However, it was just a matter of time that these
fundamental ideas were re-discovered.

Although DES is no longer considered a practical solution, it is many a

time used to describe new crypt analytical methods. Even today, there
are no crypt analytical techniques that would completely break DES in a
structural way; indeed, the only real weakness known is the short key
size (and perhaps the small block size).

DES uses the:

Data Encryption Algorithm (DEA),

A secret key block-cipher employing a 56-bit key operating on

64-bit blocks.

FIPS 81 describes four modes of DES operation: Electronic

Codebook (ECB), Cipher Block Chaining (CBC), Cipher
Feedback (CFB), and Output Feedback (OFB). Despite all these
options, ECB is the most commonly deployed mode of operation.

DES uses a 56-bit key, which is divided into eight 7-bit blocks and an
8th odd parity bit is added to each block (i.e., a “0” or “I” is added to the
block so that there are an odd number of I bit in each 8-bit block). By
using the 8 parity bits for rudimentary error detection, a DES key is
actually 64 bits in length for computational purposes (although it only
has 56 bits worth of randomness, or entropy).

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Figure 10: DEI; algorithm

DES process on 64-bit blocks of the plaintext, invoking 16 rounds of

permutations, swaps, and substitutes, as shown in Figure 10. The main
DES steps are:

1) The 64.bit block undergoes an initial permutation (JP), where

each bit is moved to a new bit position; e.g., the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd
bits are moved to the 58th, 50th, and 42nd position, respectively.

2) The permuted 64-bit input is divided into two 32-bit blocks,

called left and right, respectively. The initial values of the left and
right blocks are denoted as Lo and Ro.

3) There are then 16 rounds of operation on the L and R blocks.

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During each iteration (where n ranges from I to 16), the following

formula is used:

Ln = Rn-1
Rn = Ln-1 XOR f(Rn-1, Kn)

The new L block value is taken from the prior R block value- The new
R block is calculated by taking the bit-by-bit exclusive-OR (XOR) of
the prior Lblock with the results of applying the DES cipher function,f,
to the prior R block and Kn. (Kn is a 48-bit value derived from the 64-bit
DES key). Each round uses a different 48 bits according to the
standard’s Key Schedule algorithm.

The cipher function, f, combines the 32-bit R block value and the 48-bit
subkey in the following way:

First, the 32 bits in the R block are expanded to 48 bits by an

expansion function (E); the extra 16 bits are found by repeating
the bits in 16 predefined positions.

The 48-bit expanded R-block is then ORed with the 48-bit

subkey.

The result is a 48-bit value that is then divided into eight 6-bit
blocks.

These are fed as input into 8 selection (S) boxes, denoted S 1,….,S8.
Each 6-bit input yields a 4-bit output using a table lookup based
on the 64 possible inputs; this results in a 32-bit output from the
S-box. The 32 bits are then rearranged by a permutation function
(P), producing the results from the cipher function.

The results from the final DES round – i.e., L16 and R16 -are recombined
into a 64-bit value and fed into an inverse initial permutation (IP-1). At
this step, the bits are rearranged into their original positions, so that the
58th, 50th, and 42nd bits, for example, are moved back into the 1st, 2nd,
and 3rd positions, respectively. The output from IP-’ is the 64-bit
ciphertext block.

Breaking DES

DES’s 56-bit key was too short to withstand a brute-force attack from
computing power of modern computers. Remember Moore’s Law:
computer power doubles every 18 ‘months. Keeping this law in mind, a
key that could withstand a brute-force guessing attack in 2000 could

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hardly be expected to withstand the same attack a quarter of a century

later.

DES is even more vulnerable to a brute-force attack as it is commonly

used to encrypt words, meaning that the entropy of the 64-bit block is
greatly reduced. That is, if we are encrypting random bit streams, then a
given byte might contain anyone of 28 (256) possible values and the
entire 64-bit block has 264, or about 18.5 quintillion, possible values. If
we are encrypting words, however, we are most likely to find a limited
set of bit patterns; perhaps 70 or so if we account for upper and lower
case letters, the numbers, space, and some punctuation. That is, only
about ¼ of the bit combinations of a given byte are likely to occur.
Despite this, the U.S. government insisted throughout the mid-1990s
that 56-bit DES was secure and virtually unbreakable if appropriate
precautions were employed. 1n response, RSA Laboratories sponsored a
series of cryptographic challenges to prove that DES was no longer
secure and appropriate for use.

DES Challenge I was launched in March 1997. R. Verser

completed it in 84 days in a collaborative effort to break DES
using thousands of computers on the Internet. The first DES II
challe!lge lasted 40 days during early 1998, This problem was
solved bydistributed.net, a worldwide distributed computing
network using the spare CPU cycles of computers around the
Internet. The participants in distributed.net activities load a client
program that runs in the background, conceptually similar to the
SETI @Home “Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence” project).
By the end of the project, distributed.net systems were checking
28 billion keys per second.

The second DES II challenge lasted just less than 3 days. On

July 17, 1998, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF)
announced the construction of a hardware that could brute-force a
DES key in an average of 4.5 days. The device called Deep
Crack, could check 90 billion keys per second and cost only
about $220,000 including design. As the design is scalable, this
suggests that an organization could develop a DES cracker that
could break 56-bit keys in an average of a day for as little as
$1,000,000.

The DES III challenge, launched in January 1999, was broken in

less than a day by the coordinated efforts of Deep Crack and
distributed.net.

The Deep Crack algorithm is to launch a brute-force attack by guessing

every possible key. A 56-bit key yields 256, or about 72 quadrillion,

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possible values. The DES cracker team initially assumed that some
recognisable plaintext would appear in the decrypted string even though
they didn’t have a specific known plaintext block. They then applied all
256 possible key values to the 64-bit block. The system checked to find if
the decrypted value of the block was “interesting”, which they defined
as bytes containing one of the alphanumeric characters, space, or some
punctuation. As the likelihood of a single byte being “interesting” is
about ¼, then the likelihood of the entire 8-byte stream being
“interesting” is about ¼8, or 1/65536 (½16). This dropped the number of
possible keys that might yield positive results to about 240, or about a
trillion.

After the assumption that an “interesting” 8-byte block would be

followed by another “interesting” block. Therefore, if the first block of
ciphertext decrypted to something interesting, they decrypted the next
block; otherwise, they abandoned this key. Only if the second block was
also “interesting” did they examine the key closer. Looking for 16
consecutive bytes that were “interesting” meant that only 224, or 16
million, keys required to be examined further. This further examination
was primarily to see if the text made any sense.

It is important to mention mentioning a couple of forms of crypt analysis

that have been shown to be effective against DES. Differential
cryptanalysis, invented in 1990 by E. Biham and A. Shamir (of RSA
fame), is a chosen-plaintext attack. By selecting pairs of plaintext with
particular differences, the crypt analyst examines the differences in the
resultant ciphertext pairs. Linear plaintext, invented by M. Matsui, uses
a linear approximation to analyse the actions of a block cipher
(including DES). Both these attacks one be more efficient than brute
force.

DES Variants

After DES algorithm was “officially” broken, several variants appeared.

In the early 1990s, there was a proposal to increase the security of DES
by effectively increasing the key length by using multiple keys with
multiple passes etc. But for this scheme to work, it had to first be shown
that, the DES function is not a group, as defined in mathematics. If DES
was a group, then we could show that for two DES keys, X1 and X2,
applied to some plaintext (P), we can get a single equivalent key,
X3,that would provide the same result; i.e.,

EX2(EX1(P)) = EX3(P)

where Ex(P) represents DES encryption of some plaintext P using DES

key X. If DES were a group, it wouldn’t matter how many keys and

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passes we applied to some plaintext; we could always find a single 56-

bit key that would provide the same result.

As DES was proven not to be a group, we apply additional keys and

passes to increase the effective key length. One choice, then, might be to
use two keys and two passes, yielding an effective key length of 112
bits. This can be called Double-DES. The two keys, YI and Y2, might
be applied as follows:

C = EY2(EY1(P))
P = DYl(DY2(C))

where EY(P) and DY(C) represent DES encryption and decryption,

respectively, of some plaintext P and ciphertext C, respectively, using
DES key Y.

But an interesting attack can be launched against this “Double-DES”

scheme. The applications of the formula above can be with the
following individual steps (where C’ and P’ are intermediate results):

C’ = EY1(P) and C = EY2(C’)

P’ = DY2(C) and P = DY1(P’)

Unfortunately, C’=P’, which leaves it vulnerable to a simple known

plaintext attack (or “Meet-in-the-middle”) where the attacker or
adversary knows some plaintext (P) and its matching ciphertext (C) To
obtain C’, .the attacker or adversary needs to try all 2 56 possible values
of Y1 applied to P; to obtain P’, the attacker needs to try all 256 possible
values ofY2 applied to C. Since C’=P’, the attacker knows when a
match has been achieved – after only 256 + 256 = 257 key searches, only
twice the work of brute-forcing DES.

Triple-DES (3DES) is based upon the Triple Data Encryption

Algorithm (mEA), as described in FIPS 46-3. 3DES, which is not
susceptible to a meet-in-the-middle attack, employs three DES passes
and one, two, or three keys called KI, K2, and K3. Generation of the
ciphertext (C) from a block of plaintext (P) is accomplished by:

C = EK3(DK2(EK1(P))
where EK(P) and DK(P) represent DES encryption and decryption,
respectively, of some plaintext P using DES key K. This is also
sometimes referred to as an encrypt-decrypt-encrypt mode operation.

Decryption of the ciphertext into plaintext is accomplished by:

P = DK1(EK2(DK3(C)))

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The use of three, independent 56-bit keys provides 3DES with an

effective key length of 168 bits. The specification also defines use of
two keys where, in the operations above, K3 = K1; this provides an
effective key length of 112 bits. Finally, a third keying option is to use a
single key, so that K3 = K2 = K1 (in this case, the effective key length is
56 bits and 3DES applied to some plaintext, P, will yield the same
ciphertext, C, as normal DES would with that same key). With the
relatively low cost of key storage and the modest increase in processing
due to the use of longer keys, the best recommended practices are that
3DES are employed with three keys.

Another variant of DES, called DESX, is the contribution of Ron Rivest.

Developed in 1996, DESX is a very simple algorithm that greatly
increases DES’s resistance to brute-force attacks without increasing its
computational complexity. In DESX, the plaintext input is XORed with
64 additional key bits prior to encryption and the output is likewise
XORed with the 64 key bits. By adding just two XOR operations, DESX
has an effective keylength of 120 bits against an exhaustive key-search
attack. It is pertinent to note that DESX is not immune to other types of
more sophisticated attacks, such as differential or linear crypt analysis,
but brute-force is the primary attack vector on DES.

AES

In response to cryptographic attacks on DES, search for a replacement to

DES started in January 1997. In September 1997, a formal Call for
Algorithms was initiated and in August 1998 announced that 15
candidate algorithms were being considered (Round 1). In April 1999,
NIST announced that the 15 had been filtered down to five finalists
(Round 2): MARS (multiplication, addition, rotation and substitution)
from IBM; Ronald Rivest’s RC6; Rijndael from a Belgian team;
Serpent, developed jointly by a team from England, Israel, and Norway;
and Twofish, developed by Bruce Schneier. In October 2000, NI8.T
announced their selection: Rijndael.

In October 2000, NIST published the Report on the Development of the

Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) that compared the five Round 2
algorithms in a number of categories. The table below summarises the
relative scores of the five schemes (1=low,3=high):

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NIST selected Rijndael as its performance in hardware and software

across a wide range of environments in all possible modes. It has
excellent key setup time and has low memory requirements, in addition
its operations are easy to defend against power and timing attacks.

In February 2001, NIST published the Draft Federal Information

Processing Standard (FIPS) AES Specification for public review and
comment. AES contains a subset of Rijndael’s capabilities (e.g., AES
only supports a I 28-bit block size) and uses some slightly different
nomenclature and terminology, but to understand one is to understand
both. The 90-day comment period ended on May 29, 2001 and the U.S.
Department of Commerce officially adopted AES in December 200 I,
published as flPS PUB 197.

AES (Rijndael) Overview

Rijndael (pronounced as in “rain doll” or “rhine dahl”) is a block cipher

designed by Joan Daemen and Vincent Rijmen, both cryptographers in
Belgium. Rijndael can operate over a variable-length block using
variable-length keys; the version 2 specification submitted to NIST
describes use ofa 128-, 192-, or 256-bit key to encrypt data blocks that
are 128, 192, or 256 bits long. The block length and/or key length can be
extended in multiples of 32 bits and it is specifically designed for
efficient implementation in hardware or software on a range of
processors. The design of Rijndael was strongly influenced by the block
cipher called Square, also designed by Daemen and Rijmen. Rijndael is
an iterated block cipher, meaning that the initial input block and cipher
key undergoes multiple rounds of transformation before producing the
output. Each intermediate cipher re5tllris called State.

For simplicity, the block and cipher key are often given as an array of
columns where each array has 4 rows and each column represents a
single byte (8 bits). The number of columns in an array representing the

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state or cipher key, then, can be calculated as the block or key length
divided by 32 (32 bits = 4 bytes). An array representing a State will have
Nb columns, where Nb values of 4, 6, and 8 correspond to a 128-, 192-,
and 256-bit block, respectively. Similarly, an array representing a
Cipher Key will have Nk columns, where Nk values of 4, 6, and 8
correspond to a 128-, 192-, and 256-bit key, respectively. An example of
a 128-bit State (Nb = 4) and I 92-bit Cipher Key (Nk = 6) is shown
below:

The number of transformation rounds (Nr) in Rijndael is a function of

the block length and key length, and is given in the table below:

The AES version of Rijndael does not support all nine combinations of
block and key lengths, but only the subset using a l28-bit block size.
NIST calls these supported variants AES-128, AES-192, and AES-256
where the number refers to the key size. The Nb, Nk, and Nr values
supported in AES are:

The AES/Rijndael cipher itself has three operational stages:

AddRound Key transformation

Nr-l Rounds comprising: SubBytes transformation; ShiftRows

transformation; MixColumns transformation; AddRoundKey
transformation

A final Round comprising: SubBytes transformation; ShiftRows

transformation; AddRoundKey transformation.

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The nomenclature used below is taken from the AES specification,

although, references to the Rijndael specification are made for
completeness. The arrays sand s’ refer to the State before and after a
transformation, respectively (NOTE: The Rijndael specification uses the
array nomenclature a and b to refer to the before and after States,
respectively). The subscripts i and j are used to indicate byte locations
within the State (or Cipher Key) arraY.

The SubBytes Transformation

The substitute bytes (called ByteSub in Rijndael) transformation

operates on each of the State bytes independently and changes the byte
value. An S-box, or substitution table, controls the transformation. The
characteristics of the S-box transformation as well as a compliant S-box
table are provided in the AES specification; as an example, an input
State byte value of 107 (0x6b) will be replaced with a 127 (0x7f) in the
output State and an input value of 8 (0x08) would be replaced with a 48
(0x30).

One simple way to think of the SubBytes transformation is that a given

byte in State s is given a new value in State s’ according to the S-box.
The S-box, then, is a function on a byte in State s so that:

S`ij = S-box (s;j)

The more general depiction of this transformation is shown by:

The ShiftRows Transformation

The shift rows transformation cyclically shifts the bytes in the bottom
three rows of the State array. According to the more general Rijndael
specification, rows 2, 3, and 4 are cyclically left-shifted by C I, C2, and
C3 bytes, respect!vely, per the table below:

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The current version of AES, of course, only allows a block size of 128
bits (Nb = 4) so that CI=I, C2=2, and C3=3.

The diagram below shows the effect of)the Shift Rows transformation
on State s:

The MixColumns Transformation

The mix columns (called MixColumn in Rijndael) transformation uses a

mathematical function to transform the values of a given column within
a State, acting on the four values at one time as if they represented a
four-term polynomial.

s`I,C = MixColumns (s,,)

for 0<=i<=3 for some column, c.

The column position does not change, however, the values within t\1e
column change.

Round Key Generation and the AddRoundKey Transformation

The Cipher Key is used to derive a different key to be applied to the

block during each round of the encryption operation. These keys are
known as the Round Keys arid each will be the same length as the
block, i.e., Nb 32-bit words.

The AES defines a key schedule by which the original Cipher Key (of
length Nk 32-bit words) is used to form an Expanded Key. The
Expanded Key size is equal to the block size multiplied by the number
of encryption rounds plus I, which will provide Nr+1 different keys.
(Note that there are Nr encipherment rounds but Nr+1.

AddRoundKey transformations). For example, AES uses a I 28-bit

block and either 10, 12, or 14 iterative rounds depending upon key
length. With a I 28-bit key, we would need 1408 bits of key material
(128xll=1408), or an Expanded Key size of 44 32-bit words
(44x32=1408). Similarly, a I 92-bit key would require 1664 bits of key
material (128xI3), or 52 32-bit words, while a 256-bit key would require
1920 bits of key material (128xI5), or 60 32-bit words. The key
expansion mechanism, then, starts with the 128-, 192-, or 256-bit Cipher
Key and produces a 1408-, 1664-, or 1920-bit Expanded Key

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respectively. The original Cipher Key occupies the first portion of the
Expanded Key and is used to produce the remaining new key material.

The result is an Expanded Key that can be 11, 13, or 15 separate keys,
each used for one AddRoundKeY operation. These, then, are the Round
Keys. The diagram below shows an example using a 192-bit Cipher Key
(Nk=6). Shown in magenta italics:

The AddRoundKey (called Round Key addition in Rijndael)

transformation merely applies each Round Key, in turn, to the State by a
simple bit-wise exclusive OR operation.

MARS by Zunic et al., IBM.

This new design uses a special type of a Feistel network, which depends
heavily on the instruction sets available on modern 32-bit processors.
This has the benefit that on these target machines it is efficient, but it
may lead to implementation problems/difficulties in cheaper
architectures like smart cards.

RC6 by Rivest, Robshaw, and Yin, RSA Laboratories.

RC6.follows the ideas ofRC5 with improvements. It attempts to avoid

some of the differential attacks against RC5’s data dependent rotations.
However, there are some attacks that are not yet employed, and it is
unclear whether RC6 is well enough analysed yet.

Serpent by Anderson, Biham, and Knudsen.

Serpent has a basically conservative but, in many ways innovative

design. It may be implemented by bitslice (or vector) gate logic
throughout. This makes it rather complicated to implement from scratch,
and writing it in a non-bi~lice way involves an efficiency penalty. The
32 rounds lead to probably the highest security margin on all AES
candidates, while it is still fast enough for all practical purposes.

Twofish by Schneier et aI., Counterpane Security.

Twofish is a block cipher designed by Counterpane, whose founder and

CTO is Bruce Schneier. The design is highly delicate, supported with
many alternative ways of implementation. It is crypt analysed in much
detail, by the very authoritative “extended Twofish team”. It is basically

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a Feistel cipher, but utilises many different ideas. This cipher has key
dependent S-boxeslike Blowfish (another cipher by Bruce Schneier).

Other Symmetric Ciphers

Blowfish

Bruce Schneier designed blowfish and it is a block cipher with a 64-bit

block size and variable length keys (which may vary up to 448 bits). It
has gained of acceptance in a number of applications, including Nautilus
and PGPfone.

Blowfish utilises the idea of randomised S-boxes: while doing key

scheduling, it generates large pseudo-random lookup tables through
several encryptions. These tables depend on the user supplied key in a
very complex manner. This makes blowfish highly resistant against
many attacks such as differential and linear crypt analysis. But is not the
algorithm of choice for environments where large memory space
(something like 4096 bytes) is not available. The known attacks against
Blowfish are based on its weak key classes.

CAST-128

CAST -128, Substitution-Permutation Network (SPN) cryptosystem, is

similar to DES, which have good resistance to differential, linear and
related-key crypt analysis. CAST-128 has Feistelstructure and utilises
eight fixed S-boxes. CAST -128 supports variable key lenghts between
40 and 128 bits (described in RFC2l4:4).

IDEA

IDEA (International Data Encryption Algorithm), was developed at Ern

Zurich in Switzerland by Xuejia Lai uses a l28-bit key, and is
considered to be very secure. The best attacks against IDEA uses the
impossible differential idea of Biham, Shamir and Biryukov. They can
attack only 4.5 rounds of IDEA and this poses no threat to the total of 8.
5 rounds used in IDEA. It is pertinent to note that IDEA is patented in
the United States and in most European countries.

Rabbit

Rabbit is a stream cipher, based on iterating a set of coupled nonlinear

function. It is characterised by a high performance in software.

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RC4

RC4 is a stream cipher by Ron Rivest at RSA Data Security, Inc. It

accepts keys of arbitrary length. It used to be a trade secret, until
someone posted source code for an algorithm on the usenet, claiming it
to be equivalent to RC4. The algorithm is very fast. Its security is
unknown, but breaking it does not seem trivial either. Because of its
speed, it may have uses in certain particular applications.

RC4 is essentially a pseudo random number generator, and the output of

the generator is exclusive-ored with the data stream. For this reason, it is
very important that the same RC4 key should not be used to encrypt two
different data streams.

SELF ASSESSMENT EXERCISE 1

1) What is the result of the Exclusive OR operation IXORO?

(a) 1
(b) 0
(c) Indeterminate
(d) 10

2) A block cipher:

(a) Is an asymmetric key algorithm

(b) Converts variable-length plaintext into fixed-length ciphertext
(c) Breaks a message into fixed length units for encryption
(d) Encrypts by operating on a continuous data stream.

3) What is the block length of the Rijndael Cipher?

(a) 64 bits
(b) 128 bits
(c) Variable
(d) 256 bits

4) What is the key length of the Rijndael Block Cipher?

(a) 56 or 64 bits
(b) 512 bits
(c) 128,192,or 256 bits
(d) 512 or 1024 bits

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5) The NIST Advanced Encryption Standard uses the:

(a) 3 DES algorithm

(b) DES algorithm
(c) Rijndael algorithm
(d) IDEA algorithm

6) The modes of DES do not include:

(a) Electronic code book

(b) Variable block feedback
(c) Cipher block chaining
(d) Output feedback

3.3 Public Key Cryptography

Modern cryptography deals with communication between many

different parties, without using a secret key for every pair of parties. In
1976, Whitfield Diffie and Martin Hellman published an invited paper
in the IEEE Transactions on Information Theory titled “New Directions
in Cryptography”. This paper can be considered as the beginning of
modem cryptography. Their paper described a two -key crypto system in
which two parties can perform a secure communication over a non-
secure channel without having to share a secret key. PKC depends upon
the existence of so-called one-way function, or mathematical functions
that are easy to calculate but the calculation of the inverse function is
relatively difficult.

Generic PKC uses two keys that are mathematically related and
knowledge of one key does not allow someone to easily determine the
other key. One key is used to encrypt and the other key is used to
decrypt. It does not matter which key is applied first and because a pair
of keys are used, this is called asymmetric key cryptography. In PKC,
one of the keys is designated as the public key and the other key is
designated as the private key. The public key may be advertised but the
private key is never revealed to another party. It is straightforward
enough to send messages under this scheme. Suppose Alice wants to
send Bob a message, Alice encrypts some information using Bob’s
public key; Bob decrypts the ciphertext using his private key.

The most common PKC implementation is RSA, named after the three
MIT mathematicians who developed it – Ronald Rivest, Adi Shamir,
and Leonard Adleman. RSA can be used for key exchange, digital
signatures, or encryption of small blocks of data. The Figures 11 and 12
highlights how digital signature are created and verified. The detailed
discussion will be made in the next unit. RSA uses a variable size

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encryption block and variable size key. The key pair is derived from a
very large number, n, that is the product of two large prime numbers
selected through special rules; these primes may be 100 or more digits in
length each, yielding an n with roughly twice as many digits as the
prime factors. The pui1lic key includes n and a derivate of one of the
factor of n; an adversary cannot determine the prime factor of n (and,
therefore, the private key) from this information alone and that is what
makes the RSA algorithm so secure.

Hash Function Encrypted by

Private key

Figure 12: Digital signature verification process

Goldwasser, Micali, and Rivest gave the rigorous definition of security

for signature scheme and provided the first construction that probably
satisfied that definition, under a suitable assumption. The assumption
that claw-free pair of permutations exist, is implied by the assumption
that integer factorisation is hard. The earlier signature scheme due to
Merkle was also shown to satisfy this definition. Rompel, Naor and
Yung showed how to construct a digital signature scheme using anyone-
way function. The inefficiency of the above mentioned schemes, and
due to the fact that these schemes require the signer’s secret key to
change between invocations of the signing algorithm make these
solutions impractical.

Several other signature schemes have been shown to be secure in the so-
called random-oracle model. The random-oracle model is a model of

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computation in which it is assumed that a given hash function behaves

as an ideal random function. An ideal random function is a function
where the input domain is the set of binary strings, such that each binary
string is mapped to a random binary string of the same length. Although
this assumption is evidently false, as it formalises the notion that the
hash function is like a black box and its output cannot be determined
until it is evaluated. A proof of security in the random oracle model
gives some evidence of resilience to attack. The RSA signatures with
special message formatting, the Fiat-Shamir, and the Schnorr signature
schemes have been analysed and proven secure in the random oracle
model. However, it is known that security in the random oracle model
does not imply security in the plain model.

Gennaro, Halevi, Rabin, Cramer Shoup proposed the first signature

schemes whose efficiency is suitable for practical use and whose
security analysis does not assume an ideal random function. These
schemes are considered to be secure, under RSA assumption.

PKC depends upon the existence of so-called one-way functions, or

mathematical functions that are easy to compute whereas their inverse
function is relatively difficult to compute. Let me give you two simple
examples:

1) Multiplication vs. factorisation

2) Exponentiation vs. logarithms

The important Public-key cryptography algorithms are:

RSA

Diffie-Hellman: After the RSA algorithm was published, Diffie

and Hellman came up with their own algorithm. D-H is used for
secret-key key exchange only, and not for authentication or
digital signatures.

Digital Signature Algorithm (DSA): The algorithm specified in

NIST’s Digital Signature Standard (DSS), provides digital
signature capability for the authentication of messages.

ElGamal: Designed by Taher Elgamal, is a PKC system similar

to Diffie-Hellman and used for key exchange.

Elliptic Curve Cryptography (ECC): A PKC algorithm based

upon elliptic curves. ECC can offer levels of security with small
keys comparable to RSA and other PKC methods. It was

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designed for devices with limited compute power and/or memory,

such as smartcards and PDAs.

Public-Key Cryptography Standards (PKCS): A set of

interoperable standards and guidelines for public-key
cryptography, designed by RSA Data Security Inc.

* PKCS #1: RSA Cryptography Standard (Also RFC 3447)

* PKCS #2: Incorporated into PKCS #1.
* PKCS #3: Diffie-Hellman Key-Agreement Standard
* PKCS #4: Incorporated into PKCS #1.
* PKCS #5: Password-Based Cryptography Standard (PKCS
#5 V2.0 is also RFC 2898)
* PKCS #6: Extended-Cel1ificate Syntax Standard (being
phased out in favor ofX.509v3)
* PKCS #7: Cryptographic Message Syntax Standard (Also
RFC 2315)
* PKCS #8: Private-Key Information Syntax Standard
* PKCS #9: Selected Attribute Types (Also RFC 2985)
* PKCS #10: Certification Request Syntax Standard (Also
RFC 2986)
* PKCS #11: Cryptographic Token Interface Standard
* PKCS-#12: Personal Information Exchange Syntax
Standard
* PKCS #13: Elliptic Curve Cryptography Standard
* PKCS #14: Pseudorandom Number Generation Standard
is no longer available
* PKCS #15: Cryptographic Token Information Format
Standard

Cramer-Shoup: A public-key cryptosystem proposed by R.

Cramer and V. Shoup of IBM in 1998.

Key Exchange Algorithm (KEA): A variation on Diffie-

Hellman; proposed as the key exchange method for Capstone.

LUC: A public-key cryptosystem designed by P.J. Smith and

based on Lucas sequences. Can be used for encryption and
signatures, using integer factoring.

Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) in India

The Act provides the Controller of Certifying Authorities to license and

regulate the working of CAs and also to ensure that CAs does not
violate any of the provisions of the Act. CCA has created the framework
for Public Key Infrastructure in India. It has prescribed technical

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standards for cryptography and physical security based on international

standards/best practices of ITU, IETF, IEEE etc. CAs has to prove
compliance with these standards through a stringent audit procedure that
has been put in place. CAs also needs to get their CPS (Certification
Practice Statement) approved by the CCA. India has seven Certifying
Authorities: (I) SafeScrypt-Certifying Authority; (2) National
Informatics Centre-Certifying Authority; (3) Tata Consl/ltancy- Services
Certifying Authorities; (4) Institute for Research and Development in
Banking Technology-Certifying Authority; (5) Customs and Central
Excise-Certifying Authority; (6) Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Limited-
Certifying Authority; and (7) n(Code) Solutions CA (GNFC).

The CCA also maintains the National Repository of Digital Certificates

(NRDC), as required under the IT Act 2000 that contains all the
certificates issued by all the CAs in India. The CCA operates its signing
activity through the Root Certifying Authority of India (RCAI), which is
operational under stringent controls.

Public Key Cryptosystem Asymmetric key algorithms or Public key

algorithm use a different key for encryption and decryption (Figure 13),
and the decryption key cannot (practically) be derived from the
encryption key. Public key methods are important because they can be
used to distribute encryption keys or other data securely even when the
parties have no opportunity to agree on a secret key in private. All
known public key methods are quite slow, and they are usually only
used to encrypt session keys, that are then used to encrypt the bulk of
the data using a symmetric encryption.

FigureI3: Eucryptiou and decryption process

3.3.1 RSA Public Key Algorithm (Rivest-Shamir-Adelman

Algorithm)

RSA Public Key Algorithm is the most commonly used public key
algorithm and this algorithm can be used both for encryption and for
signing. It is generally considered to be secure when sufficiently long

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keys are used (512 bits is insecure, 768 bits is moderately secure, and
1024 bits is good). The security of RSA relies on the difficulty of
factoring large integers. The recent advances in factoring large integers
would make RSA vulnerable. It is patented in US and the Patent expired
in year 2000.

RSA Algorithm

Key Generation Algorithm

1) Generate two large random primes, p and q, of approximately

equal size such that their product n = pq is of the required bit
length, e.g., 1024 bits.

2) Compute n = pq and (φ) phi = (p -1)(q -1).

3) Choose an integer e, I < e < phi, such that gcd(e, phi) = 1.

4) Compute the secret exponent d, I < d < phi, such that ed = 1 (mod
phi).

5) The public key is (n, e) and the private key is (n, d). The values
of p, q, and phi should also be kept secret.

Where

n is known as the modulus.

e is known as the public exponent or encryption exponent.

d is known as the secret exponent or decryption exponent.

Encryption

Sender A does the following:

1) Obtains the recipient B’s public key (n, e).

2) Represents the plaintext message as a positive integerm.

3) Computes the ciphertext c.= m^e mod n.

4) Sends the ciphertext c to B.

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Decryption

Recipient B does the following:

1) Uses his private key (n, d) to compute m = c^d mod n.

2) Extracts the plaintext from the integer representative m.

Summary of RSA

n = pq where p and q are distinct

primes.
phi, φ = (p-1)(q-1)
e < n such that gcd (e,phi)=1
d = e^-1 mod phi.
c = m^e mod n, 1<m<n.
m = c^d mod n.

Example RSA Algorithm

Let us select two prime numbers, p = 7 and q= 17. Keys are generated as
follows:

1. Two prime numbers, p = 7 and q = 17

2. n=pq=7xI7= 119
3. P(n)=(p-I)(q-I)=(7-1)(17-1)=6x 16=96
4. Find e which is relatively prime to φ(n) = 96 and less than φ(n).
e = 5 for this case
5. Find d such that d.e = I mod 96 and d<96 d = 77
6. So, public key in=[5,119] and private key is= [77, 119]

Encryption and Decryption using RSA algorithm

Encryption: Let plain text input of M = 19

Cipher text C = Me(mod n)

= 195 (modI 19)= 2476099

119
= 20807 with remainder of 66
Cipher Tex t= 66

Decryption

M=cd(modn)
= 6677(mod 119)
= 19

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3.3.2 Diffie-Hellman

Diffie-Hellman is a commonly used public-key algorithm for key

exchange. It is generally considered to be secure “,hen sufficiently long
keys and proper generators are used. The security of Diffie-Hellman-
relies on the difficulty of the discrete logarithm problem (which is
believed to be computationally equivalent to factoring large integers).
Diffie-Hellman is claimed to be patented in the United States, but the
patent expired on April 29, 1997. There are also strong rumours that the
patent might in fact be invalid (there is evidence of it having been
published over an year before the patent application was led). Diffie-
Hellman is sensitive to the selection of the strong prime, size of the
secret exponent, and the generator.

The “Diffie-Hellman Method For Key Agreement” allow two hosts to

create and share a secret key.

1) First the hosts must get the “Diffie-Hellman parameters”.. A

prime number, ‘p’ (larger than 2) and “base”, ‘g’, an integer that
is smaller than ‘p’. They can either be hard coded or fetched from
a server.

2) The hosts each secretly generate a private number called ‘x’,

which is less than “p-1”.

3) The hosts next generate the public keys, ‘y’. They are created
with the function:
y=g^x%p

4) The two host now exchange the public keys (‘y’) and the
exchanged numbers are converted into a secret key, ‘z”.

z=y^x%p

‘z’ can now be used as the key for whatever encryption method is
used to transfer information between the two hosts.
Mathematically, the two hosts should have generated the same
value for ‘z’.

z = (g^x % PY’x` % P = (g^x’ % P)^x % P

All of these numbers are positive integers

x^y means: x is raised to the y power

x%y means: x is divided by y and the remainder is
returned

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Example:

Prime Number p = 353 and primitive root of353, in this case is g = 3.

Let A is sender B is receives A & Bseleet secret key as XA = 97 and XB
= 233. Now A &. B computes their public keys. Y A = 3233. Now A &
B computes their public keys.
YA = 397 mod 353 = 40
YB = 3233 mod 353 = 248

After exchanging their public keys, A & B can compute the common
secret key:
A computes:

Z=(YB) mod 253

B computes = 24897 mod 353 = 160
Z=(YA)Xbmod353 =40233 mod 353 = 160

3.3.3 Elliptic Curve Public Key Cryptosystems

Elliptic Curve Public Key Cryptosystems is an emerging field. They

have been slow to execute, but have become feasible with modem
computers. They are considered to be fairly secure, but haven’t yet
undergone the same scrutiny as done on RSA algorithm.

The Public-Key cryptography systems use hard-to-solve problems as the

basis of the algorithm. The most predominant algorithm today for
public-key cryptography is RSA, based on the prime factors of very
large integers. While RSA can be successfully attacked, the mathematics
of the algorithm has not been comprised, per se; instead, computational
brute-force attacks have broken the keys. The protection mechanism is
“simple” – keep the sire of the integer to be factor<l ahead of the
computational curve!

In 1985, cryptographers Victor Miller (IBM) and Neal Koblitz

(University of Washington) proposed the Elliptic Curve Cryptography
(ECC) independently (as shown in Figure 14). ECC is based Oh the
difficulty of solving the Elliptic Curve Discrete Logarithm Problem
(ECDLP). Like the prime factorisation problem, ECDLP is another
“hard” problem that is deCeptively simple to state: Given two points, P
and Q, on an elliptic curve, find the integer n, if it exists, such that P =
nQ.

Elliptic curves combine number theory and algebraic geometry.

1’hhecurves can be defined over any field of numbers (i.e., real, integer,
complex), although, we generally see them used over finite fields for

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applications in cryptography. An elliptic curve consists of the set of real

numbers (x, y) that satisfies the equation:

y2=x3+ax+b

The set of all the solutions to the equation forms the elliptic curve.
Changing a and b changes the shape of the curve, and small changes in
these parameters can result in major changes in the set of (x,y) solutions.

Figurel4: Elliptic Curve Cryptography

The figure above shows the addition of two points on an elliptic curve.
Elliptic curves have the interesting property that adding two points on
the elliptic curve yields a third point on the curve. Therefore, adding two
points, PI and P2, gets us to point P3, also on the curve. Small changes
in PI or P2 can cause a large change in the position of P3.

Let us analyse the original problem as stated above. The point Q is

calculated as a multiple of the starting point, P, or, Q = nP. An attacker
might know P and Q but finding the integer, n, is a difficult problem to
solve. Q is-the public key, then, and n is the private key.
RSA has been the mainstay of PKC for over two decades. But ECC is
exciting because of their potential to provide similar levels of security
compared to RSA but with significantly reduced key sizes. Certicom
Corp. (httn:// www.certicom.com/), one of the major proponents of
ECC, suggests the key siu relationship between ECC and RSA as per the
following table:

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Since the ECC key sizes are so much shorter than comparable RSA
keys, the length of the public key and private key is much shorter in
elliptic curve cryptosystems. Therefore, this results in faster processing,
and lower demands on memory and bandwidth. In practice, the final
results are not yet in; RSA, Inc. notes that ECC is faster than RSA for
signing and decryption, but slower than RSA for signature verification
and encryption.

Nevertheless, ECC is particularly useful in applications where memory,

bandwidth, and/or computational power is limited (e.g., a smartcard)
and it is in this area that ECC use is expected to grow.

3.3.4 DSA

DSS (Digital Signature Standard)

A signature-only mechanism endorsed by the United States

Government. Its design has not been made public, and many people
have found potential problems with it (e.g., leaking hidden data, and
revealing your secret key if you ever happen to sign two different
messages using the same random number).

The DSA is used by a signatory to generate a digital signature on data

and by a verifier to verify the authenticity of the signature. Each
signatory has a public and private key. The private key is used in the
signature generation process and the public key is used in the signature
verification process. For both signature generation and verification, the
data which is referred to as a message, M, is reduced by means of the
Secure Hash Algorithm (SHA) specified in FIPS YY. An adversary,
who does not know the private key of the signatory, cannot generate the
correct signature of the signatory. In other words, signatures cannot be
forged. However, by using the signatory’s public key, anyone can verify
a correctly signed message.

A means of associating public and private key pairs for the

corresponding users is required. That is, there must be a binding of a
user’s identity and the user’s public key. A mutually trusted party may

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certify this binding. For example, a certifying authority could sign

credentials containing a user’s public key and identitY to form a
certificate. Systems for certifying credentials and distributing certificates
are beyond the scope of this standard. NIST intends to publish separate
document(s) on certifying credentials and distributing certificates.

The DSA makes use of the following parameters:

1) p = a prime modulus, where 2L-I < P < 2L for 512 = < L = <1024
and L a multiple of 64

2) q=aprimedivisorofp-l,where2159<q<2160

3) g = h(P-1)/q mod p, where h is any integer with 1 < h < P - 1 such

that h(P-1)/q mod p> 1(g has order q mod p)

4) x = a randomly or pseudorandomly generated integer with 0 <x<q

5) y = gx mod p

6) k = a randomly or pseudorandomly generated integer with 0 <k<q

The integers p, q, and g can be public and can be common to a group of

users. A user’s private and public keys are x and y, respectively. They
are normally fixed for a period of time. Parameters x and k are used for
signature generation only, and must be kept secret. Parameter k must be
regenerated for each signature.

The signature of a message M is the pair of numbers r and s computed

according to the equations below:

r = (gk mod p) mod q and

s = (k-1(SHA(M) + xr)) mod q.

In the above, k-’ is the multiplicative inverse of k, mod q; i.e., (k-1 k)

mod q = 1 and 0 < k-1 < q. The value of SHA (M) is a 160-bit string
output by the Secure Hash Algorithm specified in FIPS 180. For use in
computing s, this string must be converted to an integer.
As an option, one may wish to check if r = 0 or s = 0. If either r = 0 or s
= 0, a new value of k should be generated and the signature should be
recalculated (it is extremely unlikely that r = 0 or s = 0 if signatures are
generated properly).

The signature is transmitted along with the message to the verifier.

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Prior to verifying the signature in a signed message, p, q and g plus the

sender’s public key and identity are made available to the verifier after
proper authentication.

Let M’, r’ and s’ be the received versions of M, r, and s, respectively,

and let y be the public key of the signatory. To verify first check to see
that 0 < r’ < q and 0 < s’ < q; if either condition is violated, the signature
shall be rejected. If these two conditions are satisfied, the verifier
computes:

w = (sri mod q

ul = ((SHA(M’)w) mod q

u2 = ((r’)w) mod q

v = (((g)ul (y)u2) mod p) mod q.

If v = r’, then the signature is verified-and the verifier can have high
confidence that the received message was sent by the party holding the
secret key x corresponding to y. For a proof that v = r` when M` = M, r`
= r, and s` = s, see Appendix 1.

If v does not equal r`, then the message may have been modified, the
message may have been incorrectly signed by the signatory, or the
message may have been signed by an impostor. The message should be
considered invalid.

EIGamal public key cryptosystem. Based on the discrete logarithm

problem.

ElGamal consists of three components: the key generator, the encryption

algorithm, and the decryption algorithm.

The key generator works as follows:

Alice generates an efficient description of a cyclic group G of

order q with generator g. See below for specific examples of how
this can be done.

Alice chooses a random x from {0,...,q -1}.

Alice computes h = gx.

Alice publishes h, along with the description of G,q,g, as her

public key, Alice retains x as her secret key.

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The encryption algorithm works as follows: to encrypt a message m to

Alice under her public key (G,q,g,h),

Bob converts m into an element of G.

Bob chooses a random k from {0,….,q - 1}, then calculates c1 =

gk and
c2 = m.hk
Bob sends the ciphertext (c1,c2) to Alice.

The decryption algorithm works as follows: to decrypt a ciphertext

(c1,c2) with her secret key x,
1
Alice computes c2 c1r as the plaintext message.

Note that the decryption algorithm does indeed produce the intended
message since:

1 m.h k m.h rk
c2 c1r m (mod q)
g rk g rk

If the space of possible messages is larger than the sire of G, then the
message can be split into several pieces and each piece can be encrypted
independently. Typically, however, a short key to a symmetric-key
cipher is first encrypted under EIGamal, and the (much longer) intended
message is encrypted more efficiently using the symmetric-key cipher –
this is termed hybrid encryption.

3.4 Mathematical Background

In this section, we will find out mathematical background from

mathematical Algorithms.

3.4.1 Exclusive OR (XOR)

Exclusive OR (XOR) is one of the fundamental mathematical operations

used in cryptography (and many other applications). George Boole, a
mathematician in the late 1800s, invented a new form of “algebra” that
provides the basis for building electronic computers and microprocessor
chips. Boole defined a bunch of primitive logical operations where there
are one or two inputs and a single output depending upon the operation;
the input and output are either TRUE or FALSE. The most elemental
Boolean operations are:

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NOT: The output value is the inverse of the input value (i.e., the
output is TRUE if the input is false, FALSE if the input is true).

AND: The output is TRUE if all inputs are true, otherwise

FALSE. (e.g., “the sky is blue AND the world is flat” is FALSE
while ‘1he sky is blue AND security is a process” is TRUE.)

OR: The output is TRUE if either or both inputs are true,

otherwise FALSE. (e.g., “the sky is blue OR the world is flat” is
TRUE and “the sky is blue OR security is a process” is TRUE).

XOR (Exclusive OR): The output is TRUE if exactly one of the

inputs is TRUE, otherwise FALSE. (e.g., “the sky is blue XOR
the world is flat” is TRUE while “the sky is blue XOR security is
a process” is FALSE.)

In computers, Boolean logic is implemented in logic gates; for design

purposes, XOR has two inputs and a single output, and its logic diagram
looks like this:

XOR 0 1
0 0 1
1 1 0

So, in an XOR operation, the output will be a I if one input.is a I ;

otherwise, the output is O. The real significance of this is to look at the
“identity properties” of XOR. In particular, any value XORed with itself
is 0 and any value XORed with 0 is just itself. Why does this matter?
Well, if I take my plaintext and XOR it with a key, 1 get A jumble of
bits. If I then take that jumble and XOR it with the same key, 1 return to
the original plaintext.

3.4.2 The Modulo Function

The modulo function is, simply, the remainder function. It is commonly
used in programming and is critical to the operation of any mathematical
function using digital computers.

To calculate X modulo Y (usually written X mod Y), you merely

determine the remainder after removing all multiples of Y from X.
Clearly, the value X mod Y will be in the range from 0 to Y-1.

Some examples should clear up any remaining confusion:

mod 7 = I
25mod5=0
33 mod 12 = 9
203 mod 256 = 203

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Modulo arithmetic is useful in crypto because it allows us to set the size

of an operation and be sure that we will never get numbers that are too
large. This is an important consideration when using digital computers.

1) Which of the following is an example of a symmetric key

algorithm?

(a)
(b) RSA
(c) Diffie-Hellman
(d) Knapsack

2) Which of the following is a problem with symmetric key

algorithms?

(a) It is slower than asymmetric key encryption

(b) Most algorithms are kept proprietry
(c) Work factor is not a function of the key siu.
(d) It provides secure distribution of the s=et key.

3) Which of the following is an example of an asymmetric key

algorithms?

(a) ELLIPTIC CURVE

(b) IDEA
(c) 3 DES
(d) DES

4) In public key cryptography:

(a) Only the public key can encrypt, and only the private can decrypt
(b) Only the private key can encrypt, and only the public can decrypt
(c) The public key is used to encrypt and decrypt
(d) If the public key encrypts, and only the private can decrypt.

5) In a block cipher, diffusion:

(a) Conceals the connection between the ciphertext and plaintext

(b) Spread the influence of a plaintext character over many ciphertext
characters.
(c) Cannot be accomplished
(d) Is usually implemented by non-linear S-boxes.

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6) State whether following statements are True or False. T 0 F 0

(a) Work factor of double DES is the same as for single DES
(b) Elliptic curse cryptosystem have a lower strength per bit than
RSA.
(c) In digitally-signed message transmission using a hash function
the message digest is encrypted in the public key of the sender.

4.0 CONCLUSION

In this unit you have learnt about the fundamental problems in

networking which is network security. You have therefore been taken
through the principles and practice of cryptography and the various
related algorithms.

5.0 SUMMARY

Information security can be defined as technological and managerial

procedures applied to computer systems to ensure the availability,
integrity, and confidentiality of the information managed by computer.
Cryptography is a particularly interesting field because of the amount of
work that is, by necessity, done in secret. The irony is that today,
secrecy is not the key to the goodness of a cryptographic algorithm.
Regardless of the mathematical theory behind an algorithm, the best
algorithms are those that are well known and well documented because
they are also well tested and well studied! In fact, time is the only true
test of good cryptography; any cryptographic scheme that stays in use
year after year is most likely to be a good one. The strength of
cryptography lies in the choice and management of the keys; longer
keys will resist attack better than shorter keys.

With the introduction of IT Act 2000, the electronic transactions and

electronically signed documents are valid under the court of law. Use of
PKI in India is expected to increase rapidly and for activation of global
e-commerce and so also the use of digital signatures within domestic
and other Global PKI domains. This requires the interoperability ofPKI
based applications.

Digitisation of information, networking, and WWW (world wide web),

has changed the economics of information. The Copyright Act 1957 as
amended up to 1999 takes care of the technological changes that still
require major amendments in order to deal with the challenges posed by
the computer storage, Internet and the digital revolution. With India
being party to Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Properties (TRIPs),
electronic transactions of IPRs and consultancy services related to them
is expected to be a new possibility in India. This may also promote our

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technology base to keep pace with global trends. As India has already
enacted IT Act 2000, this allows transactions signed electronically for e-
commerce primarily to be enforced in a court of law. Several issues arise
when we consider using digital documents and exchanging them over
the Internet, such as eavesdropping, tampering, impersonation etc. All
these can be remedied with the use of public key infrastructure (PKI).
However, the question of the time when a document was created may be
answered by using Digital Time stamping service, which is based on
PKI. This information may prove to be crucial for most e-commerce
legally binding transactions, in particular for supporting non-repudiation
of digitally signed transactions.

6.0 TUTOR-MARKED ASSIGNMENT

1) What is cryptography?
2) List the various requirements of application-to-application
communication.
3) List various types of cryptographic techniques.

7.0 REFERENCES/FURTHER READINGS

Willam Stallings, Network Security Essential- Application and

standard, Pearson Education, New Delhi.

A.S. Tanenbaum, (2002).Computer Networks, 4th Edition, Practice Hall

of India, New Delhi.

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UNIT 4 NETWORK SECURITY-II

CONTENTS

1.0 Introduction
2.0 Objectives
3.0 Main Content
3.1 Digital Signatures’
3.2 Management of Public Keys
3.3 Communication Security
3.4 Web Security
4.0 Conclusion
5.0 Summary
6.0 Tutor-Marked Assignment
7.0 References/Further Readings

1.0 INTRODUCTION

Computer security and network security can be defined as technological

and managerial procedures applied to computer and network systems to
ensure the availability, integrity, and confidentiality of the information
managed by the computer. It implies the protection of Integrity,
Availability and Confidentiality of Computer Assets and Services from
associated Threats and vulnerabilities. Protection of networks and their
services from unauthorised modification, destruction, or disclosure and
the provision of assurance that the network will perform its critical
functions correctly and that there will be any harmful side effects. The
major points of weakness in a computer system are hardware, software,
and data. However, other components of the computer system may also
be targeted.

In this unit, we deal with advance topics of Network Security. In Section

4.2, we define digital signatures. Section 4.3 deals with management of
public keys, section 4.4 presents a brief review of communication
security. In section “4.5, we discuss web security. We summarise this
unit in section 4.6 followed by Solutions and Answers for ‘Check Your
Progress’.

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2.0 OBJECTIVES

The objective of this unit is to provide a practical survey of both the

principles and practice of Digital Signature. After going through this
unit you should be able to understand:

digital Signature
public Key Infrastructure
management of Public Keys
communication and Web Security.

3.0 MAIN CONTENT

3.1 Digital Signatures

Digital signatures are based on public key cryptography. A private key

is used to create a digital signature and the public key is used to verify
the digital signature. The Hash value of a message when encrypted with
the private key of a person is his digital signature on that e-Document.
The Digital Signature of a person therefore, varies from document to
document, thus, ensuring authenticity of each word in that document. As
the public key of the signer is known, anybody can verify the message
and the digital signature. The Figure 1 shows the process of creating a
digital signature. The hash function is applied to the plain text which is
further encrypted will1 the private key of a sender for creating a digital
signature.

Hash Function Encrypted by

Private key
Plain text Hash Digital
Value [H] Signature

Figure 1: Digital signature

The figure 2 shows how one key is used for encryption and another key is
used for decryption. The Figure 3 shows that a person is having two keys in
public key cryptography.

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Figure 2: Encryption and signing using public key cryptography

Figure 3: Explanation using an example

Ram has been given two keys. One of Ram’s Key is called the Public
key, and the other is a Private Key

Figure 4 Ram’s co-workers

Ram’s Public key is available to anyone who needs it (Figure 4), but he
keeps his Private Key to himself. Keys are used to encrypt information.
Encrypting information means “scrambling it up”, so that only the
person with the appropriate key can make it readable again. One of
Ram’s two keys can encrypt the data, while the other key can decrypt
that same data.

Ravi (Figure 5) can encrypt a message using Ram’s Public Key. Ram
uses his Private Key to decrypt the message. Any of Ram’s co-workers
might have access to the message Ravi encrypted, but without Ram’s
Private Key, the data is worthless.

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Figure 5: Encryption of a message using public key of Ram

With his private key and the right software, Ram can put digital
signatures on documents and other data. A digital signature is a “s\amp”
Ram places on the data which is unique to Ram, and is very difficult to
forge. In addition, the signature assures that any changes made to the
data that has been signed will not go undetected.

To sign a document, Ram’s software will crunch down the data into just
a few lines by a process called “hashing”(Figure 6). These few lines are
known as a message digest. (It is not possible to change a message
digest back into the original data from which it was created, as Hash is a
one way function).

To sign a document, Ram’s software will crunch

down the data into just a few lines by a process called
“hashing” (Figure 6). These few lines are known as a
message digest. (It is not possible to change a message
digest back into the original data from which it was
created, as Hash is a one way function).

Encrypt with
Private key
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Message Signature
Digest

Figure 7: Encryption of message digest using prey

Ram’s software then encrypts (Figure 7) the message digests with his
private key. The result is the digital signature.

Signature Append

Signature

Figure 8: Append the digital signature to the document

Finally, Ram’s software appends (Figure 8) the digital signature to the

document. All the data that was hashed has been signed (Figure 9).
Figure 9: The decryption using public key

Hash Message Ram now

Digest passes the
document on to
Mohan.

Firs t,Decrypt
Shayam’s software decrypts the signature
Message
( nwgithRPuabm
usi lic’s public key) changing it back into a
Digest
Signature m sage digest. If this work, then it proves that
es
Ram has signed the document, because only Ram
has this private key. Mohan’s software then hashes
the document data into a message digest. If the
message digest is the same as the message digest
created when the signature was decrypted, then
Mohan knows that the signed data has not been
changed/tampered with.

Issues

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Mohan (our disgruntled employee) wishes to

deceive Shayam. Mohan makes sure that Shayam
receives a signed message and a public key that
appears to belong to Ram. Unknown to Shayam,
Mohan deceitfully sends a key pair he has created
using Ram’s name. Short of receiving Ram’s
public key from him in person, how can Shayam
be sure that Ram’s public key is authentic?

It so happens that Ravi works at the company’s certificate authority

centre. Ravi can create a digital certificate for Ram by using Ram’s
public key as well as some information Ram(Figure 10).

Figure 10: Creation of a digital certificate

Ram’s co-workers can verify Ram’s trusted certificate to make sure that
his public key truly belongs to him. In fact, no one at Ram’s company
accepts a signature for which there does not exist a certificate generated
by Ravi. This gives Ravi the power to revoke signatures if private keys
are compromised, or no longer needed. There are even more widely
accepted certificate authorities that certify Ravi.

If Ram sends a signed document to Shayam, to verify the signature on

the document, Shayam’s software first uses Ravi’s (the certificate
authority’s) public key to check the signature on Ram’s certificate.
Successful de-encryption of the certificate proves that Ravi created it.
After the certificate is de-encrypted, Shayam’s software can check if
Ram is in good standing with the certificate authority and that the
certificate information concerning Ram’s identity has not been altered.

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Shayam’s software then takes Ram’s public key from the certificate and
uses it to check Ram’s signature. If Ram’s public key de-encrypts the
signature successfully, then Shayam is assured that the signature was
created using Ram’s private key, for Ravi has certified the matching
public key. And of course, if the signature is valid, then we know that
Mohan didn’t try to change the signed content.

Digital Certificate

This is a certificate issued by the Certifying Authority (Figure 11) to the

holder of the public key. The contents of a digital certificate are issued
by a CA as, a data message and is always available online.

Sr. No of the Certificate

Applicant’s name, Place and Date of Birth, Name of the
Company
Applicant’s legal domicile and viri!1al domicile
Validity period of the certificate and the signature
CA’s name, legal domicile and virtual domicile
User’s public key
Information indicating how the recipient of a digitally signed
document can verify the sender’s public key
CA’s digital signature.

User Certificate
User User
Name & Name
oCtheerrtificate
credDeantaiablsase User’s
Public
Signed Key
by using
Certificate CA’s CA’s
Request secret Name
key
Validation
period

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Of CA
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User’s Figure 11: Issuing of a digital certificate by the

Public certifying authority
key Uses of Digital Signature

Contracts

The ne1ct time you purchase a car, a home, or an insurance policy, you
may never need to meet with an agent or sales representative. You may
be able to review and sign all documents online, and save secure backup
copies to your own disk.

Checks and money orders

Buying online is now easy with a credit card, but digital checks or
money orders (authenticated by secure digital signatures) may be
preferable for some transactions, especially when you don’t want to face
a large credit card bill.

Letters and memos

Businesses already transmit many letters and memos online, especially

those that are only distributed internally. But when a letter or memo
needs the weight of a manager’s signature, it must be printed, signed,
duplicated, and distributed manually or through the mail. Digital
signatures will save companies the time and expense of this manual
process.

Approvals

Many kinds of documents are collaborative works, such as legal briefs,

contracts, reports, and others. Using digital signatures, people can
collaborate on documents online and approve final drafts, before/prior to
releasing them for use.

SELF ASSESSMENT EXERCISE 1

1) What does the Electronic Signatures in Global and National

Commerce Act do?
2) What does a signature mean?
3) Why are handwritten signatures a drawback in some types of
transactions?
4) What is a digital signature?
5) What are the benefits of using digital signatures?

3.3 Management of Public Keys

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Public Key Infrastructure

The integration of Digital Signatures and Certificates and the other

services required for E-Commerce is known as Public Key
Infrastructure (PKI). These services provide integrity, access control,
confidentiality, authentication, and non-repudiation for electronic
transactions and communications. The PKI includes the followings:
Digital certificates, Certificate authority (CA), Registration authority,
policies and procedures, Certificate revocation, Non-repudiation
support, Time stamping, Lightweight Directory Access Protoco1
(LDAP), and Security-enabled applications.

The Digital certificate and management of the certificate are the main
components of PKI. The purpose of the digital certificate is to verify
individual public key. This certificate is accomplished by digital1y
signing the individuals public key and associated information using the
Private Key. A CA (Certification Authority) acts as the notary for
verifying a person’s identity and issuing a certificate that vouches for
the public key of the individual concerned. The CA signs the certificate
with its own private key. The certificate is then sent to a repository,
which holds the certificates and CRLs that denote the revoked
certificates.

Certificate and CRLs can be held in a repository, with well-defined

responsibilities shared by both the repository and the CA. Hierarchical
model followed in India is shown in Figure 12.

Figure 12: Hierarchical model being followed in India

Directories and x.500

The repository (or directory) contains entries associated with an object

class. An object class can be an individual or other computer related
entries. The X.509 certificate standard defines the authentification base
for the X.500 directory. The X.500 directory stores information on

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objects in a distributed database that resides on the network server.

Some of the principle definitions associated with X.500 include. the
following: Directory user agent (DUAs)-clients, Directory server agents
(DSAs)- servers, Directory service protocol (DSP)-enables information
exchanges between DSAs, Directory access protocol (DAPs)- enables
information exchanges from a DUA to a DSA, and Directory
information shadowing protocol (DISP)- useable information exchanges
from a DUA to a DSA. DSAs accept request from anonymous source as
well as authenticated requests. They share information through a
chaining mechanism.

Lightweight Directory Access Protocol

The Lightweight directory access protocol (LDAP) was developed as a

more efficient version of DAP and has evolved into a second version
(Yeong, Y. T .Howes, and S.KiIlie, Lightweight Director Access
Protocol, RFC 1777, 1995). LDAP servers communicate through
referrals. If it finds the directory with the required entry, it sends a
referral to the requesting directory. DAP v2 does not have chaining and
shadowing capabilities, but additional protocol can be obtained to
provide these functions.

LDAP provides a standard format for accessing certificate directories.

These directories are stored on the network LDAP servers and provide
public keys and corresponding X.509 certificates for the enterprise. A
directory contains information such as an individual’s name, address,
phone number, and public key certificate. The standard under X.500
defines the protocols and information models for computer directory
services that are independent of the platforms and other related entities.
LDAP servers are subject to attacks that affect availability and integrity.
For example, Denial of Service attacks on an LDAP server could
prevent access to the CRLs and thus, permit the use of a revoked
certificate. The DAP protocol in X.500 was unwieldy and led to most
client implementations using LDAP. LDAP version 3 is under
development; it will include extensions that provide shadowing and
chaining capabilities.

X.509 Certificates

The original X.509 certificate (CCITT, The Directory-Authentification

Framework, Recommendation X.509, 1988) was developed to provide
authentification foundation for the X.500 directory. Since then, a version
2,version 3, and recently, a version 4 have been developed. Version 2 of
the X.509 certificates address the reuse of names, version 3 provides for
certificate extensions to the core certificate fields, and version 4
provides additional extensions. These extensions can be used as needed

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by different users and different applications. A version ofX.509 that

takes into account the requirements of the internet was published by the
IETF (Housley, R. W. Ford, W.Polk, and D. Solo, Internet X.509 public
Key Infrastructure Certificate and CRL Profile, RFC 2459,1999).

The Consultation Committee, International Telephone and Telegraph,

International Telecommunications Union (CCITT -ITU)/International
Organisation for standardisation (ISO) has defined the basic format of
an X.509 certificate. This structure is outlined in the Figure J 3.

Figure 13: The CCITT-ITU/ISO X.509 certificate format

If version 3 certificates are used, the optional extensions field can be

used. It is before the signature field components in the certificate. Some
typical extensions are the entity’s name and supporting identity
information, the attributes of the key, certificate policy information, and
the type of subject. The digital signature serves as a tamper-evident
envelope.

Some of the different types of certificates that are issued include the
following:

CA certificates

Issued to CAs, these certificates contain the public keys used to verify
digital signatures on CRLs al1d certificates.

End entity (EE) certificates

Issued to entities that are not CAs, these certificates contain the public
keys that are needed by the certificate’s user in order to perform key
management or verify a digital signature.

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Self-issued (self-signed) certificates

These certificates are issued by an entity to itself to establish points of

trust and to distribute a new signing public key.

Rollover certificates

A CA issues these certificates for transition from an old public key to a

new one.

Certificate Revocation Lists

The user checks the certificates revocation list (CRL) to determine

whether a digital signature has been revoked. They check for the serial
number of the signature. The CA signs the CRL for integrity and
authentication purpose. A CRL is shown in the Figure J 4 given bell1w
for an X.509 version 2 certificates.

The CA usually generates the CRLs for its population. If the CA

generates the CRLs for its entire population, the CRL is called a full
CRL.

Key Management

Obviously, when dealing with encryption keys, the same precaution

must be used as with physical keys to secure the areas or the
combinations to the safes. The components of key management are
listed as follows:

Key Distribution

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As noted earlier, distributing secret keys in symmetric key encryption

poses a problem. Secret keys can be distributed using asymmetric key
cryptosystem. Other means of distributing secret keys include face-to-
face meeting to exchange keys, sending the keys by a secure messenger,
or some other secure alternate channel. Another method is to encrypt the
secret key with another key, called a key encryption key, and send the
encrypted key to the intended receiver. These key encryption keys can
be distributed manually, but they need not be distributed often. The
X9.l7 Standard (ANSI X9.l7 [Revised],” American National Standard
for Financial Institution Key Management [Wholesale],” American
Bankers Association, 1985) specifies key encryption keys as well as
data keys for encrypting the plaintext messages.

Splitting the keys into different parts and sending each part by a
different medium can also accomplish key distribution.

In large networks, key distribution can become a serious problem

because in an N-person network, the total number of key exchanges is
N(N-I)/2.Using public key cryptography or the creation and, exchange
of session keys that are valid only for a particular session and time are
useful mechanism for managing the key distribution problem. Keys can
be updated by generating a new key from an old key.

Key Revocation

A digital certificate contains a timestamp or period for which the

certificate is valid. Also if the key is compromised or must be made
invalid because of business-or personal-related issues, it must be
revoked. The CA maintains a CRL of all invalid certificates. The user
should regularly examine this list.

Key Recovery

A system must be put in place to decrypt critical data if the encryption

key is lost or forgotten. One method is key escrow. In this system, the
key is subdivided into different parts, each of which is encrypted and
then sent to a different trusted individual in an organisation. Keys can
also be escrowed onto smart cards.

Key renewal

Obviously, the longer a secret key is used without changing it, the more
it is subject to compromise. The frequency with which you change the
key is a direct function of the value of the data being encrypted and
transmitted. Also, if the same secret key is used to encrypt valuable data
over a relatively long period of time, you risk compromising a larger

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volume of data when the key is broken. Another important concern if

the key is not changed frequently is that an attacker can intercept and
change messages and then send different messages to the receiver. Key
encryption keys, because they are not used as often as encryption keys,
provides some protection against attacks. Typically, private keys used
for digital signatures are not frequently changed and may be kept for
years.

Key destruction

Keys that have been in use for long periods of time and are replaced by
others should be destroyed. If the keys are compromised, older messages
sent with those keys can be read.

Keys that are stored on disks or EEPROMS should be overwritten

numerous times. One can also destroy the disk by shredding and burning
them. However, in some cases, it is possible to recover data from disks
that were put into fire. Any hardware device storing the keys, such as an
EEPROM, should also be physically destroyed.

Older Keys stored by the operating system in various locations in the

memory must also be searched and destroyed.

Multiple Keys

Usually an individual has more than one public/private key pair. The
keys may be of different sires for different levels of security. A larger
key sire may be used for digitally signing documents and smaller key
sire may be used for encryption. A person may also have multiple roles
or responsibilities wherein s/he may want to sign messages with a
different signature. One key pair may be used for business matters,
another for personal use, and another for some other activity, such as
being a school board member.

Distributed vs Centralised Key Management

A CA is a form of centralised key management. It is a central location

that issues certificates and maintains CRLs. An alternative is the
distributed key management, in which a “chain of trust” or “web of
trust” is set up among users who know each other. Because, they know
each other, they can trust that each one’s public key is valid. Some of
these users may know other users and thus, verify their public key. The
chain spreads outward from the original group. This arrangement results
in an informal verification procedure that is based on people knowing
and trusting each other.

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3.3 Communication Security

This section describes authentication mechanism to support application-

level authentication and digital signatures. We will describe kerberos
mechanism in the following paragraphs.

Kerberos

Kerberos is a commonly used authentication scheme on the Internet.

Developed by MIT’s Project Athena, Kerberos is named after the three-
headed dog who, according to Greek mythology, guards the entrance of
Hades (rather than the exit, for some reason!).

Kerberos (as shown in Figure 15) employs a client/server architecture

and provides user-to-server authentication rather than host-to-host
authentication. In this model, security and authentication will be based
on a secret key technology where every host on the network has its own
secret key. It would clearly be unmanageable if every host had to know
the keys of all other hosts so, a secure, trusted host somewhere on the
network, known as a Key Distribution Centre (KDC), knows the keys of
all the hosts (or at least some of the hosts within a portion of the
network, called a realm). In this way, when a new node is brought
online, only the KDC and the new node need to be configured with the
node’s key; keys can be distributed physically or by some other secure
means.

Figure 15: Kerberos

The Kerberos Server/KDC has two main functions (Figure), known as
the Authentication Server (AS) and Ticket-Granting Server (TGS). The

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steps in establishing an authenticated session between an application

client and the application server are:

The Kerberos client software establishes a connection with the

Kerberos server’s AS function. The AS firstly authenticates that
the client is who it purports to be. The AS then provides the client
with a secret key for this login session (the TGS session key) and
a ticket-granting ticket (TGT), which gives the client permission
to talk to the TGS. The ticket has a finite lifetime so that the
authentication process is repeated periodically.

The client now communicates with the TGS to obtain the

Application Server’s key so that it (the client) can establish a
connection with the service it wants. The client supplies the TGS
with the TGS session key and TGT; the TGS responds with an
application session key (ASK) and an encrypted form of the
Application Server’s secret key; this secret key is never sent on
the network in any other form.
The client has now authenticated itself and can prove its identity
to the Application Server by supplying the Kerberos ticket,
application session key, and encrypted Application Server secret
key. The Application Server responds with similarly encrypted
information to authenticate itself to the client. At this point, the
client can initiate the intended service requests (e.g., Telnet, FTP,
H1TP, or e-commerce transaction session establishment).

Electronic Mail Security

Electronic mail is the most heavily used network based application. It is

also the only distributed application that is widely used across all
architectures and vendor platforms. With the explosively growing
reliance on electronic mail, there is a concern for authentication and
confidentiality of service. Two approaches, pretty good privacy (PGP)
and S/MIME are widely used for this purpose.

PGP

PGP is largely the effort of a single person, Phil Zimmermann, and

provides a confidentiality and authentication service that can be used for
electronic mail and file storage applications. Zimmermann has done the
following:

Selected the best available cryptographic functions as building

blocks,

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Integrated these functions into general purpose application that is

independent of operating system and processor,

Made the package and documentation, including source code,

freely available via the Internet, bulletin boards, and commercial
networks, and

Also made the Commercial versions easily available.

The actual operation of PGP consists of five services: authentication,

confidentiality, compression, e-mail compatibility, and segmentation. A
brief summary of PGP services is described in the Table given below:

S/MIME

S/MIME (Secure/Multipurpose Internet Mail Extension) is a security

enhancement to the MIME Internet e-mail format standard, based RSA
data security technology. Though both S/MlME and PGP are based on
IETF standards, S/MIME is industry standard for commercial and
organisational use, and PGP is a choice for personal e-mail security for
many users.

MIME is an extension to the RFC 822 framework (traditional email

format standard) that is intended to address some of the problems and
limitations of the use of SMTP (simple mail transfer protocol) or some
other mail transfer protocol and RFC 822.

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Virtual Private Network (VPN)

The VPN has become the de facto standard for secure remote access. It
provides business partners access to corporate network resources across
un-trusted networks. Typically, the untrusted network will be the
Internet, but VPNs offer excellent flexibility and can also be used across
more traditional network mediums such as frame relay or A TM
networks. VPNs guarantee the confidentiality and integrity of corporate
data through the use of strong encryption and authentication techniques.
VPNs have become famous because of excellent cost saving and
performance improvements in comparison to more traditional remote
access methods.
Types of VPN

VPNs are of two distinct categories: (I) Site to site VPNs, between two
or more offices or data centres; (2) Client to site VPNs, between a
desktop client and a central office or data center.

IPSec

Most clients to site VPNs are based on JPSec (short for IP Security),
which is a suite of protocols developed by the IETF to support secure
transmission of packets at the IP layer. Typically, an IPSec tunnel
connection will be created from a Client software component to a VPN
gateway (or firewall with VPN functionality). Following the
initialisation of this tunnel, all packets destined for the remote corporate
network will be routed through this tunnel. The tunnel provides the
necessary security, by encrypting each packet (using one of a selection
of algorithms) before forwarding it to the remote gateway. When
packets reach the remote gateway, they are decrypted and then
forwarded ‘in the clear’ to the final destination.

IPSec was initially devised for site to site VPN connections, so in order
to add the necessary functionality to IPSec to allow effective client to
site connections and management, each vendor has added vendor
specific features to it’s JPSec implementation. Good examples of this
include Check Point hybrid mode (to allow strong user authentication
without certificates) and NA T traversal techniques from the majority of
vendors.

As shown in the Figure 16, IPSec clients work by adding extra

functionality at the bottom of the IP Layer. This functionality inspects
traffic, and encapsulates and encrypts traffic as necessary.

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Application Layer (OSI

Layers 5,6 & 7)

Transport Layer (OSI

Layer 4)
IP Layer (OSI Layer 3)

IPSec
Network Access Layer
(OSI Layers 1 & 2)

Figure 16: Functionality inspects traffic, and encapsulates and encrypt traffic
Secure Sockets Layer (SSL)

Netscape originated SSL. Secure Sockets layer is a protocol, which is

already imbedded in most IP stacks and placed at the base of the
application layer, as shown in the Figure 17. SSL has been traditionally
and widely deployed for securing web-based applications in the form of
HTTPS (or secure HTTP). Even the most novice users are normally
aware of the padlock symbol shown on secure web sites, even if they are
unaware of the fact that this symbol means that” the site is protected by
SSI.

Application Layer (OSI

Layers 5,6 & 7)

Transport Layer (OSI

Layer 4)
IP Layer (OSI Layer 3)

Network Access Layer

(OSI Layers 1 & 2)

Figure 17: Secure socket layer (SSL).

Some SSL VPNs claim 10 have clientless or near clientless operation.

This means access to the VPN can be created from any machine with a
Web browser, including machines in Internet cafe’s and home machines.
The main drivers for SSL VPN are: Cost saving; independent platform
and mobility.

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Cost saving

Because SSL VPNs can be clientless, the cost of deploying clients is

saved. For large organizations this can be a large outlay.

Independent Platform & mobility

Access can be granted from many types of machine (Linux, Windows,

PDAs) and from many locations.

With these benefits, SSL VPNs also has many complications and
disadvantages.

Benefits of SSL

Cost saving

Because SSL VPNs can be clientless, the cost of deploying clients is

saved.

Platform independence/independent platform

Access can be granted from many types of machines with different

operating systems (Linux, Windows 2K/XP, Apple Mac, Palm OS,
Symbian, Pocket PC).

Client type mobility

Although IPSec clients can grant access across most mediums (Leased
line, DSL, Dial, GPRS) they only offer access from the corporate
desktop on which the client is installed. SSL VPNs can be configured to
allow access from corporate built laptops, home desktops, customer or
supplier desktops or any machine in an Internet cafe. This extra choice
allows a much wider audience (i.e., non-laptop users) to improve
productivity and work from any where (at home or while traveling).

Client IP mobility

Although widespread deployment is yet to take hold, mobile IP network

deployment is growing steadily. A side effect of a mobile IP network is
that the client’s source address can change as a client moves between
cells and networks. This has the effect of breaking an IPSec VPN
connection, but because SSL VPNs are not bound to the source IP
address, connections can be maintained as clients move. No NA
Tissues-Traditionally Hide Network Address Translatiol11Hide NA T)

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has caused issues with IPSec VPNs. Vendors have generally overcome
these issues by developing vendor specific NAT traversal mechanisms
based on Payload encapsulation in UDP packets. Although these
mechanisms normally function well, they break and cause
interoperability problems between vendors deployments. SSL VPNs do
not suffer such issues because they are not tied to the IP layer.

Granular access control

Although IPSec VPNs also offer highly granular access control through
machine and the service it provides, SSL VPNs can offer a greater
degree of granularity, even as far as the URL. SSL VPNs also lend
themselves to more granular access control because each resource
accessed must be explicitly defined. This differs from IPSec VPN
because the entire corporate network can be defined with a single
statement.

Restrictive firewall rules

Organisations with a reasonable security infrastructure employs a

firewall rule set with limits outbound access. SSL based VPNs
communicate on the port used by Secure HTTP (TCP port 443), which
is one of the few ports allowed outbound access from any machine in
the corporate network in most environments. Even if the proxy cache
servers are deployed, since the HTTPS traffic is encrypted, as a result,
this encrypted traffic will pass un-inspected. This is not possible with
IPSec based VPN.

As stated above in the Figure 16 SSL VPNs make use of the existing
SSL functionality that are already present in most IP Stacks. Because
SSL fits into the stack between layers 4 and 5, each application must
explicitly define its use. Based on this fact, SSL VPNs fall into 3 distinct
categories: (i) Appli~tion layer proxies, (ii) Protocol redirectors, and (iii)
Remote control enhancers. Commercial SSL products are a
Combination of the above mentioned techniques.

These techniques are discussed below:

(i) Application layer proxies

Application layer proxies are the simplest form of SSL VPNs because
they rely on the SSL functionality used by existing applications.
Because of this, application layer proxies have the least application
support. Generally, they only support Email and Web-based traffic.
They function by using the SSL setup in existing applications, for
example, you would web browse to the gateway which will then proxy

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web traffic internally (using a simple method to display links to internal

systems). To use the email, your administrators would configure the
SSL functionality in your email client and proxy all email traffic via the
gateway.

One of the advantages of application layer proxies are that they are truly
clientless. They operate with nearly all operating systems and web
browsers.

(ii) Protocol redirectors

Protocol redirectors have more flexibility than application layer proxies,

but they are truly clientless in their operation. Protocol redirectors work
by downloading a mini client from the gateway, which is installed
locally and redirects traffic. The redirection is depicted in Figure 18.

Application Layer (OSI

Layers 5,6 & 7)

SSL Transport Layer

(OSI Layer 4)
IP Layer (OSI Layer 3)

IPSec
Network Access Layer
(OSI Layers 1 & 2)

Figurel8: Protocol redirector

For example, if a connection is made through an application, which does

not use the SSL layer, the connection is captured at the base of the IP
layer and then encapsulated within an SSL tunnel. Once the traffic
reaches the SSL gateway, it is decrypted and then proxied to the original
destination.

The only realistic method of capturing the traffic on the way through the
IP stack is to redirect traffic based on name resolution to a local
resource. For example, to connect to http://mail.yahoo.com, the port
redirector is enabled, then the name mail.yahoo.com will be forced to
connect to the localhost (127.0.0.1) through the use of a host file. This
means that the mini client must have the ability to write changes to the
hosts file, which at a hardend desktop may not always be possible. Also,

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in most implementations, some administrative permission is required on

the local desktop to install the mini client, which is rarely possible using
a machine in an Internet Café.

The main advantage of the protocol redirection system is that it can

support any application that works on fixed TCP or UDP ports and in
which some implementations, and applications with dynamic port
applications can be supported (such as MS Outlook).

(iii) Remote Control Enhancers

Remote control enhancers are the most flexible form of SSL based VPN,
but they also have heavy overload. They work by enhancing a remote
control protocol like Windows Terminal Services or Citrix Metaframe
and adding SSL VPN functionality and Web Browser support. This
means any application can be added to the SSL VPN by adding the
application to the remote control desktop. As a stand-alone application,
this has serious limitations, because applications that reside on the local
desktop cannot be used directly. This is why most remote control
enhancers are partnered with other SSL VPN technologies.

On the positive side though, they can offer features like the ability to
read and update a documents held centrally without ever having to
download the entire document. While travelling and using VPN over
low speed connections, or when connection quality is poor this could be
a better option, because connections are restarted without loosing any
work.

Technical Issues

Other technical considerations include

Performance; high availability; and network performance.

Performance

SSL VPNs can support large number of concurrent users with adequate
performance.

High Availability

Most vendors (especially the ones with more mature products) are able
to perform some form of internal High Availability and fail over
mechanisms.

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Network Performance: Performance over a low speed link (GSM data or

GPRS) should be good to accept the mobility aspect of SSL VPNs. It
has been noticed that SSL VPNs can offer some performance
advantages over IPSec VPNs. Not considering the setup operations,
which can be considered “one time” for a relatively short lived
connection, the overhead of IPSec on a packet is between 50 and 57
octets (including the new IP header, the ESP header and the trailers),
representing a 10% increase on an average packet (500 byte). In contrast
to this, SSL VPNs add only 5 octets of data to each packet, just a I %
increase on the average packet. However, setup operations cannot be
ignored, but these are roughly similar in size for IPSec and SSL
connections. Also, because SSL VPNs work at a much higher layer, they
suffer far less from, the packet fragmentation issues normally associated
with IPSec VPNs. Finally, SSL has an in-built compression mechanism.

Deployment Considerations and Disadvantages of SSL VPNs

Application Support

The main hurdle to deployment of SSL VPNs is likely to be application

support. As SSL works at the boundary of layers 4 and 5, each
application must support its use. Vendors add additional support through
the use of protocol redirectors, but these often require some user
knowledge to operate. Based on this, the first step to take when
designing an SSL VPN solution is to look at the access that will be
required and assess how simple this will be to provide.

Internal Network Security Failings

With IPSec VPN, a large number of organisations allocate specific IP

addresses to remote clients systems using the RIDIUS Protocol. This
gives the ability to file and control traffic based on the IP source,
ensuring internal network security. As all sessions from an SSL VPN are
normally proxied from a single address, all clients’ sessions originate
from this single IP. Due to this, a network administrator is unable to
allocate privileges using source IP addresses. In reality, this level of
control can be handled on the SSL VPN gateway, but if a network is
already configured to some IP source based security, the overhead of
altering it, can be very high.

Audit and Activity Awareness

Any security appliance, hardware or software system should include a

good level of auditing. With SSL VPN this functionality is seen as the
key, because of the relatively simple systems needed to abuse an SSL
VPN by a remote hacker (i.e., A web browser), should logon credentials

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become compromised. Further to this, some form of real time alerting of

unusual actions (such as trying to copy an entire disk over the VPN)
must be included. Some of this functionality is seen by vendors, as
fewer keys and, is still evolving.

Client Security

As SSL VPN offers a much greater choice o(client platform with

‘clientless’ or ‘near clientless’ operation, the security of any client
connecting to the network must be scrutinised. For example, in no way
would any organisation consider a PC in an Internet cafe to be as trusted
as a corporate issued laptop. Due to this, vendors have developed
several mechanisms to boost the trust associated with an un-trusted
client connection. Some of these are outlined below:

Client Integrity Scanning

When a client connects to the VPN a small java applet is downloaded to

the client machine, which searches for good or bad files, process or ports
listening. For example, it can check for a running A V program with
current definitions, the presence of a personal firewall with a standard
rule set or the presence of any known Trojans. The disadvantage of this
mechanism is it may place limitations on the types of clients that can
connect, but more importantly, it is only a onetime snapshot of a system.
Also with an understanding or the rule set, it seems feasible that these
checks may be fooled.

Sandbox

A sandbox is used to store any files downloaded from a corporate

network over the SSL VPN. Once the VPN session is terminated, the
contents of the sandbox are securely deleted. This avoids issues of email
attachments and corporate data being accidentally left on un-trusted
machines. Sandboxes can also be used to ensure Citrix Metaframe or
other interactive session data is wiped from a machine at logoff.
Secure logoff and credential wiping

This ensures that when users logoff the system all logon credentials are
wiped from the client machine. Of course, with enterprise strength VPN
solution, a strong authentication mechanism should also be used to
protect credentials further.

Timeouts and Re-authentication

To avoid systems being left connected to the network by users, sessions

can be terminated after periods of inactivity. Also, to ensure that the

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correct user is still using the connection, periodic authentication during a

session can be implemented on client systems.

Virus, Malicious Code and Worm Activity

As the client is nearly un-trusted, most SSL VPNs can also filter traffic
at the application level (especially if an application level proxy is used,
rather than a protocol redirector), blocking worms and viruses at the
gateway. SSL VPNs used for remote access, no doubt, have significant
advantages over the IPSec alternatives. But the advantages they offer
also add complexity, which must be weighed against the advantages.
Before considering an SSL VPN deployment you should consider:
security risks involved; added mobility and flexibility; protocol support
required.

3.4 Web Security

With the transformation of the Internet from a network used primarily

by universities and research laboratories to a world-wide
communications medium, attacks on the World Wide Web and Internet
can be have very serious consequences. In today’s environment virtually
all businesses, government agencies, and many individuals now have
their own web sites. But Internet and Web are extremely vulnerable to
compromises of various sorts. As a result demand for secure web
services grows. Thus, there is a need for protecting nodes on the Internet
and for providing for the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of
information utilising these networks.

Web Security Considerations

WWW is fundamentally a client/server application running over the

Internet and TCP/IP intranet. This presents new challenge:

The web is vulnerable to attacks on the Web server over the

Internet.

Reputation can be damaged and money can be lost if the Web

servers are subverted, as it serves as a highly visible outlet for
corporate and product information.

The history of the web show that even upgraded, properly

installed systems are vulnerable to a variety of security attacks.

SSL/TLS

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The Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) protocol was developed by Netscap in

1994 to protect the confidentiality of information transmitted between
two applications, to verify the integrality of communication and to
provide authentication means in both directions. SSL implements these
functions using public and private key encryption and a message
authentication code (MAC).

Microsoft has developed a newer version of SSL, Transport Layer

security (TLS). As with SSL, TLS includes confidentiality, integrity and
authentication above the transport layer and is application independent.
Because SSL and TLS ride on the transport layer protocol, they are
independent of the application. Thus, SSL and TLS can be used with
application such as telnet, FTP, HTTP and email protocol.

Both SSL and TLS use certificates for public key verification that are
based on the X.509 standard.
SSL 3.0

The design goals of SSL 3.0 were to provide:

1) Cryptographic Security: Protection of the confidentiality of

transmitted messages.

2) Interoperability: Application should be able to be developed

using SSL 3.0 by groups of individuals without knowledge of
each other’s code.

3) Extensibility: The ability to incorporate different encryption

algorithm into SSL 3.0 without major changes to SSL 3.0.

4) Relative Efficiency: Efficient utilisation of computing and

network resources.

Session keys generated during SSL private key cryptography transaction

are either 40-bits or I 28-bits in length. Newer browsers support I 28-bit
encryption. The SSL protocol comprises two layers, the SSL Record
Protocol and the SSL Handshake Protocol. The SSL Record Protocol is
layered above a transport protocol, such as TCP. This record protocol is
used for encapsulation of higher-level-protocols, such as the SSL
Handshake protocol. The latter protocol is used for client/server mutual
authentication, negotiation of a cryptographic algorithm, and exchange
of cryptographic keys.

Thus, through these mechanisms, SSL provides:

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a) Mutual authentication using public key cryptography based on

algorithms, such as, the Digital Signature Standard (DSS) and
RSA.

b) Encryption of messages using private key cryptography based on

algorithm, such as, IDEA, 3DES, and RC4.

c) Integrity verification of the message using a keyed message

authentication code (MAC) based on hash functions, such as, MO
% and SHA.

TLS 1.0

Similar to SSL, the TLS protocol is comprised of the TLS Record and
Handshake Protocols. The TLS Record Protocol is layered on top of a
transport protocol such as TCP and provides privacy and reliability to
the communications. The privacy is implemented by encryption using
symmetric key cryptography (DES or RC4). Anew secret key is
generated for each connections; but, the Record Protocol can be used
without encryption. Integrity is provided through the use of a MAC
(Message Authentication Code) using hash algorithms such as SHA or
MOS.

The TLS Record Protocol is also used to encapsulate a higher-level

protocol such as the TLS Handshake Protocol. The server and client use
this Handshake Protocol to authenticate each other. The authentication
can be accomplished using asymmetric key cryptography (RSA or
DSS). The Handshake Protocol also sets up the encryption algorithm
and cryptographic keys to enable the application protocol to transmit
and receive information.

Since TLS is based on SSL, they have similar functionality and goals;
however, SSL and TLS have enough differences that they cannot
interoperate. In order to address this situation, TLS through built-in
mechanism becomes compatible with SSL 3.0.

S-HTTP

Secure HTTP (S-HHTP) is a communication protocol for providing

secure messaging over HTTP. S-HTTP provides, equal and symmetric
capabilities to both client and server, but when an entity that is S-HTTP
enabled communicates with another entity that is not S-HTTP capable,
the secure features will not work. S-HTTP implements secure, end-to-
end transactions. S-HTTP supports a symmetric key encryption only
mode, and therefore, does not require public key encryption for key
exchanges. It is flexible, but permits the clients and servers to use

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different forms of transactions related to the signing of messages,

encryption of messages, algorithms used, and types of certificates. S-
HTTP protocol supports the following:

Option negotiations for defining the type of transactions desired,

A variety of key management mechanisms,
Various trust models,
Multiple cryptographic algorithms,
Multiple operation modes, and
Different encapsulation formats.

Instant Messaging

Instant messaging supports the real time exchange of messages between

two parties using the Internet. To use this service, the user has to have
instant messaging client software on his or her computer system. The
client software then communicates with an instant messaging server.
Some popular messaging utilities are the freeware ICQ (for “I seek you”
at www. Icq.com), AIM (America Online’s Instant Messenger),
Microsoft’s instant messaging utility in MSN Explorer, and Yahoo
Instant Messenger.

One problem with instant messaging is lack of inter operability. A

person with an instant messaging utility from one source or vendor may
not be able to communicate with a person using a different instant
messaging package. To solve this problem, the Internet Engineering
Task force (IETF) has developed a standard protocol for instant
messaging- the Instant Messaging Presence Protocol.

IM Vulnerabilities

Messages sent through the instant messaging protocol are not inherently
secure and safe. The instant messaging server is vulnerable because it
contains both the messages and the connection information of the user.
Thus, instant messaging servers should be secure servers located in
protected and limited access areas. In addition to that, some of the
security features provided by some instant messaging software utilities
include:

encryption, integrity, and authentication services using SSL,

authentication against propriety databases, domains, or LDAP,

secure transfer of files,

ability to use any TCP port,

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web-based tools for administration of the instant messaging

network on the instant messaging server, including tools for user
account administration, logging of critical data, and analysis of
log information.

Naming Conventions

New Technology File Systems (NTFS) has the capability to generate

names in the DOS 8.3 naming convention to service l6-bit application
that access files that do not conform to DOS 8.3 naming. Windows
2000, Windows NT, and Windows NT Workstation support the NTFS
file system. Windows 95/98 support, the earlier FAT file system along
with the FAT 32, new version. The NTFS enhancement over
FATIFAT32 includes optimisation of available disk space, fault
tolerance, and improved security features.

Web servers that respond to requests for files in their DOS 83 fields
names are vulnerable to attacks that can cause the server to reveal source
code. A fix to this problem is, to disable DOS 8.3 file name creation on
the NTFS server, but this may result in difficulties in using l6-bit
applications.

4.0 CONCLUSION

In this concluding unit of this course you have been taken through
digital signature, public key infrastructure, management of public keys
as well as web security. It is our belief that with what you have learnt in
this course you will be able to show your own among dfgt professionals
and build upon it.

5.0 SUMMARY

Computer and Network security relates to technological and Managerial

procedures applied to a computer, computer system, computer network
to ensure the availability, integrity and confidentiality of data. In this
unit covered various aspects of digital signatures, management of public
keys, public key infrastructures in Nigeria Communication and web
security etc.

6.0 TUTOR-MARKED ASSIGNMENT

1) What is X.509 certificate?

2) List components of a X.509 Certificate and CRL certificate.
3) List all Certification Authorities Operating in India.
4) Which choice below most accurately describes SSL?

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(i) It’s a widely used standard of securing email at the Application

level.
(ii) It gives a user remote access to a command prompt across a
secure, encrypted session.
(iii) It uses two protocols, the Authentication header and the
Encapsulating Security Payload.
(iv) It allows an application to have authenticated, encrypted
communication across a network.

5) List differences between SSL and TLS.

6) What is S-HTfP?
7) What are instant messaging and its vulnerabilities?

7.0 REFERENCES/FURTHER READINGS

William Stallings, Network Security Essential – Application and

standard, Pearson Education, New Delhi.

A.S. Tanenbaum, Computer Networks. 4. Edition, Practice Hall of India,

New Delhi, 2002.

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