Ln.

5 – COMPUTER NETWORKING
Computer Network –
• A computer network is an interconnection among two or more computers or computing devices.
• Such interconnection allows computers to share data and resources among each other.
• Examples of network in our everyday life- Social network, Mobile network, Network of computers,
Airlines, railway, banks, hospitals networks etc
• A basic network may connect a few computers placed in a room.
• The network size may vary from small to large depending on the number of computers it
connects.
• Apart from computers, networks include networking devices like switch, router, modem, etc.
• Networking devices are used to connect multiple computers in different settings.
• For communication, data in a network is divided into smaller chunks called packets.
• These packets are then carried over a network.

Benefits of networking-
 Share resources– such as printers and scanners.
 Share storage- being able to access files from any machine on the network.
 Reliability
 Communication facility
 Cost saving – reduced overall cost
 Time saving

Note- Types of resources shared:

Hardware : A network allows users to share many hardware devices such as printers , modems, fax
machines, CD ROM etc.,
Software: Sharing software resources reduces the cost of software installation, saves space on
hard disk

Limitations of networking
 Managing a large network is complicated, requires trained specialist.
 If networks are badly managed, services can become unusable and productivity falls.
 If the central server fails, then the files on the file server become inaccessible.
 Purchasing the network cabling and file servers can be expensive.
 Involves security issues- virus attacks.

Client server architecture-

The client server model has all nodes on a network acting as clients.
When these systems need to access a resource, they send a request
to the server. The server will then provide the required resources for
a network.

Nodes (Workstations)
• Any system or device connected to a network is called a node.
• It is any physical device within a network of other tools that’s able to send, receive, or forward
information.
• For example, a network connecting three computers and one printer, along with two more
wireless devices, has six total nodes.

Types of network –
Based on the geographical area the network covers, computer networks are classified as :
 PAN – Personal Area Network
 LAN – Local Area Network
 MAN – Metropolitan Area Network
 WAN – Wide Area Network
PAN-
A network of communicating devices (Computer, Phone, MP3/MP4 Player, Camera etc.) within the
proximity of an individual.
It covers an area of a few meters radius (upto 10m radius)
There can also be multiple devices in PAN.
A PAN is set up using guided or unguided media
Eg. Transferring songs from one phone to another, transferring files from PC to MP3 player etc.

LAN-
A network of communicating devices in a room , building or campus.
It covers an area of a few meters to a few kilometres radius (upto 1 km radius)
A LAN is set up using guided media or unguided media.
A LAN is owned, controlled, and managed by a single person or organization.
A LAN setup using unguided media is known as WLAN (wireless LAN)
LAN is comparatively secure as only authentic users in the network can access other computers or
shared resources.
Users can print documents using a connected printer, upload or download documents and
software to and from the local server.
Data transfer in LAN is quite high, and usually varies from 10 Mbps to 1000 Mbps.
Ethernet is a set of rules that decides how computers and other devices connect with each other
through cables in a local area network or LAN.

MAN-
A network of communicating devices within a city
It covers an area of a few kilometers to a few hundred kilometres radius(upto 100 km radius)
A MAN is set up using guided media or unguided media
Network of schools, or banks , or government offices etc.,
Usually formed by connecting a number of LANs

WAN –
A network of communicating devices crossing the limits of a city, country or continent.
A WAN is set up using guided media or unguided media
Network of ATMs, banks , National government offices, International government offices etc.,
spread over a country , continents
Usually formed by connecting a number of LANs, MANs or maybe other WANs
Best example of WAN is Internet

NETWORK DEVICES
o The devices which are used for communication between different hardware’s used in a network
are known as network devices.
o These are mainly used for transmitting and receiving the data quickly and securely in between
different peripheral devices.
o Some common networking devices are: NIC , HUB , SWITCH , REPEATER , GATEWAY, ROUTER,
MODEM

NIC –
 Also known as Ethernet card.
 A network interface card (NIC) is a computer circuit board or card that is installed in a computer
so that it can be connected to a network.
 It acts as an interface between computer and the network.
 2 types- Ethernet NIC (Wired) , WLAN (Wireless) NIC
 The Ethernet cable connects the computer to the network through NIC.
 Ethernet cards can support data transfer between 10 Mbps and 1 Gbps (1000 Mbps).
 Each NIC has a MAC address, which helps in uniquely identifying the computer on the network.

HUB -
Hub is a device used to connect several computers or devices together in a network.
It has ports into which the cables from individual computers' NICs are inserted. So each
computer's NIC is connected to the hub and hence all the computers are connected together.
When a computer has to send some information to some other computer(s), the information is
sent by the NIC to the hub.
Then the hub retransmits this information to the other computers attached to it regardless of the
fact if data packet is destined for the device connected or not.
The computer(s) for which the information is intended receive(s) this information and accept(s) it.
Other computers on the network simply reject this information.
The limitation of hub is that if data from two devices come at the same time, they will collide.
Types of Hub
• Active Hub: Amplifies the signal when required and works as a Repeater.
• Passive Hub: It simply passes the signal without any change.

SWITCH
✓ A switch is a networking device that plays a central role in a Local Area Network (LAN).
✓ Hub will just forward the data but a switch redirects the information received only to the intended
node in the network. So switch is called an intelligent hub.
✓ When data arrives, the switch extracts the destination address from the data packet and looks it
up in a table to see where to send the packet. Thus it sends signals to only selected devices
instead of sending to all.
✓ A switch does not forward the signals which are noisy or corrupted. It drops such signals and asks
the sender to resend it.

Functions of switch-
 It can forward multiple packets at the same time.
 Can be used to segment a big network into different Subnetworks to control the network traffic
and security.
 Used to combine various small network segments to form a big Network.
 Switch can perform error checking before forwarding data, that makes it very efficient as it does
not forward packets that have errors and forward good packets selectively to correct port only.

REPEATER
✓ Data is carried in the form of signals over the cable.
✓ These signals can travel a specified distance (usually about 100 m).
✓ Signals lose their strength beyond this limit and become weak.
✓ If the signal becomes weak, it cannot reach its destination.
✓ Therefore, some device is required which can re-strengthen the data signal before it gets too
weak. In such case a Repeater is used.
✓ A repeater is a device that amplifies a signal transmitted on the network.
✓ In case of Twisted pair cable, signals become weak after 100 meters.
✓ Repeater has two ports: one for incoming signal and another one for “boosted” outgoing signal.
GATEWAY
There are thousands of computer networks that exist. These networks use different hardware and
software and they often need to communicate with each other.
Different networks are sometimes incompatible with each other. When two or more networks
using different hardware and software have to be connected, some device is needed which can
translate one network's language into the other's.
A gateway is a device that connects different types of networks and performs the necessary
translation so that the connected networks can communicate properly.
A LAN gets connected to Internet (WAN) using a gateway.
Gateways serve as an entry and exit point for a network as all data must pass through or
communicate with the gateway prior to being routed.
It is a key access point that acts as a “gate” between an organisation's network and the outside
world of the Internet.
For simple Internet connectivity at homes, the gateway is usually the ISP that provides access to
the entire Internet.
Generally, a router is configured to work as a gateway device in computer networks.
A gateway can be implemented as software, hardware, or a combination of both.
This is because network gateway is placed at the edge of a network and the firewall is usually
integrated with it.

ROUTER
✓ A router connects a local area network to the internet.
✓ It is a network device that can receive the data, analyse it and transmit it to other networks.
✓ It is a device like a switch that routes data packets based on their IP addresses.
✓ The basic role of Routers in a network is to determine the best possible route (shortest path) for
the data packets to be transmitted.
✓ In a large network (WAN), multiple routers works to facilitate speedy delivery of data packets.
✓ It improves performance and reliability in a network.
✓ Compared to a hub or a switch, a router has advanced capabilities as it can analyse the data
being carried over a network, decide or alter how it is packaged, and send it to another network
of a different type.
✓ A router can be wired or wireless.
✓ Nowadays, home Wi-Fi routers perform the dual task of a router and a modem or switch.
✓ These routers connect to incoming broadband lines, from ISP (Internet Service Provider), and
convert them to digital data for computing devices to process.

MODEM
A MODEM (MOdulator-DEModulator) is a device that converts Digital signal into Analog
(Modulation) and Analog to Digital (Demodulation) to enable their travelling through telephone
lines. This conversion is required because Telephone lines can’t carry digital data.
Modulator converts information from digital mode to analog mode at the transmitting end
and demodulator converts the same from analog to digital at receiving end.
Modem is of 2 types - Internal ,External.
A broadband modem is an external device that connects to your computers and other network
devices using either a network cable or over a wireless connection.

TOPOLOGY :
Refers to the arrangement of physical connections among nodes in a network. The selection of
topology for a network depends on the following factors-
❖ Cost:- It includes cable/media cost and installation cost depends on the distance between nodes.
❖ Flexibility:- Arrangement of furniture and walls in the building may affect the selection of
topology and media.
❖ Reliability:- Fault detection during Network failure also affects the selection of topology.
TYPES- BUS, STAR, RING , TREE , MESH
BUS topology-
A bus topology consists of a central cable (backbone), to which all the computers and other
devices are connected.
If any node has to send some information to any other node, it sends the signal to the backbone.
The signal travels in both directions through the entire length of the backbone and is received by
the node for which it is intended.

A small device called terminator is attached at each end of the backbone. When the signal
reaches the end of backbone, it is absorbed by the terminator.
This prevents the reflection of signal back on the cable and hence eliminates the chances of signal
interference.
When the signal reaches the end of the cable length, it bounces back and returns in the direction
it came from. This is known as signal bounce.
Signal bounce will create problem in the network, because if another signal is sent on the cable
length at the same time, the two signals will collide.

Advantages
➢ Simple layout and requires less cables.
➢ Easy to expand since the node may be connected at any point on linear part
Disadvantages:
➢ Detection of fault is quite difficult because there is no centralized control.
➢ In case of main cable or terminal fault, the entire networks goes down.
➢ To cover a long distance, Repeaters is needed to maintain the signal intensity.
➢ Terminator is required to terminate the signal at both end of the cable.

Star topology-
▪ In star topology, each communicating device is connected to a central
node, which is a networking device like a hub or a switch.
▪ It is considered very effective, efficient and fast as each device is
directly connected with the central device.
▪ The central node can be either a broadcasting device means data will
be transmitted to all the nodes in the network, or a unicast device
means the node can identify the destination and forward data to that
node only.
▪ The disturbance in one device will not affect the rest of the network, but any failure in the central
networking device may lead to the failure of complete network.

Advantages:
➢ Easy to setup and expand.
➢ Easy to locate fault in case of network failure.
➢ It offers centralized control over the network.
Disadvantages:
➢ Increases cabling cost since each node is directly connected to the centre node.
➢ Difficult to expand due to limited connecting points at centre node or device.
➢ All nodes are dependent on central node. if the central device (Switch) goes down then entire
network breaks down.
Ring topology-
• In ring topology, each node is connected to two other devices, one each on
either side, in the form of a ring or circle.
• The link in a ring topology is unidirectional.
• Thus, data can be transmitted in one direction only (clockwise or
counterclockwise).
• Data transmitted on a ring network travels from device to device around the
entire ring, in one direction.
• No collisions of data packets occur.
• Packets of data travel from one device to the next until they reach their destination.

Advantages:
➢ Simple layout and requires less cables.
➢ Easy to expand i.e. node may be connected at any point on circular path.
➢ Data can transfer between workstations at high speeds.
Disadvantages:
➢ Detection of fault is difficult i.e. failure of one node will affect the whole network.
➢ Less reliable i.e. a failure in the cable or any node breaks the loop and entire network becomes
down.
➢ Network reconfiguration is difficult.

Tree topology-
It is the combination of star and bus topology.
All stars are connected together like a bus
The bus-star hybrid approach provides for further
expandability of the network
Even if one network fails (star) the other network
remain connected.
In this type of network, data transmitted from
source first reaches the centralised device and from there the data passes through every branch
where each branch can have link for more nodes.

Advantages of tree topology:

Can be changed as leaf nodes can accommodate more nodes in the hierarchical chain.
Other hierarchical networks are not affected if one of them gets damaged
Easier maintenance and fault finding
Disadvantages of tree topology:
Huge cabling is needed
A lot of maintenance is needed

Mesh Topology-
Here all the network nodes are individually connected to most of the other
nodes.
It provides an alternative route in the case host is down or too busy.
It is excellent for long distance networking because it provides extensive
back up, rerouting and pass through capabilities.
There is not a concept of a central switch, hub or computer which acts as a central point .

Advantages
Data can be transmitted from different devices simultaneously. This topology can withstand high
traffic.
Even if one of the components fails there is always an alternative present. So data transfer doesn’t
get affected.
Expansion and modification in topology can be done without disrupting other nodes.
Disadvantages -
 Overall cost of this network is way too high as compared to other network topologies.
Building and maintaining the topology is difficult and time consuming.
Installation and configuration are difficult if the connectivity gets more.
Cabling cost is more and the most in case of a fully connected mesh topology.

Transmission Media
• Computers on a network are able to share data and other resources and also able to
communicate among themselves.
• To make all this possible there must be some medium over which the data can travel from one
computer to another.
• A medium of data transmission over a computer network is called a channel or a transmission
medium.
• Channels may be guided (wired) or unguided (wireless).
 Guided (Wired) Media: It consists of physical wired medium to carry signals.
 Unguided (Wireless) Media: It consists of data transmission through the air and is commonly
referred to as wireless.

Twisted Pair cable: [ Copper Pair]

▪ It is the most widely used cable for creating small computer networks.
▪ It consists of 4 insulated pairs of wires twisted around each other and pairs are colour coded.
▪ The wires are twisted around to minimize interference from other twisted pairs in the cable.
▪ An RJ-45 connecter is used to connect this cable to a computer.
▪ It is low-cost, low-weight and has flexible cables.
▪ It is easy to install and maintain.
▪ Suitable for short distance (up to 100 mt.). For long distance Repeater is required.
▪ It supports low bandwidth and offers up to 100 Mbps speed.
▪ It is of 2 types-
▪ Un-Shielded Twisted Pair (UTP) and
▪ Shielded Twisted Pair (STP), which contains extra shielding.
▪ It offers better immunity against internal & external electromagnetic interference.

Coaxial cable
• This type consists of two concentric conductors (an inner conductor & an outer conductor) a solid
insulated wire surrounded by wire mesh, each separated by some kind of foil or insulator.
• Coaxial cable is used as a transmission line for radio frequency signals, in applications such as
connecting radio transmitters and receivers with their antennas, computer network (Internet)
connections, and distributing cable television signals.
• Suitable for Broadband transmission (cable TV) and can be used in shared cable network.
• It is less flexible and expensive compared to Twisted Pair cable.
Optical Fiber
• Optical Fiber is a flexible optically transparent fiber, usually made of glass or plastic like material.
• It uses light to carry voice and data messages.
• It is used to transmit data through light signals over long distances.
• They are arranged in bundles called optical fibre cables.
• An optical fiber has following parts: Core , Cladding , Buffer coating , buffer jacket.
• Offers secure and high speed transmission up to a long distance.
• Not suitable for domestic purposes due to high maintenance cost.

Infrared waves
• Have a frequency of 300 GHz to 400 THz
• Used for short range communication (approx. 5m) in a variety of wireless communications,
monitoring and control systems
• Cannot penetrate any solid objects
• No interference, since it cannot penetrate through solids
• Eg. Used in remote controlled devices, cordless mouse, Intrusion Detectors, headset, printers etc.
• At one time only two devices can communicate (Line of sight transmission)
• Line of sight transmission is used, so information passed to one device is not leaked to other
device
• No government license is required to use it.

Radio waves
• Have a frequency of 3 KHz to 3 GHz
• Used for communication over a few meters (in walkie-talkie) upto covering an entire city.
• Easy to generate, can travel long distances & can penetrate through buildings
• Is Omni – directional (capable of transmitting and receiving radio signals equally in any direction
in the horizontal plane)
• Used for communication both indoors & outdoors.
• Cordless phones, AM & FM Radio Broadcast, Garage door openers are examples of radio wave
transmission.

Microwaves-
• Have a frequency of 300 MHz to 300 GHz
• Microwaves travel in straight lines, therefore sending and receiving antennas need to be aligned
with each other
• Cannot penetrate any solid objects
• For long distance microwave communication, high towers are build and microwave antennas are
put on their tops
• Example : Where land is costly and a lot of formalities need to be completed to dig land for
cabling, microwave antennas are put on top of high rise buildings for communication purpose

Satellites-
• Satellite communication uses Microwave (1.5 GHz -20GHz) as media.
• Used for long distance wireless communication, from intercity to inter continental
• There are multiple microwave frequency bands used for satellite communication
• Transmission from the earth to satellite is known as uplink (1.6GHz – 30.0GHz)
• Transmission from the satellite to earth is called downlink (1.5GHz – 20GHz)
• Downlink frequency is always lower than the uplink frequency
• A communication satellite is a relay station in orbit above the earth that receives , regenerates, &
redirects the signals carried on a specific frequency

Bluetooth-
✓ It is a wireless technology for creating personal networks operating within a range of 10 meters.
✓ Have a frequency of 2.402GHz to 2.480GHz
✓ Used for short range communication (approx. 10m) in a variety of wireless communications,
monitoring and control systems
✓ Line of sight between communicating devices is not required
✓ Eg. Used in baby monitors, door openers, cell phones etc.
✓ Can connect upto 8 devices simultaneously
✓ Slow data transfer rates (1 Mbps)
✓ Low interference and is inexpensive

Wifi
✓ Wi-Fi (Wireless Fidelity) Communication is similar to Bluetooth in operation but covers a large
range of coverage (50 -200 mts.).
✓ It offers network connectivity with mobility (Any place) within its range.
✓ Mostly it is used in home, office buildings, college or university campus, Cyber Café and Hotels to
provide Internet connectivity.

SERVER
✓ A server is a computer that is responsible for making the networking tasks happen.
✓ It facilitates the sharing of data, software and hardware resources on the network.
✓ On big networks, there can be servers dedicated to do specialized tasks.
✓ For eg:- a printer server serves only printing requests, a file server only handles file related
services.

Internet
✓ The Internet is a global wide area network that connects computer systems across the world.
✓ It allows people to share information and communicate with each other.
✓ All the related documents on a server are linked together using hyperlinks.
✓ Using hyperlinks we can move from one document to another. This is called navigation.
History of Internet-
▪ The Internet began as a U.S Department of Defense network to link scientists and university
professors around the world. It was known as ARPANET – Advanced Research Projects Agency
Network .
▪ Sir Tim Berners-Lee invented the World Wide Web in 1989. He was a scientist at CERN (Geneva)
Switzerland.
▪ Its further development is guided by W3C (World Wide Web Consortium)
▪ The World Wide Web Consortium is the main international standards organization for the www.

Hyperlink & hypertext-

• A hyperlink is a word, phrase, or image that you can click on to jump to a new document or a new
section within the current document.
• Hypertext is text with hyperlinks. It is a simple text with link that directs users to somewhere else
on the web.

Protocol-
• A network protocol is an established set of rules that determine how data is transmitted between
different devices in the same network.
• Some important protocols are- TCP/ IP, http, https, FTP, SMTP etc.
• http- The HyperText Transfer Protocol is a set of rules which is used to retrieve linked web pages
across the web. It’s more secure and advanced version is HTTPS.

HTML-
 HyperText Markup Language or HTML is a language which is used to design standardised Web
Pages so that the Web contents can be read and understood from any computer across the globe.
 It uses tags to define the way page content should be displayed by the web browser.
 Basic structure of every webpage is designed using HTML.
URI-
 URI — Uniform Resource Identifier is a unique identifier to identify a resource located on the web.
 URI identifies a resource (hardware or software) either by its location or by its name or by both.
 URL is a subset of URI and only identifies the location of the resource.

URL
 The uniform resource locator (URL) is the unique identifier of a web page.
 It appears in the "Address Bar" of the web browser.
 The most general form of a URL syntax is as follows:
Protocol://domain name/<directory path>/<object name>

 Protocol- It specifies the type of protocol to be followed by the server. Some commonly used
protocols are http, https, ftp etc.
 Domain name- It specifies the name of the web server on the Internet. Eg:- .com, .mil,.edu
 Directory Path- It specifies the location of file/ web page on the server.
 Object name – It specifies the name of the specific web page like index.html
 The complete unique address of the page on a website is called URL (Uniform Resource Locator)
e.g. http://www.cbse.nic.in/welcome.html

Types of URL-
1. Absolute URL - (Complete URL)
• These are the URL that contain complete location information. It begins with a protocol lie http://
and continues including every detail.
• Syntax- protocol://domain/path
2. Relative URL- (Partial URL)
• The relative URL, does not use the full web address and only contains the location after the
domain.

Domain name
 Domain Names are used in URLs to identify particular Web servers.
 It is difficult to remember the IP addresses of all the computers you wish to communicate with.
 Therefore a system has been developed which assigns names to some computers(web servers)
and maintains a database of these names and the corresponding IP addresses. These names are
domain names.
 Domain name is the name assigned to a server through Domain Name System.
 A domain name usually has more than one parts:
✓ top level domain name or primary domain name
✓ sub-domain name(s).
 For example, in the domain name cbse.nic.in,
in is the primary domain name; nic is the sub-domain of in; cbse is the sub-domain of nic.
Top level or Primary Domain are classified into :
 Generic Domains like .com, .org, .edu, .net, .gov and
 Country Domain like .in, .ca, .jp, .nz, .us etc.
Generic Domain Names -
.com – Commercial business .edu – Educational institutions
.gov – Government agencies .mil – Military organizations
.org – organizations (non profit)
Country Specific Domain Names
.in – India .ae – UAE .au – Australia .nz –New Zealand
.pk – Pakistan .jp – Japan .us – United States of America
Domain name resolution
 It is the process of getting the corresponding IP address from a domain name.
 Since computers on the network are identified by its IP addresses, so it is required to convert a
Domain name or URL typed in the Browser, into its corresponding IP address.
 This process is called Domain Name Resolution.
 This resolution is done by the designated servers called DNS servers, provided by the Internet
Service Providers.

Applications of internet
Following are some of the broad areas or services provided through Internet:
❑ The World Wide Web (WWW)
❑ Electronic mail (Email)
❑ Chat
❑ Voice Over Internet Protocol (VoIP)

www
• The World Wide Web—commonly referred to as WWW, W3, or the Web—is an interconnected
system of public webpages accessible through the Internet.
• The Web is not the same as the Internet.
• The internet is a huge network of computers all connected together. www is a collection of
webpages found on this network of computers.
• Your web browser uses the internet to access the web.

Email-
Email is the short form of electronic mail.
It is one of the ways of sending and receiving message(s) using the Internet.
It is generally sent from and received by mail servers [computers that are dedicated to processing
and directing email ].
Once a server has received a message, it directs it to the specific computer that the mail is
addressed to.
Email uses multiple protocols within the TCP/IP suite.
For example, SMTP is used to send messages, while the POP or IMAP protocols are used to
retrieve messages from a mail server.

Common facilities available for an email user:

❖ Creating an email, attaching files with an email, saving an email as draft for mailing later. Creating
email is also termed as composing.
❖ Sending and receiving mail. Same email can be sent to multiple email addresses, simultaneously.
❖ Sending the copy of mail, as carbon copy (cc) or blind carbon copy (bcc).
❖ Forwarding a received email to other user(s)
❖ Filtering spam emails
❖ Organising email in folders and sub folders
❖ Creating and managing email ids of the people you know.
❖ Setting signature/footer to be inserted automatically at the end of each email
❖ Printing emails using a printer or saving as files.
❖ Searching emails using email address or email subject text

Advantages of E-mail:
• No use of stationery.
• It is cheap and free of cost and is fast.
• Immediate feedback.
• Records of mails maintained.
• Can send attachments and has multimedia support.
Limitations of E-mail:
• Internet facility should be there at both sender and receiver end.
 • Text message format might get altered by the operating system used.
• E-mail Virus attack through attachments.
• Hard to convey emotions.

Email address
• E-mail is generally of the form username@domainname.
• The username and the domain name are separated by @ symbol.
• E-mail message comprises of different components: E-mail Header, Greeting, Text, and Signature.
• The username is the name you choose to identify yourself.
• The email provider is the website that hosts your email account.
• Many people also have an email address hosted by their company, school, or organization. These
email addresses are usually for professional purpose.

Spam vs. Junk Mail

✓ Both spam and junk mail represent messages that clutter the user's inbox.
✓ Spam is defined as irrelevant or inappropriate messages sent to a large number of people.
✓ Junk mail has been defined as unwanted advertising or promotional material received through
mail or email.

Chat
• Chatting or Instant Messaging (IM) over the Internet means communicating to people at different
geographic locations in real time through text message(s).
• Chat often occurs in a virtual chat room, which can include many different people who may or may
not know each other. Many chat rooms focus on a particular topic or interest.
• There are numerous chat and IM programs you can download, including Hangouts, Skype etc.
• In addition, there are many browser-based services that don't require downloading. For
example, Facebook and Gmail allow you to chat with your contacts whenever you're signed in.
• For a successful chat session, the communicating parties should be online simultaneously, and use
the same chat application.
• Applications such as WhatsApp, Slack, Skype, Yahoo Messenger, Google Talk, Facebook
Messenger, Google Hangout, etc., are examples of instant messengers.
• Some of these applications support instant messaging through all the modes — text, audio and
video.

SMS & MMS-

 Short Message Service or SMS is small text which can be sent to any mobile phone.
 Generally, this service is used by individuals or any organization to send Bulk-Message to
promote a product, advertisement or greeting messages.
 Some service providers also allows Multimedia Messages (MMS) which may contains pictures or
small video along with text.

Video Conferencing
 Video conferencing is a technology that allows users in different locations to hold face-to-face
meetings without having to move to a single location together.
 It is convenient for business users in different cities or even different countries because it saves
time, expenses, associated with business travel.
 Video conferencing can be used to connect a traditional classroom with students who are taking
the class remotely.

VoIP
✓ It stands for Voice over Internet Protocol.
✓ It allows us to have voice call (telephone service) over the Internet, i.e., the voice transmission
over a computer network rather than through the regular telephone network.
✓ It is also known as Internet Telephony or Broadband Telephony.
✓ It is a method of transmitting the human voice over Internet protocol (IP) networks.
✓ Skype uses VoIP to let you make phone calls, video calls, group calls, and more over the
Internet instead of using traditional phone lines.
✓ Eg:- Skype, Hangout, FB Video Calling, Apple FaceTime
Advantages of a VoIP—
 These services are either free or very economical, so people use them to save on cost.
 VoIP call(s) can be received and made using IP phones from any place having Internet access.
Disadvantage-
 Call quality is dependent on Internet connection speed.
 Slow Internet connection will lead to poor quality voice calls.

website
✓ A website (usually referred to as a site in short) is a collection of web pages related through
hyperlinks, and saved on a web server.
✓ A visitor navigates from one page to another by clicking on hyperlinks.
✓ Also, all the pages of a website are integrated under one domain name and have a common
theme and template.
✓ To access a website, one has to type the address of the website (URL) in the address bar of a
browser, and press enter.

Some of the common purposes for which websites are designed are listed below:
 Selling products and delivering services
 Posting and finding information on the internet
 Communicating with each other
 Entertainment purposes
 Distributing contents and software

webpage
 Web page is an electronic document designed using HTML.
 It displays information in textual or graphical form.
 It may also contain downloadable data files, audio files or video files.
 Traversal from one webpage to another web page is possible through hyperlinks.
 Basic structure of a web page is created using HTML and CSS (Cascaded Style Sheet).
 Program codes called scripts are used to define the manner in which the page will behave on
different actions.
 Scripts make a web page interactive. JavaScript is the most popular and commonly used scripting
language. However, Python and PHP are also used to apply scripting on a web page.
 The first page of the website is called a home page.
 It generally contains information and links to all the related web pages.
 Each web page has a unique address that is visible on the address bar.
 2 types of web pages- static and dynamic

Static vs dynamic webpage

Static web page:
▪ A web page which displays same kind of information whenever a user visits it, is known as a static
web page.
▪ It generally has .htm or .html as extension.
▪ When a web server receives a request (from browser) for a static web page, it just locates the
page on its storage media and sends it to the browser of the client.
▪ No additional processing is performed on the page.
▪ Hence, a static web page remains the same for all users until someone changes its code manually.

Dynamic web page:

▪ An interactive web page is a dynamic webpage.
▪ It uses scripting languages to display changing content on the web page.
▪ It generally has php, .asp," or .jsp as extension.
▪ When a request for a dynamic web page is made to the web server, it does not simply retrieve the
page and send.
▪ Before sending the requested web page, the server may perform some additional processes like
getting information from the database, updating date and time, weather information, etc.
▪ The content of such pages changes frequently.
▪ They are more complex and thus take more time to load than static web pages.

Web server
▪ A web server is used to store and deliver the contents of a website to clients such as a browser
that request it.
▪ A web server can be software or hardware.
▪ As computer hardware, it stores web server software and a website’s contents.
▪ As a software, it is a specialised program that understands URLs or web addresses coming as
requests from browsers, and responds to those requests.
▪ The web browser from the client computer sends a request (HTTP request) for a page containing
the desired data or service. The web server then accepts, interprets, searches and responds (HTTP
response) to the request.
▪ The requested web page is then displayed in the browser of the client.
▪ If the server is not able to locate the page, it sends a page containing the error message (Error
404 – page not found) to the client’s browser.

Web hosting
• Web hosting is a service that allows us to put a website or a web page onto the Internet, and
make it a part of the World Wide Web.
• Once a website is created using a hardware server, we need to connect it to the Internet so that
users across the globe can access.
• A web server whether it is a local server or a cloud server when connected to the Internet is
assigned a unique numeric address on the Internet called IP address.
• This IP address needs to be mapped to a textual name called domain name of the website.
• This is because it is not convenient for users to remember a numeric IP address. Thus, for
accessing a website, the user enters the domain through a browser (URL). The domain name has
to be registered (purchased) with an authorised agency.

How to host a website?

Steps to follow-
o Select the web hosting service provider that will provide the web server space as well as related
technologies and services such as database, bandwidth, data backup, firewall support, email
service, etc.
o Identify a domain name, which best suits our requirement, and get it registered through domain
name Registrar.
o Once we get web space, create logins with appropriate rights and note down IP address to
manage web space.
o Upload the files in properly organised folders on the allocated space.
o Get domain name mapped to the IP address of the web server.

Web browser
• Web browser is software program for accessing the World Wide Web.
• When a user requests a web page from a particular website, the web browser retrieves the
necessary content from a web server and then displays the page on the user's device.
• Mosaic was the first web browser developed by the National Centre for Supercomputing
Application (NCSA).
• The initial web browsers like Mosaic used to support HTML documents containing plain text (static
website) only, but nowadays with the advancement of technology, modern web browsers allow us
to view interactive and dynamic websites.
• In addition to this, most modern browsers allow a wide range of visual effects, use encryption for
advanced security and also have cookies that can store the browser settings and data.

Commonly used browsers

Internet Explorer –
• Internet Explorer (IE) is a product from software giant Microsoft. This is the most commonly used
browser in the universe. This was introduced in 1995.
Google Chrome
• Developed by Google and its beta version was first released on September 2, 2008 for Microsoft
Windows. Today, chrome is known to be one of the most popular web browser with its global
share of more than 50%.
Mozilla Firefox
• Firefox is a browser derived from Mozilla. It was released in 2004 and has grown to be the
second most popular browser on the Internet.
Safari
• Safari is a web browser developed by Apple Inc. and included in Mac OS X. It was first released as
a public beta in January 2003.
Opera
• Opera is smaller and faster than most other browsers, yet it is full- featured. Fast, user-friendly,
multiple windows, zoom functions, and more.

Browser settings
• Each browser application allows us to change or customize its settings in a user friendly manner.
• It has settings you can change, including privacy settings, search engine preferences, autofill and
autocomplete behavior, and more.
• Open Mozilla Firefox, and on the top right corner of the browser window, click the Menu button.
• From the drop down button, select Options.
• The preferences and Options window will be displayed in the browser.
• Panels to choose on left side- General, Home, Search, Privacy and Security and Sync.
• General Panel: • setting default browser, • language & appearance of text, • downloading files
and applications, • firefox update settings, • browsing & network settings
• Home Panel: • set the home page of the browser, browser window and tab settings.
• Search Panel: options to edit the settings of the search engine used by Firefox.
• Privacy and Security Panel: options to secure the browser and data. It includes
• enhanced tracking protection , • forms and passwords, • history and address bar,
• cookies and site data , • permission to view pop ups windows and install addons
• Sync Panel: options to set up and manage a Firefox account which is needed to access all services
given by Mozilla.
Make the desired settings and close the browser settings window.

Add-ons or extensions
▪ An add-on is any small third-party software program or script that is added to a program to give
it additional features and abilities.
▪ These are usually not full software but are simply pieces of code that you can use to modify the
interface.
▪ An add-on is also referred to as extension in some browsers.
▪ These extensions help you get around the web faster, add extra security for your online travels,
change the look of your browser and much more.
▪ Google dictionary is an addon to firefox that extends the functionality of the browser to be able to
find meanings for a word within a webpage.
▪ Adding the functionality of a sound and graphics card is an example of an add-on.
▪ Add-ons are often created by people or organizations not affiliated with the original developer
and installed using a program option or through a third-party website.
With Google Chrome:
On your computer, open Chrome.
At the top right, click More > More tools > Extensions.
On to the extension you want to remove, click Remove.
Confirm by clicking Remove.
Note:
You shouldn’t overload your browser with extensions. You should try to limit the number of
extensions you use. It makes the browser slower. Try to only install ones you’ll actually use — if
you don’t use an extension, uninstall it from your browser to reduce clutter and speed things up.
Just like any other piece of software , we need to be careful with add-ons too. They’re running in
your browser, so a bad extension could use its access to snoop on your browsing, possibly
capturing your credit card numbers and passwords.

Plug-ins
 A plug-in is a software that manages Internet content that a browser is not designed to process.
 Plug-in is a complete program but add-on is not a full program.
 For example, if you wanted to watch a video on a website, you may need a plugin to do so. If the
plugin is not installed, your browser will not understand how to play the video.
 Examples of Plug-ins -
✓ Adobe Acrobat Reader for displaying *.pdf files
✓ Adobe Flash Video for streaming videos in flv format
✓ Apple QuickTime Player for streaming videos in qt-format
✓ Winamp for streaming MPEG3 sound files
✓ Windows Media Player - Firefox Plug-in, Chrome Plug-in, Opera Plug-in, Safari Plug-in for
streaming WMV and WMA files

Cookies
• A cookie (also known as a web cookie, browser cookie, and HTTP cookie) is a small bit of text or a
file that accompanies requests and pages as they go between the web server and browser.
• The purpose of the cookie is to help the website keep track of your visits and activity.
• Though cookies are meant for storing data based on your activity performed during your earlier
visit such as logon details, details of a shopping cart, visited pages in a website, etc. they could
also be tracked by unauthorized users and possibly gain access to your personal information.
• As text, cookies are not executable. Since they are not executed, they cannot replicate themselves
and not harm the computer directly. However, due to the fact that the browser reads and sends
cookies to the web server, they can be used as spyware.
• Today, most of the browsers ask users whether to accept cookies or not, but rejecting cookies
makes some websites unusable.