Data communication and

Computer Networks

Chapter Two
Network Line Configuration
 Overviews of line configuration
Line configuration refers to the way two or more
communication devices attached to a link. Line
configuration is also referred to as connection.
A Link is the physical communication pathway that
transfers data from one device to another.
For communication to occur, two devices must be
connected in same way to the same link at the same time.
There are two possible line configurations.
1. Point-to-Point.
2. Multipoint.

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 Point-to-Point
A Point to Point Line Configuration Provide dedicated link between
two devices use actual length of wire or cable to connect the two
end including microwave & satellite link. Infrared remote control &
TVs remote control.
The entire capacity of the channel is reserved for transmission
between those two devices. Point to point network topology is
considered to be one of the easiest and most conventional network
topologies.

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 Multipoint Configuration
MC also known as Multi-drop line configuration one or more than two
specific devices share a single link capacity of the channel is shared.
Multiple devices share the Link that is the capacity of the channel is
shared now. There can be two possibilities in a Multipoint Line Config:
Spatial Sharing: If several devices can share the link simultaneously, its
called Spatially shared line configuration
• Temporal (Time) Sharing: it involves sharing a single resource among
multiple users or tasks by rapidly switching between them in time.

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 Network by Geographical Coverage
• Depending on their function, size, ownership or
geographical coverage, networks are categorized
as:-
– Local Area Networks (LAN)
– Metropolitan Area Network (MAN)
– Wide Area Network (WAN)
– Personal Area Network (PAN)

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 LAN
• A LAN is a communications network that interconnects a variety of
devices and provides a means for information exchange & resource
sharing among those devices
– The scope of a LAN is small:- it connects some hosts in a single office,
building, or campus
– LANs often use Ethernet or Wi-Fi technologies for connectivity.
– Usually the LAN is privately owned network
– The data rates of LANs are typically much greater than WANs
• LAN configuration can be:
– Switched LAN:- Ethernet
– Wireless LAN

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 Wide Area Networks (WAN)
• An interconnection of devices capable of communication, however,
– It has a wider geographical span, spanning a town, a state, a country, or even
the world.
• A WAN is normally created and run by communication companies and
leased by an organization that uses it.
• WANs are implemented using different technologies, such as:
– Circuit switching
– Packet switching
– ATM, Frame relay
• The network contains numerous cables or telephone lines, each one
connecting a pair of routers (switching elements)

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 MAN
• It interconnects users with computer resources in a geographic
area or region larger than that covered by a LAN but smaller
than the area covered by a WAN
– i.e. MANs provide a middle ground between LANs and WANs,
typically spanning a city/metro area with higher speed
connections.
• It is also used to interconnect several LANs
• Might be either private or public network

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 Network Devices
• Hosts and networks do not normally operate in isolation.
Instead, we use connecting devices
– To connect hosts together to make a network or
– To connect networks together to make an internet
• Connecting devices operate in different layers of the Internet
model.
• LAN’s are connected to the Backbone Network by using some
types of devices such as Hubs, Repeaters, Switches, Bridges,
Routers and Gateways
– Backbone Network:- is a means of connecting 2 LAN’s. It provides a
transmission channel for packets from being transmitted from one
LAN to the other.
The Network Interface Card (NIC)
The network interface card (NIC) is the expansion
card you install in your computer to connect
(interface)
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your computer to the network
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 Hubs
• It operates in the physical layer of the OSI model
• It is non-intelligent device, and has no decision making
capability
• It takes the input data from one of the ports and broadcast
the information to all the other ports connected to the
network
– It does not know upper layer addresses (e.g. MAC address)
of the ports connected to the network
Lack of security

Most hubs are simple

multiport repeaters.

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 Hub-example
• If Computer A wants to send some data to Computer B
using a Hub, then, Computer A broadcasts the data on the
network, and Computer B, being connected to the
network, has access to the data. But, in this case all the
other ports connected to the network has access to the
data that is being transmitted by Computer A

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 Types of HUB
Active Hub: – These are the hubs that have their own power
supply and can clean, boost, and relay the signal along with the
network. It serves both as a repeater as well as a wiring center.
These are used to extend the maximum distance between nodes.
Passive Hub:- These are the hubs that collect wiring from nodes
and power supply from the active hub.
These hubs relay signals onto the network without cleaning and
boosting them and can‘t be used to extend the distance between
nodes.
Intelligent Hub:-Works like active hubs and includes remote
management capabilities. They also provide flexible data rates to
network devices. It also enables an administrator to monitor the
traffic passing through the hub and to configure each port in the
hub.
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 Repeater
• A repeater is a device similar to the Hub, but has additional
features. It also works in the Physical layer.
• The repeaters are used in places where amplification of input
signal is necessary
– But, the kind of amplification done by the repeater is different
from the regular amplification by amplifiers
• The regular amplifier amplifies everything fed into it,
including noise
• A repeater, however, regenerates the input signal, and
amplifies only the desirable signal. Hence, the noise
component of the signal is eliminated

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• The repeaters are necessary in that during transmission of
signals over long distances, the signal will get attenuated,
delay distorted and encounter noise which lead in loss of
data.
– Hence, in order to prevent this, the regenerative repeaters are
used

• One common problem between repeaters and Hubs is that only one
transmission can take place on the network at a particular time.
• If multiple devices transmit data simultaneously, there will be collision
of data
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 Switch
• A switch is an intelligent device that works in the data link layer. The term
intelligent refers to the decision making capability.
• Since it works in the data link layer, it has knowledge of the Media Access
Control (MAC) addresses of the ports in the network.
• The switch can perform error checking before forwarding data,
which makes it very efficient as it does not forward
packets that have errors and forward good packets selectively to
the correct port only.
• In other words, the switch divides the collision domain of hosts,
but broadcast domain remains the same.

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 Cont…
• A switch can work at either the Data Link layer
or the Network layer of the OSI model.
• A multilayer switch is one that can operate at both layers,
which means that it can operate as both a switch and a
router.
• A multilayer switch is a high performance device that
supports the same routing protocols as routers.
• Switches can be subject to distributed denial of service
(DDoS) attacks; flood guards are used to prevent malicious
traffic from bringing the switch to a halt.
• Disable all unused ports and use DHCP snooping, ARP
inspection and MAC address filtering.
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• If data has to be sent from Computer A to Computer B, then, the
data is transferred to the Computer B only, and not to any other
computers connected on the network. Hence, it establishes a link
between the sender and the receiver based on the MAC addresses.

• Simultaneous data transfer is possible in a switch.

• It is also to be noted that a switch is a secure device
 Because it sends information only to the desired destinations, and also
certain security features such as firewalls can be implemented in the
Switches.

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 Router
• Any computer can be connected to the internet via
MODEM, which performs the MODulation and the
DEModulation operations
• But, when there are more than one computer at home or in
an organization, and you have a single internet connection,
you need a Router.
– Router is a device which is used when multiple devices need to
connect to the Internet using the same Internet Protocol (IP)
address
• Hence, the router does the job of connecting multiple
devices in a LAN to the Internet using the same IP
address.
– Since the router works in the Network Layer, it does forwarding
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 Gateway
• The Gateway devices work in the Transport layer and above,
where different network technologies are implemented
• Gateways provide translation between networking
technologies such as Open System Interconnection (OSI)
and Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol
(TCP/IP).
• Because of this, gateways connect two or more
autonomous networks, each with its own routing
algorithms, protocols, topology, domain name service, and
network administration procedures and policies.
E.g. to interconnect a Telephone network (which uses ISDN network
technology) and internet network (that is implemented using IP)

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 Collision and Broadcast Domains
• Collision
– A collision is the result of two devices on the same
Ethernet network (shared network segment) attempting to
transmit data at exactly the same time.
• A collision domain is a part of the network where packet
collisions can occur.
– Each port in a Hub is in the same collision
domain
– But, each port on a bridge, switch, or
router is in a separate collision domain.

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• Collision domain example

• We see, the above figure has 6 collision domains

– Each port on the hub is on the same collision domain
– Three collision domains on the switch
– And three collision domains on the router
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• Broadcast Domain
– This is a domain in which a broadcast is forwarded.
– A broadcast domain contains all devices that can reach
each other at the data link layer (OSI layer 2) by using
broadcast.
– All ports on a hub or a switch are by default in the same
broadcast domain.
– All ports on a router are in different broadcast domains and
routers don’t forward broadcasts from one broadcast
domain to another.

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• Broadcast domain example

• In the picture above we have three broadcast domains, since

• All ports on a hub or a switch are in the same broadcast
domain, and
• All ports on a router are in a different broadcast domain
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 Network Topologies
• Topology of a network is the geometric representation of
the relationship of all the links and linking devices (usually
called nodes) to one another
• When two or more devices are connected, they form a
topology
• Two kinds of network topologies
– Physical
– Logical
• Physical topology: refers to the way in which a network is
laid out physically (physical structure of the network)
• Logical topology: arrangement of devices on a
computer network and how they communicate with one
another
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 The four basic Topologies
• Bus, Ring, Star and Mesh
• Bus Topology
– It has one long cable that acts as a backbone to link all the
devices with nodes of the network
– The devices are connected to the bus cable by drop lines
and taps

Drop line

Tap

Terminator
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• Advantages of bus topology
– Little cabling
– Easy to install
• Disadvantages
– Difficult to modify (reconnect)
– Difficult to isolate fault
– If a bus cable is broken anywhere along the line,
all transmission will be stopped

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Ring Topology
• Each device has a dedicated point-to-point connection with
only the two devices on either side of it
• A signal is passed along the ring in one direction from device
to device until it reaches to its destination
• Each device in the ring incorporates a repeater
– i.e. when a device receives a signal intended for another device,
it regenerates the bits and passes them to the next node
• To add or delete a device, we only need to change two
connections from either side of the device.

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 Adv. & Dis.
• Pros:
– Easy to install
– Easy to identify faults
• Cons:
– Delay in large ring
– Break in the ring stops all transmission

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Star Topology
• Each device has a dedicated point-to-point link only to a central
controller (called a Hub)
– i.e. the devices are not directly connected to one another
– Instead, if one device wants to send data to another, it sends the data
to the hub, which then transfers the data to the other connected
device.
• Each device needs only one link and input/output port to connect it
to any number of other devices

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 Adv. & Dis.
• Pros:
– One I/O port per device
– Little cabling (*relatively)
– Easy to install and reconfigure
– Robustness
– Easy to identify & isolate faults
• Cons:
– Single point of failure
– More cabling still required
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Mesh Topology
• In this topology, every device has a dedicated point-to-point
link to every other device
– i.e. the link carries traffic only between the two devices it
connects
• In mesh topology, our main concern is the number of possible
links that can be created in the network
– Consider for n number of nodes in a network, each node must be
connected to every other node, as shown below
N2

N1 N3

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• Node N1 must be connected to n – 1 other nodes, node N2 must be
connected to n – 1 other nodes, and finally node N must be connected
to n – 1 other nodes
– Thus, for the n nodes to be connected to n-1 other nodes, we need 
n*(n-1) total links
– However, if the links are bidirectional (duplex mode), the required
number of physical links become  n*(n-1)/2
– This also requires that, all the devices in the network should have (n-1)
input/output ports
• E.g. for n = 5, the total number of links = 5*(5-1) = 20 unidirectional
links OR 5*(5-1)/2 = 10 bidirectional links.

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 Adv. & Dis.
• Pros:
– Dedicated links
– Robustness
– Privacy
– Easy to identify fault
• Cons:
– A lot of cabling
– Lots of I/O ports
– More complexity
– Expensive
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 How many Broadcast and Collision
Domain????

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