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A network has been defined as an interconnection of different computing components such as servers, workstations, network devices, printers among others for the purposes of sharing data and communication. For a network to fully operate, the should be physical and logical connection (Comer, 2015). The former is achieved by use of network protocols such as Transmission Control Protocol while the latter is established by use of transmission media such as Ethernet cable (Irving, 2010). This report will seek to described the different networking principles and their protocols. The first section will discuss the benefits of different types of networks and standards, the impact of network topology, communication, and bandwidth, and compare the different network principles and how protocols facilitate effectiveness of networking systems. The second section will discuss the operating principles of networking devices and server types, the inter-dependence of workstation hardware with relevant networking software, and investigate the different types of servers giving recommendations on performance and cost for a selection of various network situation. The third part will describe the network topology in the case study and provide a conclusion of the entire paper.
The basic function of a network is to transfer data from one node to another and share resources such as printers, databases, and servers. A network can be differentiated depending on the range of computer network and the size. The most common types of computer networks include: Wide Area Network (WAN), Metropolitan Area Network (MAN), and Local Area Network (LAN). The subsection will discuss these types in details.
A local area network (LAN) is a type of a network that is used to connect computer systems in one building, office, or a group of buildings that are nearby. The most commonly used standard in a LAN network is Ethernet. This type of network requires additional networking devices such as switches, bridges, and hubs to extend the network. LANs have a transmission rate of between 10 to 1000 Mbps. Lan facilitates easy sharing of information and other network resources conveniently. In a business setup, LAN is used to share applications, printers, and files. If a LAN is interconnected using a wireless technology, the it is referred to as Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) which uses IEEE 802.11 family standards (Kizza, 2017). The diagram below illustrates how a LAN looks like.
Figure 1: Structure of Local Area Network (Kizza, 2017)
A Metropolitan Area Network is a type of computer network that interconnects different LANs within close proximity mostly in a metropolitan area such as a town or a city. High performance fiber-based and high-performance routers are used to interconnect the LAN allowing high data transfer rates than the internet. MAN networks mostly use IEEE 802.16 family standards (Peterson, 2011).
A Wide Area Network (WAN) is a type of computer network that cover a large geographical area by connecting the various MANs and LANs. WAN facilitate communication among the different computer systems and people across the world (Lagkas, Angelidis and Georgiadis, 2010). WAN can be implemented using a private network od a public transmission system. The diagram below illustrates the structure of a WAN.
Figure 2: WAN Structure (Lagkas, Angelidis and Georgiadis, 2010)
There exist different networking standards today. Every network standard has a specific purpose that is outlines by the standard itself (Begen, Bok and Saltsidis, 2017). The is a different standard that allows one to communicate through a telephone line and a different one that allows you to communicate through the internet. Basically, it is the network standards that dictates how we interact on a daily business through the different networking platforms (Begen, Bok and Saltsidis, 2017). There exist different types of network standards such as de facto standards which are developed by network vendors like Cisco, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, the American National Standards Institute (ANSI), and those published by the International Telecommunication Union (Mariotte and Starr, 2018). The most commonly used standards are those from the IEEE 802 family including IEEE 802.11 designed for Wireless Local area network, IEEE 802.5 designed for token ring topology networks, IEEE 802.3 designed for Ethernet Networks, and IEEE802.1 designed for MAN and LAN networks (Begen, Bok and Saltsidis, 2017). These standards are very important because they have been designed to help us in establishing communications.
A network topology can be described as the organization of computer systems on a network. It outlines how the different nodes on a network are organized and how they are connected to one another. Basically, it is the physical connection of the nodes and links on a computer network. There are different network topologies including star topology, ring topology, bus topology, mesh, and tree topology (Soparia and Bhatt, 2014). These topologies are very essential when designing a computer network, because as mentioned earlier it determines how the different nodes on a network communicate. It also determines the performance and the amount of bandwidth that can be transmitted on the network.
Basically, bandwidth requirements are dictated by the needs of the organization. Typically, a smaller network requires less bandwidth as compared to a larger network where traffic is heavy. Bandwidth refers to the amount of data that can be transmitted on a network at a specific time. Basically, high bandwidth is expensive however, it can transmit data faster the low bandwidth network (Rodrigues, 2012). The amount of bandwidth influenced by the types of modems and network cards used as well as the kind of cable used.
This section will compare the different network principles and discuss how the various network protocols enable effectiveness of the different network systems. The different processes running in different systems can only communicate if there is any link between the two systems. There are various network principles but this section will only focus on the common principles. They include the following (Peterson and Davie, 2012):
Switching principles: this principle describes how data is transmitted from one end point to another through a computer network. There are three type of switching including packet switching, message switching, and circuit switching.
Message Passing Principle: this principle differs from the switching principle in that, message passing principle deal with concerns like the type of connection between the receiver and the sender; whether connectionless or connection-oriented, how massages are addresses, and the synchronization between the receiving and the sending activities.
Addressing principle: this principle is sued to determine with whom to communicate either by address, name, content, sources, route, group, or broadcast identifier. Data representation is another principle that determines how data is represented in the different computer systems because different computers run on different CPUs. Many at time, data presentation problems occur because of the size of the pointers, the alignment of data, representation of floating-point numbers, and the order of bytes in a word.
Protocols plays a very significant role in enabling the effectiveness of network systems. There exists different protocol, and just like the network standard each particular protocol plays a specific role in communication and ensuring effectiveness of the computer systems (Lloret, 2009). Data link protocol on layer 2 of the OSI layer is responsible for logical and physical connections to the destination of the packet using the network interface card (NIC) (Lloret, 2009). Transmission control protocol and internet protocol are responsible for routing and directing the packets to the right destination using the shortest route possible. Additionally, other protocols like UDP are responsible for establishing connection between two systems on the network through the ports identified by the IP address and the corresponding port number.
This section will be responsible for discussing the operating principles of the different networking devices and server types.
This section will discuss the operating principle of the different networking devices. We will focus on the most common networking devices such as a switch, router, hub, gateway, modem, and network interface card (Sosinsky, 2009).
Network Interface Card (NIC): networking is not possible without this device. It enables the communication between a device and other networking devices. The function of an NIC card is to convert the packets between two different technologies of data transmission. Basically, it converts serial data into parallel data streams and vice versa (Trivedi, 2013).
Bridge: a bridge is a networking device that us used in large network to divide it into small segments. It connects different types of transmission medium such as a fiber optic with a UTP cable and connected networks with different architectures such as Token ring with Ethernet networks.
Switch: this networking device is used to connect several network components in a network just like a bridge and a hub. However, it has additional functions. The main function of a switch is to make switching decisions in hardware using application specific integrated circuits (ASICs) (Trivedi, 2013). It works just like a hub but the difference is that the switch does not broadcast the data signals, it analyzes the signal identifies the destination address and forwards it only to the target destination node.
Modem: basically, this networking devices is used to connect a network to the internet. It allows digital data to be transported via telecommunication lines. It allows for communication between a telecommunication company and the different computer systems on the network.
Router: a router us used to interconnect two different network segments. When a router receives a packet on its interface, it determines its destination address, and forwards the packet to the destination address from the interface connected to the destination address. The router maintains a record of all the connected network sin order to forward a packet. Typically, a router connects network segments that are different, used to connect different network protocols such as IPX and IP, connect two different transmission media such as fiber optic and UTP, breaks a large network in to smaller networks, connects smaller networks in to one big network, enables access to DSL services, and connects two different network architectures (Trivedi, 2013).
there exist many types of servers in the computing world. This section will attempt to discuss the operating principle of three most common servers. A server is a dedicated computer that is powerful and specialized machine designed to offer dedicated services to other computers (Bannister, 2012). The following are the different types of servers:
File server: a file server is a type of server that is dedicate to allow users to access file records from a file server on a network.
Database server: this is a type of server where a client makes SQL requests to a server and the response is given through the network (Bannister, 2012).
Transaction server: in this type of sever, a client invokes remote procedures that is stored on the server that contains SQL database engine. The server has procedural statements that are used to process a batch of SQL statements (transactions) (Bannister, 2012). (Bannister, 2012)
This section will discuss the inter-dependence of workstation hardware with the relevant software. A hardware is the physical component that we see on a computer including hard drives, memory, processor, monitor, peripheral devices among others. Networking software such as network operating system requires hardware that is compatible with them to operate. As such, the workstation hardware provides a platform for installing the different types of network software (Comer, 2015). The hardware is used to maintain the network software, while the software is used to maintain the network and its resources. In this set up, PRTG monitor will be used to monitor the network hardware and the overall network infrastructure. For instance, if a network administrator wants to check on how the different hardware devices such as router, switch, access points, or servers are working, PRTG software can be used. Also, network operating system is required to control the network hardware components.
The choice of servers depends on the business requirements. Also, the cost of the server is based on its performance. This section will provide a summary of the different types of servers with recommendations based on cost and performance.
|
Proxy server |
Mail server |
Web Servers |
FTP servers |
Application server |
Cost |
£900 |
£1500 |
£2000 |
£800 |
£1099 |
Performance |
Number of CPUs: 2 RAM: at least 8GB |
Number of CPUs: 3 RAM: at least 8GB |
Number of CPUs: 4 RAM: at least 16GB |
Number of CPUs: 2 RAM: at least 8GB |
Number of CPUs: 4 RAM: at least 32GB |
Table 1: Types of Servers (Ezhilchelvan and Mitrani, 2017)
For the above case, a mail server with 3 CPUs and 8GB RAM will be enough to handle the requirements of the company. It can be noted that this is a small network and will only require application and mail servers. For the application server, a 32GB RAM and 4CPUs server is recommended because regardless of the size of the company, some applications may be ‘heavy’ and may consume a lot of run time capacity.
A proxy server is required to manage request from clients who are trying to access resources from other servers. The company will also require a web server to allow the clients to access web pages through hypertext transfer protocol which are then forwarded to the client through a web browser. FTP server is necessary to allow sharing of files and access to common, up-to-date records. It is used to mange file transfer between the server and the clients connected on a network.
The type of network topology in the case study bus topology. In this topology, all the network devices are connected to one backbone cable. The type of cable used varies, but for the above case cat5 ethernet cable can be used. This topology has several advantages including: recommended for small networks, easy for connecting devices in a liner manner, and is cheaper as it requires shorter cables. However, it has a number of setbacks including: it is quite difficult to troubleshoot the network, difficult to troubleshoot specific issues on individual devices, does not work well for larger networks, requires terminators on both ends of the backbone cable, if the backbone cable fails, the entire network is compromised, and is slower. This topology can be substituted with other topologies such as bus topology or tree topology because they offer better performance and are more reliable
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