Telecommunications Demystified

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Chapter 1

Introducing Telecommunications

I can still recall sitting in my first class on telecommunications as an undergrad—the teacher going off into a world of technical detail and I in my chair wondering, "What is this stuff called communications and telecommunications?" So, first, some simple definitions and examples—the big picture.

1.1 Communication Systems

1.1.1 Definition

A communication system is, simply, any system in which information is transmitted from one physical location—let’s call it A—to a second physical location, which we’ll call B. I’ve shown this in Figure 1.1. A simple example of a communication system is one person talking to another person at lunch. Another simple example is one person talking to a second person over the telephone.

Figure 1.1 A communication system

1.1.2 The Parts of a Communication System

Any communication system is made up of three parts, shown in Figure 1.2. First is the transmitter, the part of the communication system that sits at point A. It includes two items: the source of the information, and the technology that sends the information out over the channel. Next is the channel. The channel is the medium (the stuff) that the information travels through in going from point A to point B. An example of a channel is copper wire, or the atmosphere. Finally, there’s the receiver, the part of the communication system that sits at point B and gets all the information that the transmitter sends over the channel.

Figure 1.2 Parts of a communication system

We’ll spend the rest of this book talking about these three parts and how they work.

1.1.3 An Example of a Communication System

Now, let’s run through a simple but very important example of a communication system. We’ll consider the example of Gretchen talking to Carl about where to go for lunch, as shown in Figure 1.3.

Figure 1.3 Gretchen talking to Carl at lunch

The Transmitter

The transmitter, in this case, is made up of parts of Gretchen, namely her vocal cords, windpipe, and mouth. When Gretchen wants to talk, her brain tells her vocal cords (found in her windpipe) to vibrate at between 100 Hz and 10,000 Hz, depending on the sound she’s trying to make. (Isn’t it cool that, every time you talk, a part of you is shaking at between 100 and 10,000 times per second?) Once Gretchen’s vocal cords begin to vibrate, here are the three things that happen next:

(1) the vibrations of her vocal cords cause vibrations in the air in her windpipe;

(2) these vibrations in the air move up her windpipe to her mouth; and

(3) as the vibrating air moves out through Gretchen’s mouth, the shape of her mouth and lips, and the position of her tongue, work together to create the intended sound.

The Channel

In our example, the channel is simply the air between Gretchen and Carl. The shaped vibrations that leave Gretchen’s mouth cause vibrations in the air, and these vibrations move through the air from Gretchen to Carl.

The Receiver

The receiver in this case is Carl’s eardrum and brain. The vibrations in the air hit Carl’s eardrum, causing it to vibrate in the same way. Carl’s shaking eardrum sends electrical signals to his brain, which interprets the shaking as spoken sound.

The human eardrum can actually pick up vibrations between 50 Hz and 16,500 Hz, allowing us to hear sounds beyond the range of what we can speak, including a variety of musical sounds.

1.2 Telecommunication Systems

1.2.1 Definition

A telecommunication system is two things: (1) a communication system-that is, a system in which information is transmitted from one physical location, A, to a second physical location, B; and (2) a system which allows this information to be sent beyond the range of usual vocal or visual communications. Gretchen and Carl’s lunchtime chat would not qualify as a telecommunication system, but the telephone system which they used later for an afternoon talk does qualify.

1.2.2 Four Examples and an Erratic History Lesson

Here are four examples of telecommunication systems, ordered chronologically to create what we’ll optimistically call a brief history of telecommunications.

Smoking Up In the B.C.’s, smoke signals were sent out using fire and some smoke signal equipment (such as a blanket). The smoke, carried upward by the air, was seen by people far (but not too far) away, who then interpreted this smoke to have some meaning. It is said that a fellow named Polybius (a Greek historian) came up with a system of alphabetical smoke signals in the 100s B.C., but there are no known recorded codes.

Wild Horses Until the 1850s in the U.S., the fastest way to send a message from one’s home to someone else’s home was by Pony Express. Here, you wrote what you wanted to say (the transmitter), gave the writing to a Pony Express man, who then hopped on his horse and rode to the destination (the channel), where the message would be read by the intended person (the receiver).

Telegraph In 1844, a fellow named Samuel Morse built a device he called the telegraph, the beginning of the end of the Pony Express. The transmitter consisted of a person and a sending key, which when pressed by the person, created a flow of electricity. This key had three states: Off which meant the key was not pressed; Dot, which meant the key was pressed for a short time and then released; and Dash, which meant the key was pressed for a longer time and then released. Each letter of the alphabet was represented by a particular sequence of dots and dashes. To keep the time to send a message short, the most commonly used letters in the alphabet were represented by the fewest possible dots or dashes; for example, the commonly used t was represented by a single dash, and the much-loved e was represented by a single dot. This system of representing letters is the well-known Morse code. The channel was an iron wire. The electricity created by the person and the sending key (the transmitter) was sent along this wire to the receiver, which consisted of an audio-speaker and a person. When the electricity entered the audio-speaker from the iron wire, it made a beeping sound. A Dot sounded like a short beep, and a Dash sounded like a longer beep. The person, upon hearing these beeps, would then decode the letters that had been sent. The overall system could send about two letters a second, or 120 letters a minute. The first words sent over the telegraph, by inventor Morse himself, were What has God wrought!" (I have since wondered what Morse, who basically invented a simple dot-dash sending system, would have said about, oh, say, a nuclear bomb.)

The Telephone The telephone was invented in 1876 by Alexander Graham Bell, whose first words on the phone were, Mr. Watson, come at once, I need you. Alex had just spilled battery acid down his pants and, as you can imagine, was in quite urgent need of his assistant’s help. Figure 1.4 shows an illustration of two people, who we’ll call Carl and Monica, using the telephone. What follows is a wordy description of how the telephone works. Refer to Figure 1.4 to help you with the terms.

Figure 1.4 Monica and Carl talking on a telephone

The transmitter consists of Monica (who is talking) and the transmitting (bottom) end of the telephone. Monica speaks, and her vocal cords vibrate. This causes vibrations in the air, which travel through and out her mouth, and then travel to the bottom end of the telephone. Inside the bottom end of the telephone is a diaphragm. When the vibrations of the air arrive at this diaphragm, it, like an eardrum, begins to vibrate. Directly behind the diaphragm are a bunch of carbon granules. These granules are part of an electrical circuit, which consists of a 4-V source, copper wire, and the carbon granules. The carbon granules act as a resistor (with variable resistance) in the circuit. When the diaphragm is pushed back by the vibrating air, it causes the carbon granules (right behind it) to mush together. In this case, the granules act like a low-resistance resistor in the circuit. Hence, the current flowing though the electric circuit is high (using the well-known V = R · I rule). When the diaphragm is popped out by the vibrating air, it causes the carbon granules (right behind it) to separate out. In this case, those carbon granules are acting like a high-resistance resistor in the electrical circuit. Hence, the current flowing though the circuit is low. Overall, vibrations in the diaphragm (its pushing back and popping out) cause the same vibrations (frequencies) to appear in the current of the electrical circuit (via those carbon granules).

The channel is a copper wire. The vibrating current generated by the transmitter is carried along this wire to the receiver.

The receiver consists of two parts: the receiving (top) part of the telephone, and Carl’s ear. The current, sent along the copper wire, arrives at the top end of the telephone. Inside this top end is a device called an electromagnet and right next to that is a diaphragm. The current, containing all of Monica’s talking frequencies, enters into the electromagnet. This electromagnet causes the diaphragm to vibrate with all of Monica’s talking frequencies. The vibrating diaphragm causes vibrations in the air, and these vibrations travel to Carl’s ear. His eardrum vibrates, and these vibrations cause electrical signals to be sent to his brain, which interprets this as Monica’s sound.

1.3 Analog and Digital Communication Systems

The last part of this chapter is dedicated to explaining what is meant by analog and digital communication systems, and then explaining why digital communication systems are the way of the future.

1.3.1 Some Introductory Definitions

An analog signal is a signal that can take on any amplitude and is well-defined at every time. Figure 1.5(a) shows an example of this. A discrete-time signal is a signal that can take on any amplitude but is defined only at a set of discrete times. Figure 1.5(b) shows an example. Finally, a digital signal is a signal whose amplitude can take on only a finite set of values, normally two, and is defined only at a discrete set of times. To help clarify, an example is shown in Figure 1.5(c).

Figure 1.5 (a) An analog signal; (b) a discrete time signal; and (c) a digital signal

1.3.2 Definitions

An analog communication system is a communication system where the information signal sent from point A to point B can only be described as an analog signal. An example of this is Monica speaking to Carl over the telephone, as described in Section 1.2.2.

A digital communication system is a communication system where the information signal sent from A to B can be fully described as a digital signal. For example, consider Figure 1.6. Here, data is sent from one computer to another over a wire. The computer at point A is sending 0s or 1s to the computer at point B; a 0 is being represented by −5 V for a duration of time T and a 1 is being represented by a +5 V for the same duration T. As I show in that figure, that sent signal can be fully described using a digital signal.

Figure 1.6 A computer sending information to another computer

1.3.3 And Digital Became the Favorite

Digital communication systems are becoming, and in many ways have already become, the communication system of choice among us telecommunication folks. Certainly, one of the reasons for this is the rapid availability and low cost of digital components. But this reason is far from the full story. To explain the full benefits of a digital communication system, we’ll use Figures 1.7 and 1.8 to help.

Figure 1.7 (a) Transmitted analog signal; (b) Received analog signal

Figure 1.8 (a) Transmitted digital signal; (b) Received digital signal

Let’s first consider an analog communication system, using Figure 1.7. Let’s pretend the transmitter sends out the analog signal of Figure 1.7(a) from point A to point B. This signal travels across the channel, which adds some noise (an unwanted signal). The signal that arrives at the receiver now looks like Figure 1.7(b). Let’s now consider a digital communication system with the help of Figure 1.8. Let’s imagine that the transmitter sends out the signal of Figure 1.8(a). This signal travels across the channel, which adds a noise. The signal that arrives at the receiver is found in Figure 1.8 (b).

Here’s the key idea. In the digital communication system, even after noise is added, a 1 (sent as +5 V) still looks like a 1 (+5 V), and a 0 (−5 V) still looks like a 0 (−5 V). So, the receiver can determine that the information transmitted was a 1 0 1. Since it can decide this, it’s as if the channel added no noise. In the analog communication system, the receiver is stuck with the noisy signal and there is no way it can recover exactly what was sent. (If you can think of a way, please do let me know.) So, in a digital communication system, the effects of channel noise can be much, much less than in an analog communication