Unit 4

Types of networks
Below is a list of the most common types of computer networks in order of scale.

Local area network

A local Area Network (LAN) is a computer network covering a small physical area, like
a home, office, or small group of buildings, such as a school, or an airport. Current wired
LANs are most likely to be based on Ethernet technology, although new standards like
ITU-T G.hn also provide a way to create a wired LAN using existing home wires (coaxial
cables, phone lines and power lines)

ADVANTAGES OF LAN
 Files can be stored on a central computer (the file server) allowing data to be
shared throughout an organisation.
 Files can be backed up more easily when they are all on a central fileserver rather
than when they are scattered across a number of independent workstations.
 Networks also allow security to be established, ensuring that the network users
may only have access to certain files and applications.
 Software and resources can be centrally managed.
 Network versions of software often allow for their speedy installation on
workstations from the file server.
 Expensive devices such as laser printers or scanners can be shared.
 Users can access their files from any workstation

DISADVANTAGES OF LAN
 Power - a good LAN is required to be on all the times.
 Security - each computer and device become another point of entry for
undesirables.
 Upkeep - when things go wrong or the software gets updated.
 Frustration if having a problem setting up.
 A lot of times a network shares one Internet connection - if all computers running
at once, can reduce speed for each.
 Area covered is limited.

Metropolitan area network

A metropolitan area network (MAN) is a network that connects two or more local area
networks or campus area networks together but does not extend beyond the boundaries of
the immediate town/city. Routers, switches and hubs are connected to create a
metropolitan area network.

ADVANTAGES OF MAN
The biggest advantage of MANs is the bandwidth (potential speed) of the connecting links. 

This means that resources (such as databases and files) shared on the network can be accessed
extremely quickly. 
Some installations allow multiple users to share the same high-speed Internet connection,
thereby sharing the cost of the service and securing a better quality of service through collective
bargaining and economies of scale.

DISADVANTAGES OF MANs
The key disadvantage of MANs is the cost of the cutting-edge technology employed. Also, this
equipment generally has to be installed for the first time, as the copper traditionally used for
the phone network is generally considered to be too slow to be annexed for this purpose. 

The cost is what inhibits the geographical reach of MANs, which is also another drawback.

Wide area network

A wide area network (WAN) is a computer network that covers a broad area (i.e. any
network whose communications links cross metropolitan, regional, or national
boundaries [1]). Less formally, a WAN is a network that uses routers and public
communications links. Contrast with personal area networks (PANs), local area networks
(LANs), campus area networks (CANs), or metropolitan area networks (MANs), which
are usually limited to a room, building, campus or specific metropolitan area (e.g., a city)
respectively. The largest and most well-known example of a WAN is the Internet. A
WAN is a data communications network that covers a relatively broad geographic area
(i.e. one city to another and one country to another country) and that often uses
transmission facilities provided by common carriers, such as telephone companies. WAN
technologies generally function at the lower three layers of the OSI reference model: the
physical layer, the data link layer, and the network layer.

Advantages
  Messages can be sent very quickly to anyone else on the network.
 These messages can have pictures, sounds, or data included with them (called
attachments).

 Expensive things (such as printers or phone lines to the internet) can be shared by
all the computers on the network without having to internet) can be shared by all
the computers on the network without having to the same data.

 This avoids problems where some users may have older information than others.
-Share information/files over a larger area

Disadvantages

 Setting up a network can be an expensive and complicated experience.

 The bigger the network the more expensive it is.

 Security is a real issue when many different people have the ability to use
information from other computers.

 Protection against hackers and viruses adds more complexity and expense.

 Once set up, maintaining a network is a full-time job which requires network
supervisors and technicians to be employed.

 Information may not meet local needs or interests

 Vulnerable to hackers or other outside threats

Virtual private network

A virtual private network (VPN) is a computer network in which some of the links
between nodes are carried by open connections or virtual circuits in some larger network
(e.g., the Internet) instead of by physical wires. The data link layer protocols of the
virtual network are said to be tunneled through the larger network when this is the case.
One common application is secure communications through the public Internet, but a
VPN need not have explicit security features, such as authentication or content
encryption. VPNs, for example, can be used to separate the traffic of different user
communities over an underlying network with strong security features.

A VPN may have best-effort performance, or may have a defined service level agreement
(SLA) between the VPN customer and the VPN service provider. Generally, a VPN has a
topology more complex than point-to-point.

A VPN allows computer users to appear to be editing from an IP address location other
than the one which connects the actual computer to the Internet.
Internetwork
In modern practice, interconnected networks use the Internet Protocol. There are at least
three variants of internetworks, depending on who administers and who participates in
them:

 Intranet
 Extranet
 Internet

Intranets and extranets may or may not have connections to the Internet. If connected to
the Internet, the intranet or extranet is normally protected from being accessed from the
Internet without proper authorization. The Internet is not considered to be a part of the
intranet or extranet, although it may serve as a portal for access to portions of an extranet.

Intranet

An intranet is a set of networks, using the Internet Protocol and IP-based tools such as
web browsers and file transfer applications that is under the control of a single
administrative entity. That administrative entity closes the intranet to all but specific,
authorized users. Most commonly, an intranet is the internal network of an organization.
A large intranet will typically have at least one web server to provide users with
organizational information.

Extranet

An extranet is a network or internetwork that is limited in scope to a single organization

or entity but which also has limited connections to the networks of one or more other
usually, but not necessarily, trusted organizations or entities (e.g., a company's customers
may be given access to some part of its intranet creating in this way an extranet, while at
the same time the customers may not be considered 'trusted' from a security standpoint).
Technically, an extranet may also be categorized as a CAN, MAN, WAN, or other type
of network, although, by definition, an extranet cannot consist of a single LAN; it must
have at least one connection with an external network.

Internet

The Internet consists of a worldwide interconnection of governmental, academic, public,

and private networks based upon the networking technologies of the Internet Protocol
Suite. It is the successor of the Advanced Research Projects Agency Network
(ARPANET) developed by DARPA of the U.S. Department of Defense. The Internet is
also the communications backbone underlying the World Wide Web (WWW). The
'Internet' is most commonly spelled with a capital 'I' as a proper noun, for historical
reasons and to distinguish it from other generic internetworks.
Participants in the Internet use a diverse array of methods of several hundred
documented, and often standardized, protocols compatible with the Internet Protocol
Suite and an addressing system (IP Addresses) administered by the Internet Assigned
Numbers Authority and address registries. Service providers and large enterprises
exchange information about the reachability of their address spaces through the Border
Gateway Protocol (BGP), forming a redundant worldwide mesh of transmission paths.

Types of Network Topologies

Bus Topology

Alternatively referred to as a line topology, a bus topology is a network setup in which

each computer and network device are connected to a single cable or backbone. The
following sections contain both the advantages and disadvantages of using a bus topology
with your devices.

Advantages of bus topology

 It works well when you have a small network.
 Easiest network topology for connecting computers or peripherals in a linear
fashion.
 Requires less cable length than a star topology.

Disadvantages of bus topology

 Difficult to identify the problems if the whole network goes down.
 It can be hard to troubleshoot individual device issues.
 Not great for large networks.
 Terminators are required for both ends of the main cable.
 Additional devices slow the network down.
  If a main cable is damaged, the network fails or splits into two.

Ring topology

Alternatively referred to as a ring network, a ring topology is a computer network

configuration where the devices are connected to each other in a circular shape. Each
packet is sent around the ring until it reaches its final destination. Ring topologies are
used in both local area network (LAN) and wide area network (WAN) setups. The picture
to the right is a visual example of a network using the ring topology to connect several
computers together.

Additional information
In the past, the ring topology was most commonly used in schools, offices, and smaller
buildings where networks were smaller. However, today, the ring topology is seldom
used, having been switched to another type of network topology for improved
performance, stability, or support.

Advantages of ring topology

 All data flows in one direction, reducing the chance of packet collisions.
 A network server is not needed to control network connectivity between each
workstation.
 Data can transfer between workstations at high speeds.
 Additional workstations can be added without impacting performance of the
network.

Disadvantages of ring topology

  All data being transferred over the network must pass through each workstation
on the network, which can make it slower than a star topology.
 The entire network will be impacted if one workstation shuts down.
 The hardware needed to connect each workstation to the network is more
expensive than Ethernet cards and hubs/switches.

Star Topology

Alternatively referred to as a star network, star topology is one of the most common
network setups. In this configuration, every node connects to a central network device,
like a hub, switch, or computer. The central network device acts as a server and the
peripheral devices act as clients.

The picture to the right shows how this network setup gets its name, as it is shaped like a
star.

Advantages of star topology

 Centralized management of the network, through the use of the central computer,
hub, or switch.
 Easy to add another computer to the network.
 If one computer on the network fails, the rest of the network continues to function
normally.

Disadvantages of star topology

 Can have a higher cost to implement, especially when using a switch or router as
the central network device.
 The central network device determines the performance and number of nodes the
network can handle.
 If the central computer, hub, or switch fails, the entire network goes down and all
computers are disconnected from the network.
Mesh topology
A network setup where each computer and network device is interconnected with one
another, allowing for most transmissions to be distributed, even if one of the connections
go down. This topology is not commonly used for most computer networks as it is
difficult and expensive to have redundant connection to every computer. However, this
topology is commonly used for wireless networks. Below is a visual example of a simple
computer setup on a network using a mesh topology.

A mesh topology can be a full mesh topology or a partially connected mesh topology.

In a full mesh topology, every computer in the network has a connection to each of the
other computers in that network. The number of connections in this network can be
calculated using the following formula (n is the number of computers in the network):
n(n-1)/2

In a partially connected mesh topology, at least two of the computers in the network have
connections to multiple other computers in that network. This is a cheaper way to build a
network that has some redundancy in the event one of the primary computers or
connections in the network were to be down.

Tree topology

Imagine a hierarchy of network nodes, with the root node serving client nodes, that in
turn serve other lower-level nodes. The top-level node is mostly a mainframe computer
while other nodes in the hierarchy are mini or microcomputers. In this arrangement, the
node at each level could be forming a star network with the nodes it serves. In this case,
the structure combines star and bus topologies and inherits their advantages and
disadvantages.
Advantages

▸ The tree topology is useful in cases where a star or bus cannot be implemented
individually. It is most-suited in networking multiple departments of a university or
corporation, where each unit (star segment) functions separately, and is also connected
with the main node (root node).

▸ The advantages of centralization that are achieved in a star topology are inherited by the
individual star segments in a tree network.

▸ Each star segment gets a dedicated link from the central bus. Thus, failing of one
segment does not affect the rest of the network.

▸ Fault identification is easy.

▸ The network can be expanded by the addition of secondary nodes. Thus, scalability is
achieved.

Disadvantages
▸ As multiple segments are connected to a central bus, the network depends heavily on
the bus. Its failure affects the entire network.

▸ Owing to its size and complexity, maintenance is not easy and costs are high. Also,
configuration is difficult in comparison to that in other topologies.

▸ Though it is scalable, the number of nodes that can be added depends on the capacity of
the central bus and on the cable type.
Hybrid topology
A hybrid topology is a type of network topology that uses two or more other network
topologies, including bus topology, mesh topology, ring topology, star topology, and tree
topology.

DOMAIN CONCEPTS
The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the
standard Internet Protocol Suite (TCP/IP) to serve billions of users worldwide. It is a
network of networks that consists of millions of private and public, academic, business,
and government networks of local to global scope that are linked by a broad array of
electronic and optical networking technologies. The Internet carries a vast array of
information resources and services, most notably the inter-linked hypertext documents of
the World Wide Web (WWW) and the infrastructure to support electronic mail.

Most traditional communications media, such as telephone and television services, are
reshaped or redefined using the technologies of the Internet, giving rise to services such
as Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) and IPTV. Newspaper publishing has been
reshaped into Web sites, blogging, and web feeds. The Internet has enabled or accelerated
the creation of new forms of human interactions through instant messaging, Internet
forums, and social networking sites.

The origins of the Internet reach back to the 1960s when the United States funded
research projects of its military agencies to build robust, fault-tolerant and distributed
computer networks. This research and a period of civilian funding of a new U.S.
backbone by the National Science Foundation spawned worldwide participation in the
development of new networking technologies and led to the commercialization of an
international network in the mid 1990s, and resulted in the following popularization of
countless applications in virtually every aspect of modern human life. As of 2009, an
estimated quarter of Earth's population uses the services of the Internet.

The Internet has no centralized governance in either technological implementation or

policies for access and usage; each constituent network sets its own standards. Only the
overreaching definitions of the two principal name spaces in the Internet, the Internet
Protocol address space and the Domain Name System, are directed by a maintainer
organization, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). The
technical underpinning and standardization of the core protocols (IPv4 and IPv6) is an
activity of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), a non-profit organization of
loosely-affiliated international participants that anyone may associate with by
contributing technical expertise.
The World Wide Web is a system of interlinked hypertext documents contained on the
Internet. With a web browser, one can view web pages that may contain text, images,
videos, and other multimedia and navigate between them using hyperlinks. Using
concepts from earlier hypertext systems, English physicist Sir Tim Berners-Lee, now the
Director of the World Wide Web Consortium, wrote a proposal in March 1989 for what
would eventually become the World Wide Web.[1] He was later joined by Belgian
computer scientist Robert Cailliau while both were working at CERN in Geneva,
Switzerland. In 1990, they proposed using "HyperText [...] to link and access information
of various kinds as a web of nodes in which the user can browse at will", [2] and released
that web in December.[3]

"The World-Wide Web (W3) was developed to be a pool of human knowledge, which
would allow collaborators in remote sites to share their ideas and all aspects of a common
project." [4] If two projects are independently created, rather than have a central figure
make the changes, the two bodies of information could form into one cohesive piece of
work.

File Transfer Protocol (FTP) is a standard network protocol used to exchange and
manipulate files over a TCP/IP based network, such as the Internet. FTP is built on a
client-server architecture and utilizes separate control and data connections between the
client and server applications. Client applications were originally interactive command-
line tools with a standardized command syntax, but graphical user interfaces have been
developed for all desktop operating systems in use today. FTP is also often used as an
application component to automatically transfer files for program internal functions. FTP
can be used with user-based password authentication or with anonymous user access. The
Trivial File Transfer Protocol (TFTP) is a similar, but simplified, not interoperable, and
unauthenticated version of FTP.

Search Engines are programs that search documents for specified keywords and returns
a list of the documents where the keywords were found. A search engine is really a
general class of programs, however, the term is often used to specifically describe
systems like Google, Bing and Yahoo! Search that enable users to search for documents
on the World Wide Web.

A URL (Uniform Resource Locator) is a form of URI and is a standardized naming

convention for addressing documents accessible over the Internet or Intranet. An
example of a URL is http://www.reva.edu.in

BASIC PROGRAMMING LANGUAGE

LET Statement

 One of the more useful BASIC language keywords is LET. It is an instruction to the
computer to either assign a specified value to a variable name, or to do certain
computations and then assign the result to a variable name.
 The LET statement is not a statement of algebraic equality; rather, it is a definition
that assigns a value or a number to a variable. 

 The LET statement can be used to assign a constant value to a variable name, a

variable to a variable name, or the result of an expression to a variable name.
Therefore, the LET statement is often referred to as an statement.

For example:

Assigning a constant value to a variable name

In this example the value 212 is assigned to the variable name A and stored in memory
with the location name, A. The equal sign should be read as be replaced by or more
precisely be assigned the value of. This does not represent algebraic equality.

Assigning the value of an expression to a variable name 

In this example, the expressions on the right side of the equal sign were calculated and
the results assigned to the variable names Al, A2, and A3. Then in line 50 when we
wanted to print the answers we referenced the variablenames instead of having to recode
the expressions.

Three important points to remember about the LET statement are: 

    It assigns a value to a variable name.

    The value may be expressed as a constant, another variable or an expression.

    The value is stored in memory and may be referenced by its variable name.

PRINT Statement

Summary

Displays textual output on the screen console.

Syntax

PRINT [list of expressions]

[list of expressions] consists of zero one or more expressions. Each pair of expressions

must be separated by either a semicolon or a comma. The list of expressions may end in a
trailing semicolon or comma (see description below).

[list of expressions] is therefore: [[expression][,|;]] [ [[expression][,|;]] [ [[expression][,|;]]

... ] ]

Remarks and Examples

A PRINT statement can be used to write a string of text to the screen. For example,

PRINT "Hello world!"

will output

Hello world!

To write an empty line to the screen, use the PRINT statement alone without any
expressions after it, as shown in the following example:

10 PRINT "Hello world!"

20 PRINT
30 PRINT "Goodbye!"
RUN
Hello world!

Goodbye!

 comma can be used instead of a semicolon to separate values. With the

comma, the cursor is advanced to the next tab stop position. By default tab
stops are 10 characters wide. If the current cursor position is in the first column
(1), and a value is output that is less than ten characters in length, and a comma
is used, then the cursor will be advanced to column 10 before the next value is
printed. If the value that was output was, say, 15 characters in length, then the
cursor would have been advanced to the next tab stop position, that is, column
20.

Commas and semicolons can be used together in the same PRINT statement, as
shown in the following example:
10 PHONE$ = "555-1212"
20 PRINT "Name", "Age", "Phone"
30 PRINT "Alice", 25, PHONE$; " Ext. 123"
40 PRINT "Bob", 19, PHONE$; " Ext. 456"
50 PRINT "Carol", 63, PHONE$; " Ext. 789"
RUN
Name Age Phone
Alice 25 555-1212 Ext. 123
Bob 19 555-1212 Ext. 456
Carol 63 555-1212 Ext. 789

INPUT STATEMENTS

The input statement pauses the program, prints aquestion mark (?) at the current text
cursor position, and then displays the text cursor. A visible text cursor indicates that the
user must enter data before the program will continue. The number and type of variables
specified as input items determines the number and type of values the user must supply.
The program may include as many input items as necessary in an input statement,
separating them with commas.

Example :

INPUT a
INPUT x, y
INPUT name$, age, phone$

The first line expects the user to enter a single number, the second line expects two
numbers, and the third expects three pieces of information — a string, a number, and
another string (in that order).

The INPUT statement allows a program to request information from the user.

The following program gives an example:

10 PRINT "Give me a number and I'll double it";

20 INPUT X
30 PRINT "Twice ";X " is ";X*2
When you run this program, the INPUT command on line 20 displays a question mark on
the screen and waits for you to enter data. The number you type is assigned to the
variable X. If you do not type anything, or type letters or symbols instead, X is assigned
the value 0.

INPUT may also be used with string and integer variables:

10 PRINT "What is your name ";

20 INPUT A$
30 PRINT "Hello ";A$

Line 10 in each of the above two programs is used to print a message on the screen
indicating the type of response required. The INPUT statement allows text prompts to be
included, so the program above could be written more neatly as:

10 INPUT "What is your name ",A$

20 PRINT "Hello ";A$

The comma in line 10 tells the computer to print a question mark when it wants input
from the keyboard. If you leave out the comma, the question mark is not printed. A semi-
colon may be used, with exactly the same effect as the comma.

When the program is being executed, the INPUT statement requires you to press Return
if you wish to send what you have typed to the computer. Until you press Return, you can
delete all or part of what you have typed by pressing Delete or Ctrl-U to erase the whole
line.

When you are inputting a string, the computer ignores any leading spaces and anything
after a comma, unless you put the whole string inside quotation marks.

To input a whole line of text, including commas and leading spaces, INPUT LINE (or
LINE INPUT) may be used:

10 INPUT A$
20 INPUT LINE B$
30 PRINT A$
40 PRINT B$

RUN the above program and, in response to each of the question marks, type

Hello, how are you?

This produces the following output:

Hello
Hello, how are you?

Several inputs may be requested at one time:

10 INPUT A,B,C$

You may enter the data individually, pressing Return after each item. In this case you are
prompted with a question mark until you enter the number required. Alternatively, you
can give all the inputs on one line, separated by commas.