NETWORK DESIGN METHODOLOGY

TOP-DOWN NETWORK DESIGN

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Top-Down Network Designing and
Design, 3rd Edition Supporting Computer
Networks (CCNA)
Priscilla Oppenheimer

2
Four phases in the top-down network
design methodology

 I: Identifying Your Customer's Needs and

Goals

II: Logical Network Design

III: Physical Network Design

IV: Testing, Optimizing, and Documenting
Your Network Design

3
 PART 1
IDENTIFYING YOUR
CUSTOMER’S NEEDS
AND GOALS

 Analyzing Business Goals and Constraints

 Analyzing Technical Goals and Tradeoffs
 Characterizing the Existing Internetwork
4  Characterizing Network Traffic
 CHAPTER ONE
ANALYZING BUSINESS GOALS
AND CONSTRAINTS

 Systematic, Top-down network

design methodology
 Analysing your customer’s
business objectives
 Analysing the business constrains;
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budgets, timeframes, workplace
politics.
NETWORK DESIGN

 Good network design must recognizes

customer’s requirements.
 Network design choices and tradeoffs must
be made when designing the logic network
before any physical devices are selected.

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STRUCTURED NETWORK DESIGN

Four fundamental network design goals:

 Scalability

 Availability

 Security

 Manageability

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STRUCTURED NETWORK DESIGN
 Core Layer: connects Distribution Layer devices
 Distribution Layer: interconnects smaller LANs

 Access Layer: provides connections for hosts and

end devices

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START FROM THE TOP
Layer 7 Application

Layer 6 Presentation

Layer 5 Session

Layer 4 Transport

Layer 3 Network

Layer 2 Data Link

Layer 1 Physical 9
10
 SYSTEMS DEVELOPMENT LIFE CYCLES
(SDLC)

 Typicalsystems are developed and

continue to exist over a period of time,
often called a systems development life
cycle (SDLC).

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TOP-DOWN NETWORK DESIGN STEPS
systems
Analyze
development life
requirements
cycle (SDLC).

Monitor and Develop

optimize logical
network design
performance

Implement Develop
and test physical
network design
Test, optimize,
and document
design
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 THE PDIOO NETWORK LIFE CYCLE
Plan
Design Plan
Implement
Operate Design
Optimize
Retire
Optimize

Implement

Operate

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NETWORK DESIGN STEPS

 Phase 1 – Analyze Requirements

 Analyze business goals and constraints
 Analyze technical goals and tradeoffs
 Characterize the existing network
 Characterize network traffic

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NETWORK DESIGN STEPS

 Phase 2 – Logical Network Design

 Design a network topology
 Design models for addressing and naming
 Select switching and routing protocols
 Develop network security strategies
 Develop network management strategies

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NETWORK DESIGN STEPS

 Phase 3 – Physical Network Design

 Select technologies and devices for campus
networks
 Select technologies and devices for enterprise
networks

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NETWORK DESIGN STEPS

 Phase
4 – Testing, Optimizing, and
Documenting the Network Design
 Test the network design
 Optimize the network design
 Document the network design

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BUSINESS GOALS
 Increase revenue
 Reduce operating costs

 Improve communications

 Shorten product development cycle

 Expand into worldwide markets

 Build partnerships with other companies

 Offer better customer support or new

customer services
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RECENT BUSINESS PRIORITIES
 Mobility

 Security

 Resiliency (fault tolerance)

 Business continuity after a disaster

 Network projects must be prioritized based

on fiscal goals
 Networks must offer the low delay required
for real-time applications such as VoIP

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BUSINESS CONSTRAINTS

 Budget

 Staffing

 Schedule

 Politics and policies

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COLLECT INFORMATION BEFORE THE
FIRST MEETING

 Before meeting with the client, whether

internal or external, collect some basic
business-related information
 Such as
 Products produced/Services supplied
 Financial viability
 Customers, suppliers, competitors
 Competitive advantage

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MEET WITH THE CUSTOMER

 Try to get
 A concise statement of the goals of the
project
 What problem are they trying to solve?
 How will new technology help them be more

successful in their business?

 What must happen for the project to
succeed?

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MEET WITH THE CUSTOMER
 Get a copy of the organization chart
 This will show the general structure of the organization
 It will suggest users to account for

 It will suggest geographical locations to account for

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MEET WITH THE CUSTOMER
 Get a copy of the security policy
 How does the policy affect the new design?
 How does the new design affect the policy?

 Is the policy so strict that you (the network designer)

won’t be able to do your job?
 Start cataloging network assets that security
should protect
 Hardware, software, applications, and data
 Less obvious, but still important, intellectual property,
trade secrets, and a company's reputation

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 THE SCOPE OF THE DESIGN PROJECT

 Small in scope?
 Allow sales people to access network via a VPN
 Large in scope?
 An entire redesign of an enterprise network
 Use the OSI model to clarify the scope
 New financial reporting application versus new routing
protocol versus new data link (wireless, for example)
 Doesthe scope fit the budget, capabilities of staff
and consultants, schedule?

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GATHER MORE DETAILED INFORMATION

 Applications
 Now and after the project is completed
 Include both productivity applications and
system management applications
 User communities
 Data stores
 Protocols
 Current logical and physical architecture
 Current performance

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SUMMARY

 Systematic approach
 Focus first on business requirements and
constraints, and applications
 Gain an understanding of the customer’s
corporate structure
 Gain an understanding of the customer’s
business style

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REVIEW QUESTIONS

 What are the main phases of network design

per the top-down network design approach?
 What are the main phases of network design
per the PDIOO approach?
 Why is it important to understand your
customer’s business style?
 What are some typical business goals for
organizations today?
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 CHAPTER TWO

ANALYZING TECHNICAL GOALS

AND TRADEOFFS

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Copyright 2010 Cisco Press & Priscilla Oppenheimer

TECHNICAL GOALS
 Scalability

 Availability

 Performance

 Security Your lab report should

reflect some of these goals
 Manageability of your own designed
 Usability network.
 Adaptability

 Affordability

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SCALABILITY
 Scalability
refers to the ability to grow
 Some technologies are more scalable
 Flat network designs, for example, don’t scale
well
 Try to learn
 Number of sites to be added
 What will be needed at each of these sites
 How many users will be added
 How many more servers will be added

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32
33
AVAILABILITY
 Availability
can be expressed as a percent
uptime per year, month, week, day, or hour,
compared to the total time in that period
 For example:
 24/7 operation
 Network is up for 165 hours in the 168-hour week

 Availability is 98.21%

 Different applications may require different

levels
 Some enterprises may want 99.999% or
“Five Nines” availability
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AVAILABILITY
 Availability can also be expressed as a
mean time between failure (MTBF) and
mean time to repair (MTTR)
 Availability = MTBF/(MTBF + MTTR)
 For example:
 The network should not fail more than once
every 4,000 hours (166 days) and it should be
fixed within one hour
 4,000/4,001 = 99.98% availability

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AVAILABILITY
DOWNTIME IN MINUTES

Per Hour Per Day Per Week Per Year

99.999% .0006 .01 .10 5
99.98% .012 .29 2 105
99.95% .03 .72 5 263
99.90% .06 1.44 10 526
99.70% .18 4.32 30 1577(26
H)
99.999% AVAILABILITY MAY
REQUIRE TRIPLE REDUNDANCY

ISP 1 ISP 2 ISP 3

Enterprise

 Can the customer afford this? 37

SERVER FARMS
Many enterprise networks provide users with Internet-
accessible services, such as email and e-commerce.
The availability and security of these services are
crucial to the success of a business.
Managing and securing numerous distributed servers at
various locations within a business network is difficult.
Recommended practice centralised servers in server
farms. Server farms are typically located in computer
rooms and data centres.

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39
40
BENEFITS OF CREATING A SERVER FARM
1. Network traffic enters and leaves the server farm at a
defined point. This arrangement makes it easier to
secure, filter and prioritise traffic.
2. Redundant, high-capacity links can be installed to the
servers and between the server farm network and the
main LAN. This configuration is more cost-effective
than attempting to provide a similar level of connectivity
to servers distributed throughout the network.
3. Load balancing and failover can be provided between
servers and between networking devices.
4. The number of high-capacity switches and security
devices is reduced, helping to lower the cost of providing
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services.
NETWORK PERFORMANCE
 Common performance factors include
 Bandwidth
 Throughput
 Bandwidth utilization
 Offered load
 Accuracy
 Efficiency
 Delay (latency) and delay variation
 Response time

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BANDWIDTH VS. THROUGHPUT
 Bandwidth and throughput are not the
same
 Bandwidth is the data carrying capacity of a
circuit, fixed.
 Usually specified in bits per second-bps
 Throughput is the quantity of error free
data transmitted per unit of time
 Measured in bps, Bps, or packets per second (pps)
 Depend on offered load, access method and error rate

 Throughput < Bandwidth

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BANDWIDTH, THROUGHPUT, LOAD
100 % of Capacity
T
h
r Actual
o
u
g
h
p
u
t
100 % of Capacity
44

Offered Load
OTHER FACTORS THAT AFFECT THROUGHPUT

 The size of packets

 Inter-frame gaps between packets
 Packets-per-second ratings of devices that forward
packets
 Client speed (CPU, memory, and HD access speeds)
 Server speed (CPU, memory, and HD access speeds)
 Network design
 MAC Protocols (ALOHA 18.4%)
 Distance
 Errors
 Time of day, etc., etc., etc.
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THROUGHPUT VS. GOODPUT
 Are you referring to bytes per second,
regardless of whether the bytes are user
data bytes or packet header bytes
 Or are you concerned with application-layer
throughput of user bytes, sometimes called
“goodput”
 In that case, you have to consider that bandwidth is
being “wasted” by the headers in every packet

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PERFORMANCE (CONTINUED)

 Efficiency
 How much overhead is required to deliver an
amount of data?
 How large can packets be?
 Larger better for efficiency (and goodput)
 But too large means too much data is lost if a packet is

damaged
 How many packets can be sent in one bunch without an

acknowledgment?

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EFFICIENCY
Small Frames (Less Efficient)

Large Frames (More Efficient)

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DELAY FROM THE USER’S POINT OF
VIEW
 Response Time
 A function of the
application and the
equipment the
application is
running on, not just
the network
 Most users expect to
see something on the
screen in 100 to 200
milliseconds

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DELAY FROM THE ENGINEER’S POINT
OF VIEW

 Propagation delay
 A signal travels in a cable at about 2/3 the speed
of light in a vacuum (3×108 m/s)
 Transmission delay (also known as
serialization delay)
 Time to put digital data onto a transmission line
 For example, it takes about 5 ms to output a 1,024 byte
packet on a 1.544 Mbps T1 line
 Packet-switching delay
 Queuing delay
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QUEUING DELAY AND BANDWIDTH UTILIZATION

15
Average Queue Depth

12
9
6
3
0
0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1
Average Utilization

 Number of packets in a queue increases exponentially

as utilization increases
 Queue depth = utilization/(1- utilization)
EXAMPLE
A packet switch has 5 users, each offering
packets at a rate of 10 packets per second
 The average length of the packets is 1,024 bits

 The packet switch needs to transmit this data

over a 56-Kbps WAN circuit
 Load = 5 x 10 x 1,024 = 51,200 bps
 Utilization = 51,200/56,000 = 91.4%
 Average number of packets in queue =
(0.914)/(1-0.914) = 10.63 packets

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SECURITY

 Focus on requirements first

 Detailed security planning later (Chapter
8)
 Identify network assets
 Including their value and the expected cost
associated with losing them due to a security
problem
 Analyze security risks

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MANAGEABILITY

 Fault management
 Configuration management

 Accounting management

 Performance management

 Security management

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USABILITY

 Usability:the ease of use with which

network users can access the network and
services
 Networks should make users’ jobs easier

 Some design decisions will have a

negative affect on usability:
 Strict security, for example

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ADAPTABILITY
 Avoid incorporating any design elements
that would make it hard to implement new
technologies in the future
 Change can come in the form of new
protocols, new business practices, new fiscal
goals, new legislation
 A flexible design can adapt to changing
traffic patterns and Quality of Service (QoS)
requirements
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AFFORDABILITY
A network should carry the maximum
amount of traffic possible for a given
financial cost
 Affordability is especially important in
campus network designs
 WANs are expected to cost more, but costs
can be reduced with the proper use of
technology
 Quiet routing protocols, for example
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MAKING TRADEOFFS (EXAMPLE)
 Scalability 20
 Availability 30
 Network performance 15
 Security 5
 Manageability 5
 Usability 5
 Adaptability 5
 Affordability 15
Total (must add up to 100) 100

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SUMMARY

 Continue to use a systematic, top-down

approach
 Don’t select products until you understand
goals for scalability, availability, performance,
security, manageability, usability,
adaptability, and affordability
 Tradeoffs are almost always necessary

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REVIEW QUESTIONS

 What are some typical technical goals for

organizations today?
 How do bandwidth and throughput differ?

 How can one improve network efficiency?

 What tradeoffs may be necessary in order to

improve network efficiency?

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 CHAPTER THREE

CHARACTERIZING THE
EXISTING INTERNETWORK

61

Copyright 2010 Cisco Press & Priscilla Oppenheimer

WHAT’S THE STARTING POINT?
 According to Abraham Lincoln:
 “If we could first know where we are and whither
we are tending, we could better judge what to do
and how to do it.”

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WHERE ARE WE?

 Characterize the exiting internetwork in

terms of:
 Its infrastructure
 Logical structure (modularity, hierarchy, topology)
 Physical structure

 Addressing and naming

 Wiring and media
 Architectural and environmental constraints
 Health

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DIAGRAM A PHYSICAL NETWORK AND
DOCUMENT THE EXISTING NETWORK
Network documentation:
 Logical and physical diagrams

 Floor plans

 Complete lists for equipments and

applications
 Current network configuration files
GET A NETWORK MAP (PHYSICAL)
Medford Roseburg
Fast Ethernet Fast Ethernet
50 users 30 users
Frame Relay Frame Relay
CIR = 56 Kbps CIR = 56 Kbps
DLCI = 5 DLCI = 4

Gigabit Grants Pass

HQ
Ethernet Gigabit
Grants Pass Ethernet
HQ
Fast Ethernet
75 users
FEP
(Front End
Processor)

IBM
Mainframe
T1

Web/FTP server
Eugene
Ethernet T1 Internet 65
20 users
DIAGRAM A PHYSICAL NETWORK AND
DOCUMENT THE EXISTING NETWORK

 Identifyand document the strengths and

weaknesses of the existing network
 Focus on finding ways to overcome
weaknesses
67
CHARACTERIZE ADDRESSING AND
NAMING

 IP addressing for major devices, client

networks, server networks, and so on
 Any addressing oddities, such as
discontiguous subnets?
 Any strategies for addressing and naming?
 For example, sites may be named using airport
codes
 San Francisco = SFO, Oakland = OAK
 In LSBU, T-tower block; K-keyworth building; B-
Borough road building; L- london road building

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DISCONTINUOUS SUBNETS – make
problems for some routing protocols

Area 0
Network
192.168.49.0

Router A Router B

Area 1 Area 2
Subnets 10.108.16.0 - Subnets 10.108.32.0 -
10.108.31.0 10.108.47.0

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CHARACTERIZE THE WIRING AND MEDIA
 Single-mode fiber
 Multi-mode fiber
 Shielded twisted pair (STP) copper
 Unshielded-twisted-pair (UTP) copper
 Coaxial cable
 Microwave
 Laser
 Radio
 Infra-red

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ARCHITECTURAL CONSTRAINTS

 Make sure the following are sufficient

 Air conditioning
 Heating
 Ventilation
 Power
 Protection from electromagnetic interference
 Doors that can lock

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ARCHITECTURAL CONSTRAINTS

 Make sure there’s space for:

 Cabling conduits
 Patch panels
 Equipment racks
 Work areas for technicians installing and
troubleshooting equipment

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73
CHECK THE HEALTH OF THE
EXISTING INTERNETWORK

 Performance

 Availability

 Bandwidth utilization
 Accuracy

 Efficiency

 Response time
 Status of major routers, switches, and
firewalls
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 CHARACTERIZE AVAILABILITY

Date and Duration Cause of Last Fix for Last

MTBF MTTR of Last Major Major Major
Downtime Downtime Downtime

Enterprise

Segment 1

Segment 2

Segment n

Mean time between failures (MTBF) 75

Mean time to recovery (MTTR)
 NETWORK UTILIZATION IN MINUTE
INTERVALS Network Utilization

16:40:00

16:43:00

16:46:00

16:49:00

16:52:00
Time

16:55:00 Series1

16:58:00

17:01:00

17:04:00

17:07:00

17:10:00
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Utilization 76
NETWORK UTILIZATION IN HOUR
INTERVALS
Network Utilization

13:00:00

14:00:00
Time

15:00:00 Series1

16:00:00

17:00:00

0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3 3.5 4 4.5

Utilization

77
 BANDWIDTH UTILIZATION BY
PROTOCOL

Relative Absolute Multicast

Broadcast
Network Network Rate
Rate
Utilization Utilization

Protocol 1

Protocol 2

Protocol 3

Protocol n

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CHARACTERIZE PACKET SIZES

79
 CHARACTERIZE RESPONSE TIME

Node A Node B Node C Node D

X
Node A

X
Node B

Node C X

Node D X

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CHECK THE STATUS OF MAJOR ROUTERS,
SWITCHES, AND FIREWALLS

 show buffers
 show environment

 show interfaces
Use Cisco
 show memory IOS show
 show processes command
 show running-config

 show version

81
TOOLS

 Protocolanalyzers
 Multi Router Traffic Grapher (MRTG)

 Remote monitoring (RMON) probes

 Cisco Discovery Protocol (CDP)

 Cisco IOS NetFlow technology

 CiscoWorks

82
SUMMARY

 Characterize the exiting internetwork before

designing enhancements
 Helps you verify that a customer’s design
goals are realistic
 Helps you locate where new equipment will go

 Helps you cover yourself if the new network

has problems due to unresolved problems in
the old network

83
REVIEW QUESTIONS
 What factors will help you decide if the
existing internetwork is in good enough shape
to support new enhancements?
 When considering protocol behavior, what is
the difference between relative network
utilization and absolute network utilization?
 Why should you characterize the logical
structure of an internetwork and not just the
physical structure?
 What architectural and environmental factors
should you consider for a new wireless 84
installation?
 CHAPTER FOUR

CHARACTERIZING NETWORK
TRAFFIC

85

Copyright 2010 Cisco Press & Priscilla Oppenheimer

NETWORK TRAFFIC FACTORS

 Traffic flow
 Location of traffic sources and data stores

 Traffic load

 Traffic behavior

 Quality of Service (QoS) requirements

86
USER COMMUNITIES, a set of worker who use
a particular application or set of applications.

User Size of Location(s) of Application(s)

Community Community Community Used by
Name (Number of Community
Users)

87
DATA STORES (SINKS), an area in a network
where application layer data resides. Server, or any
device where large quantities of data are stored.

Data Store Location Application(s) Used by User

Community(or
Communities)

88
 TRAFFIC FLOW, involves identifying and
characterizing individual traffic flows between
traffic source and stores.

Destination 1 Destination 2 Destination 3 Destination

MB/sec MB/sec MB/sec MB/sec

Source 1

Source 2

Source 3

Source n

89
 Library and Computing Center
TRAFFIC FLOW 30 Library Patrons (PCs) 10-Mbps Metro

EXAMPLE 30 Macs and 60 PCs in Ethernet to Internet

Computing Center
Server Farm
App 1 108 Kbps
App 2 20 Kbps App 2 60 Kbps
App 3 96 Kbps App 3 192 Kbps
App 4 24 Kbps App 4 48 Kbps
App 9 80 Kbps App 7 400 Kbps
Total 220 Kbps Total 808 Kbps

50 PCs 25 Macs
50 PCs

Administration Arts and

App 1 30 Kbps
Humanities
App 2 20 Kbps App 1 48 Kbps
App 3 60 Kbps App 2 32 Kbps
App 4 16 Kbps App 3 96 Kbps
Total 126 Kbps App 4 24 Kbps
App 5 300 Kbps Math and
App 6 200 Kbps
App 8 1200 Kbps Sciences
30 PCs Total 1900 Kbps 50 PCs 90

Business and
Social Sciences
TYPES OF TRAFFIC FLOW

 Terminal/host

 Client/server

 Thin client
 Peer-to-peer

 Server/server

 Distributed computing

91
TRAFFIC FLOW FOR VOICE OVER IP

 The flow associated with

transmitting the audio voice is
separate from the flows
associated with call setup and
teardown.
 The flow for transmitting the digital
voice is essentially peer-to-peer.
 Call setup and teardown is a
client/server flow
 A phone needs to talk to a server or phone
switch that understands phone numbers,
IP addresses, capabilities negotiation, and
so on.
92
IDENTIFYING APPLICATION IMPACTS
ON NETWORK DESIGN

File transfer and email applications:

 Unpredictable bandwidth usage
 Large packet size
 Centralization of file and mail servers in a
secure location
 Redundancy to ensure reliable service
IDENTIFYING APPLICATION IMPACTS
ON NETWORK DESIGN

HTTP and web traffic:

 Network media

 Redundancy

 Security
 NETWORK APPLICATIONS
TRAFFIC CHARACTERISTICS

Name of Type of Protocol(s) User Data Stores Approximate QoS

Application Traffic Used by Communities (Servers, Hosts, Bandwidth Requirements
Flow Application That Use the and so on) Requirements
Application

95
TRAFFIC LOAD
 To calculate whether capacity is sufficient,
you should know:
 The number of stations
 The average time that a station is idle between
sending frames
 The time required to transmit a message once
medium access is gained
 That level of detailed information can be
hard to gather, however

96
SIZE OF OBJECTS ON NETWORKS

 Terminal screen: 4 Kbytes

 Simple e-mail: 10 Kbytes

 Simple web page: 50 Kbytes

 High-quality image: 50Mbytes

 Database backup: 1Gbytes or more

97
TRAFFIC BEHAVIOR
 Broadcasts
 All ones data-link layer destination address
 FF: FF: FF: FF: FF: FF
 Doesn’t necessarily use huge amounts of bandwidth
 But does disturb every CPU in the broadcast domain

 Multicasts
 First bit sent is a one
 01:00:0C:CC:CC:CC (Cisco Discovery Protocol)
 Should just disturb NICs that have registered to
receive it
 Requires multicast routing protocol on internetworks

98
NETWORK EFFICIENCY

 Frame size
 Protocol interaction

 Windowing and flow control

 Error-recovery mechanisms

99
QOS REQUIREMENTS

 ATM service specifications

 Constant bit rate (CBR)
 Realtime variable bit rate (rt-VBR)
 Non-realtime variable bit rate (nrt-VBR)
 Unspecified bit rate (UBR)
 Available bit rate (ABR)
 Guaranteed frame rate (GFR)

100
QOS REQUIREMENTS PER IETF
(Internet Engineering Task Force, develops and
promotes Internet standards, It is an open
standards organization, with no formal
membership or membership requirements.)

 IETF integrated services working group

specifications
 Controlled load service
 Provides client data flow with a QoS closely
approximating the QoS that same flow would receive
on an unloaded network
 Guaranteed service
 Provides firm (mathematically provable) bounds on
end-to-end packet-queuing delays
101
QOS REQUIREMENTS PER IETF

 IETFdifferentiated services working

group specifications
 RFC 2475
 IP packets can be marked with a differentiated
services codepoint (DSCP) to influence queuing
and packet-dropping decisions for IP
datagrams on an output interface of a router

102
HOW QUALITY OF SERVICE IS
IMPLEMENTED ON THE LAN/WAN
Where QoS can be implemented to affect
traffic flow:
 Layer 2 devices

 Layer 3 devices
DOCUMENT THE NETWORK
REQUIREMENTS OF SPECIFIC
CATEGORIES OF APPLICATIONS
 Estimate the volume of application traffic
during the initial design phase.
 Document projected applications and
associated hardware in a network diagram.
SUMMARY

 Continue to use a systematic, top-down

approach
 Don’t select products until you understand
network traffic in terms of:
 Flow
 Load
 Behavior
 QoS requirements

105
REVIEW QUESTIONS

 List and describe six different types of traffic

flows.
 What makes traffic flow in voice over IP
networks challenging to characterize and plan
for?
 Why should you be concerned about broadcast
traffic?
 How do ATM and IETF specifications for QoS
differ?
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