Unit - III

Computer Networks

A network is a collection of interconnected autonomous computing devices so as to exchange

information or share resources. Each computer on the network is called a node and hence, a network is a
series of points or nodes interconnected by communication paths (transmission media).

Advantages of networking
1. Resources like Printer, Hard Disk, etc. can be shared on a computer network.
2. It provides easy accessibility to resources, information, and online services from anywhere.
3. Increases security and reliability of data, by backing up important data on shared devices.
4. Improved Communication through email, websites, audio/video calls, etc.
5. It leads to increased productivity, cost-saving as well as time-saving.

Disadvantages of Networking
1. Complex to set up and maintain.
2. Initial setup can be costly.
3. It may be used by unauthorized users to steal or corrupt the data and even to deploy computer viruses
or computer worms on the network.
4. People become reliant on the data stored at the central server, which if fails can cause havoc.

Types of Networks - Based on Geographical Spread

LAN MAN WAN
Expands to Local Area Network Metropolitan Area Network Wide Area Network
Area covered It connects a group of It covers relatively large It can connect computers
computers in a small region such as cities, towns, in different countries/
geographical area, upto 1 km can be up to 30-40 km continents.
Used for College, School, Hospital Small towns, City Country/Continent
Technology used Ethernet, Wi-Fi Optical fibre, Radio-wave Satellite

Network Devices
Ethernet Card/ NIC (Network Interface Card): Any computer which has to be a part of a computer
network must have an NIC (Network Interface Card / Unit) installed in it. A computer communicates with
other computers on a network with the help of an NIC only. It is also called as TAP (Terminal Access Point).
Each NIC is assigned two addresses:
MAC IP
Full Form Media Access Control Address Internet Protocol Address
Purpose It identifies the physical address of a It identifies connection of a computer on the
computer on the internet. internet.
Bits It is 48 bits (6 bytes) hexadecimal address. IPv4 is a 32-bit (4 bytes) address, and IPv6 is a
128-bits (16 bytes) address.
Assigned by MAC address is assigned by the IP address is assigned by the network
manufacturer of NIC card. administrator or Internet Service Provider.
Change Cannot be changed Can be changed
Example 10 : B5 : 03 : 63 : 2E : FC 192.168.0.102

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Modem: A modem (Modulator - Demodulator) is a peripheral device that enables a computer to transmit data
over, telephone or cable lines. The computers operate digitally using binary language (a series of zeros and
ones), but transmission mediums are analog. It converts the digital signals to analog (modulation) and the
analog signals back to digital (demodulation).

Repeater: A repeater is an electronic device that receives a signal, amplifies it and then retransmits it on the
network so that the signal can cover longer distances. Network repeaters regenerate incoming electrical,
wireless or optical signals. An electrical signal in a cable gets weaker with the distance it travels.

Hub: Hub is a device that allows us to connect multiple computers/devices

together in a network. Whenever a computer has to send some information to
some other computer, the information is sent by the NIC to the hub. Then the hub
retransmits this information to the all other computers attached to it. The
computer for which the information is intended receives this information. Other
computers on the network simply reject this information.

Switch: A switch is an intelligent hub. It looks exactly like a hub. It has the same
function as that of a hub: to connect multiple computers/devices in a network. But
the difference between the two is in the way they re-transmit the received
information. Unlike a hub, a switch sends the information selectively only to those
computers for which it is intended.

Router: A Router is a wired/ wireless network device that can handle networks with
different protocols. Using a routing table that stores calculated paths, routers make sure that
the data packets are travelling through the best possible paths to reach their destinations.

Gateway: A gateway is a network device that connects two dissimilar networks.

It establishes an intelligent connection between a LAN and WAN with
completely different structure and protocols. A network gateway can be
implemented in software, hardware, or as a combination of both.

Network Topologies
Topology is the pattern of interconnection of nodes in a local area network (LAN). While choosing a topology,
care has to be taken that the installation cost is minimum, the network so should be reliable and flexible.

Mesh Topology: In this topology, each node is connected with every other node in the network.
Advantages
i) Can handle large amounts of traffic as multiple nodes can transmit data
simultaneously.
ii) More reliable, if a node gets down it does not affect the remaining network.
iii) More secure
Disadvantages
i) Complex wiring.
ii) Cabling cost is high.
iii) Many connections are unutilized.

Ring or Circular Topology: Each node is connected to two nodes and the data is
received from one node and transmitted to the other node. The data moves only in
one direction (clockwise/ anti-clockwise).
Advantages
i) It requires less cable length.
ii) Cost effective
iii) Simple and easy to install
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Disadvantages
i) Less Secure
ii) Less Reliable, a single node/ connection fail disrupts the entire network
iii) Failure of node leads to failure of entire network.
iv) It is difficult to diagnose the fault.
v) It is difficult to reconfigure the network.

Bus Topology: It is also known as Linear Topology. Each node attaches directly to a common cable which
acts as the backbone and functions as a shared communication medium. Data sent from a node passes on the
backbone and transmitted to the length of the bus in both directions.
Advantages
i) Short cable length
ii) Less installation cost
iii) Simple and easy to install
Disadvantages
i) Less Secure
ii) Less reliable
iii) Fault detection and isolation is difficult.

Star Topology: A star network features a central connection point called a hub/switch to which all other
nodes are connected by a direct path.
Advantages
i) Very effective, efficient and fast
ii) Failure of a single connection does not affect the entire network.
iii) Easy to reconfigure
iv) Fault detection is easier.
Disadvantages
i) Large amount of cable is needed which increases the installation
cost of the network.
ii) The entire network is dependent on the central node. If it fails the
entire network goes down.

Tree Topology: Tree topology is a combination of bus and star topology. The network looks like an inverted
tree with the central root branching and sub-branching down to the nodes.
Advantages
i) Supports future expandability of the network much
better than a bus or star topology.
ii) Best suited for applications which have a hierarchical
flow of data and control.
Disadvantages
i) Overall length is limited by the type of cable used.
ii) If backbone cable breaks, the entire segment goes down.
iii) It is difficult to configure

Internet, Web and the Internet of Things

1. Internet: It is a global network of computing devices. It is being used for education, creativity,
entertainment, socialisation, and e-commerce. Computers are connected to a modem/ Wi-Fi, which are
connected to a local Internet Service Provider (ISP) who then connects to a regional and further a
national network, and such country-wise networks form the Internet backbone.

2. WWW (World Wide Web): The World Wide Web (WWW) or web in short, is an ocean of
information, stored in the form of trillions of interlinked web pages, web sites and web resources.

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3. Hyper Text Markup Language (HTML): HTML is a language that is used to design web pages
which are then displayed by web browsers. HTML is a language that supports multimedia documents
and consists of audio, video, graphics, pictures, etc.

4. URL: A location on an Internet server is called a website. Each website has a unique address called
URL (Uniform Resource Locator)/ URI (Uniform Resource Identifier). The format of URL is:
protocol://domainname/path+name of the page Eg: http://www.cbse.nic.in/newsite/index.html

5. Hyper Text Transfer Protocol (HTTP): HTTP is used to transfer all files and other data (collectively
called resources) from one computer to another on the World Wide Web. HTTP defines how the data
is formatted and transmitted over the network. The more secure and advanced version is HTTPS
(Hyper Text Transfer Protocol Secure) which encrypts the data before transmission. The HTTPS based
websites require SSL Digital Certificate.

6. Electronic Mail (Email): Email is the short form of electronic mail. It is one of the ways of sending
and receiving message(s) using the Internet. An email can be sent anytime to any number of recipients
at anywhere. The message can be either text entered directly onto the email application or an attached
file (text, image audio, video, etc.).
To use email service, one needs to register with an free/ paid email service provider by creating a mail
account. Eg: Google (gmail), Yahoo (yahoo mail), Microsoft (outlook), etc. Some of the facilities are:
i. Creating/ Composing an email, attaching files, saving as draft for mailing later.
ii. Sending, receiving and forwarding mail.
iii. Sending the copy of mail, as carbon copy (cc) or blind carbon copy (bcc).
iv. Organising emails in folders/ Filtering spam emails

7. Chat: Chatting or Instant Messaging (IM) over the Internet means communicating to people at
different geographic locations in real time through text message(s). For a successful chat session, the
communicating parties should be online simultaneously, and use the same chat application. Eg:
WhatsApp, Slack, Skype, Yahoo Messenger, Google Talk, Facebook Messenger, Google Hangout.

8. Website: A website is a collection of various web pages that are hosted on web servers. The first page
of a website is known as home page where all the links related to other documents are displayed.
Websites can be designed for various purposes such as selling products and delivering services,
posting/ finding information, communication, entertainment, disseminating contents & software, etc.

9. Web Page: A web page is an electronic document/page designed using HTML. It displays information
in textual or graphical form. A web page can be classified into two types:
a) Static web page: A web page which displays same kind of information whenever a user visits it is
known as a static web page. A static web page generally has .htm or .html as extension.
b) Dynamic web page: An interactive web page is a dynamic web page. It uses scripting languages
to display changing content. Such a page generally has .php, .asp, or .jsp as extension.

10. Web Server: A web server is a server that stores web pages and when a web client sends any request
to a server, the server responds to the request and displays the requested web pages. Eg: Apache web
server, Netscape enterprise web server, Microsoft internet information server, etc.

11. Hosting of a website: Web hosting is a service that allows us to put a website or a web page onto the
Internet, and make it a part of the World Wide Web.

12. Domain Name Resolution (DNR): Communication between computers on a network takes place with
the help of IP addresses. Each computer server hosting a website is given a unique name called the
domain name. They are registered on a server called the DNS Server. When you use the Domain
name/ URL to access a website, it finds the matching IP address by using the DNS Server. The process
by which your computer finds the IP addresses of domain names is called Domain Name Resolution.

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13. Web Browser: It is a software that helps to view web pages and websites. Some popular web
browsers are: Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Opera, AOL, Webkit, Iceweasel, etc.

14. Browser Settings: Every web browser has got certain settings that define the manner in which the
browser will behave. These settings may be with respect to privacy, search engine preferences,
download options, auto signature, autofill and autocomplete feature, theme and much more. Each
browser application allows us to change or customize its settings in a user friendly manner.

15. Add-Ons and Plug-ins: Add-ons and plug-ins are the tools that help to extend and modify the
functionality of the browser.
A plug-in is a complete program or may be a third-party software. For example, Flash and Java are
plug-ins. A Flash player is required to play a video in the browser. A plug-in is a software that is
installed on the host computer and can be used by the browser for multiple functionalities and can
even be used by other applications as well.
An add-on is not a complete program and so is used to add only a particular functionality to the
browser. An add-on is also referred to as extension in some browsers. Adding the functionality of a
sound and graphics card is an example of an add-on.

16. Cookies: A computer cookie is a small file, which is stored by a website on the client’s computer.
Cookies can be used to store browsing information, login credentials, language preference, search
queries, recently viewed web pages, etc. Usually, cookies are used for enhancing the user’s browsing
experience and do not infect your computer with malware.

17. VoIP: VoIP stands for Voice over Internet Protocol. For transferring of voice, voice over internet
protocol is used. The voice calls are first digitized, compressed and then fragmented into small packets,
which are then relayed by Internet Protocol (IP) cross network.

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