Montecino's CS 103 Course Page Lecture 6 - Networks LANS - local area networks - geographically close together - in the same building. WANS -
Wide area
networks - network that covers a fairly large geographical area. A WAN
often consists of a number of LANS connected
together to form a WAN. Click here for layouts of various types of networks Most LANS connect workstations and personal computers. workstations - A type of computer used for engineering applications (CAD/CAM), desktop publishing, software development, and other types of applications that require a significant amount of computing power and high quality graphics capabilities - can have local resources or LAN resources. Some times the label is applied to all computer's connected to the LAN. NIC - Network Interface Card -A printed circuit board /expansion card that you can insert into a computer - in this case to allow the computer to be connected to a network. This is a picture of a network interface card:
Click
here for other images of Interface cards
Ethernet A local-area network (LAN) protocol developed by Xerox, with DEC and Intel in 1976. Ethernet uses a bus or star configuration (manner in which the network and computers is configured.) Wireless LAN - (WLAN) is a flexible data communication system - an extension to or an alternative for a wired LAN within a building or campus. It uses radio frequency (RF) technology, to transmit and receive data over the air, reducing the need for wired connections. They provide mobility with movable LANs. - the type of error checking to be used - data compression method - procedures for sending and receiving messages - what devices/hardware are supported - what software is supported network bus - some Ethernets use a serial bus, which is a common cable connecting all stations. A data packet, which contains the address of the destination station, is broadcast to all nodes at the same time, and the recipient computer responds by accepting it. Data is transmitted serially (one bit after the other) over the cable. See local bus and software bus. Why Is It Called a Bus?
node - a processing location in a network. A node can be a computer or some other device, such as a printer. Every node has a unique network address, sometimes called a Data Link Control (DLC) address or Media Access Control (MAC) address. back to top
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