Week 1 Lecture 1

[Back to Lecture Notes page]

B227 Data Communications, Semester 1 2000

Unit Coordinator: HIEW Hong Liang
Room: Science and Computing 2.4
Email: h.hiew@murdoch.edu.au
Tel: (08) 9360 6058

Lecture Outline:

Unit Aims and Objectives

Lectures and Tutorials

Unit Materials

Assessments

Consultation Times

What Are We Studying?

Data communication between computers

This normally entails:

two or more computers connected together somehow
some means of transmission medium

wire - optical fiber - radio waves etc.

streams of data
some means of error detection
Agreed standards (protocols) on how the data is to be exchanged

Unit Aims and Objectives:

On completion of this unit, you will:

have gained an understanding of the technical process data communications - the hardware, software and communications services available to support distributed access to computing facilities
understand the requirements for data communications - the need to provide services enabling organisations to utilise information
understand the crucial importance of the role and nature of standards (or protocols) in the field of data communications
understand the manner in applying data communications technologies
demonstrate proficiency in the use of data communications hardware and software
understand the implications of data communications in application systems design and management, both at program level and at the architectural level.

Lectures and Tutorials:

Lectures

Tuesday 9:30-10:20am ECL Lecture Theater 4, ECL Building

Thursday 1:30-3:30pm Robertson Lecture Theater, Science and Computing Building

Tutorials

Lab ECL 2.050

For internal students, fill a tutorial allocation sheet before you leave this lecture today.

Outline of the Lectures:

Topic	Week	Topic Content	References
1	1	Intro to Data Communications: hardware, software, OSI & TCP/IP reference models, Layers	wk 1: Tanebaum Ch. 1
2	2,3	The Physical Layer: Data comm. Theory, Transmission Media, transmission providers, ISDN, ATM, bandwidth	wk 2: Tanebaum Ch. 2, sect. 2.1,2.2,2.3, 2.4 wk 3: Tanebaum Ch. 2, sect. 2.5,2.6,2.7,2.8
3	4,5	The Data link Layer: design issues, error detection, data link protocols	wk 4: Tanebaum Ch. 3, sect. 3.1,3.2,3.3, 3.4 wk 5: Tanebaum Ch. 3, sect. 3.5, 3.6
4	6,7	The Medium Access Sub-Layer: MA protocols ALOHA, CSMA/CD, High Speed LANS	wk 6: Tanebaum Ch. 4, sect. 4.1,4.2,4.3 wk 7: Tanebaum Ch. 4, sect. 4.4,4.5,4.6
5	8,9	The Network Layer: design issues, routing Algorithms. Congestion issues, internetworking, the IP protocol, ATM network layer	wk 8: Tanebaum Ch. 5, sect. 5.1,5.2 wk 9: Tanebaum Ch. 5, sect. 5.3,5.4,5.5,5.6
6	10,11	The Transport Layer: Transport protocols, TCP, UDP, ATM protocols, performance issues.	wk 10: Tanebaum Ch. 6, sect. 6.1,6.2,6.3, 6.4 wk 11: Tanebaum Ch. 6, sect. 6.5,6.6
7	12,13	The Application Layer: security, domain names, SNMP, mail, news & internet client server	wk 12: Tanebaum Ch. 7, sect. 7.1,7.2,7.3 wk 13: Tanebaum Ch. 7, sect. 7.4, 7.5, 7.6.1, 7.6.2, 7.7

The references are outlined are for those who wants to read ahead. I will supply more as the semester progresses.

Unit Materials:

Textbook:

Computer Networks by Andrew Tanenbaum 3rd edition (1996) Prentice-Hall

Web Site:

http://www.it.murdoch.edu.au/~hiew/b227

Contains:

unit outline – required reading
important notices – required reading at regular intervals
lecture notes, tutorial exercise sheets, assignments and project descriptions, etc.

Assessments:

Practical Component: 45%

Assignment 1: 10%

Assignment 2: 10%

Project: 25%

Final Examination: 55%

Due Dates:

Assignment	Due Date	Time
1	Friday of Week 5 24th March 2000	5.00 PM
2	Friday of Week 9 28th April 2000	5.00 PM
3	Friday of Week 12 26th May 2000	5.00 PM

To Pass the Unit:

To pass the unit, the student must submit all assignments and the project, as well as sit the final exam.

In order to achieve a particular letter grade you must attain certain minimum percentage scores in each of:

1.the practical component,

2.the final examination, and

3.overall.

Project:

For internal students, the project will be done in teams of three. External students will do the project individually.

Internal students can select your own teams for under the following arrangement:

Before the end of week 5 (24^th March) you submit a typed memo informing me of the members of the group and your student numbers. The memo must be signed by all three members.

Any students that have not formed or joined a team by then will be assigned to a team by me. The teams will be posted on the unit web site.

Each team will be assigned a team number which MUST be quoted on each page of the assignment submission.

Personal Consultations:

I will be available after every lecture to answer any questions you may have.

My other consultation times are on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays. The exact timetable is posted on my door at S&C 2.4.

Important Notices:

Finally, let me re-iterate that it is essential you keep up with the important notices I put on the web site.

http://www.it.murdoch.edu.au/~hiew/b227/ImportantNotices.html

Please refer to that file regularly, at least once a week.

If you have a problem accessing this file at least once a week, notify me ASAP for alternate arrangements.

[Back to Lecture Notes page]