[Internet Technology Assignment 1]

[Emily Ha]

[Student No:747184]

Lecturer name: [Udaya]

Question 1
Part A
I. Satellite Internet connections are an example of high bandwidth(transmitting at
gigabits/sec to various users) and high latency. It's latency is mainly caused by the
propagation delay due to the vast distance between the Earth's ground station and the
satellite.
II. In contrast, a 56kbps modem calling a computer in the same home will have low
bandwidth and low latency.
Part B
Max. data rate = 2B log2V bits/sec
= 2 x 9600 x log2(32)
= 2 x 9600 x 5
= 96000 bps

Question 2
Part A
Two ways the TCP/IP and OSI are the same:
- Based on the concept of a stack of independent protocols.
- Both models have interchangeable transport and network layers and their operation
is based upon packet-switched technology.

Two ways the TCP/IP and OSI are different:

- The OSI model supports both connectionless and connection oriented
communication in the network layer, but only connection-oriented communication
in the transport layer, where it counts (because the transport service is
visible to the users). The TCP/IP model supports only one mode in the network
layer (connectionless) but both in the transport layer, giving the users a choice.
In other words, OSI transport layer guarantees the delivery of packets where as the
TCP/IP transport later does not.

- TCP/IP has 4 layers and the OSI has 7 layers.

B. Message length = M bytes
Header length = h bytes
Protocol layers = n
Header bytes per packet = n*h
Total bytes per packet = (M+nh)
Fraction of bandwidth filled with headers = nh/(M+nh)

Question 3
Part A
I would choose the coaxial cable over the geostationary satellite link to transmit a phone call
between Melbourne and Sydney. The coaxial cable has high bandwidth, exceptional error
performance and negligible propagation delay over relatively long distances and excellent
security. It's thick inner core gives it good signal attenuation, its outer shield protects it from
Electromagnetic Interference and Radio Frequency Interference(RFI). Furthermore, the
geostationary satellite link would experience a one-half second or longer delay due to the
distance(between the satellite and Earth) the signal has to travel during transmission. Whilst
data transmissions and television, which are services that flow in one direction to many points
are less sensitive to the initial transmission delay, for signals transmitted during a phone call
which requires data to flow in both directions and intended to be transmitted to one
particular point, the delay will impact the quality of the call.
Part B

Total size of image

= 640 x 340 x 3
= 921,600 bytes
As 1 byte = 8 bits
= 921,000 x 8 (Convert to bits)
= 7,373,800 bits

Transmissions :

Over 56-kbps model channel( 56000 bits/sec )

= 7,372,800/56000
= 131.657sec
Over a 1-Mbps cable (1,000,000 bits/sec)
= 7,372,800/1,000,000
= 7.373 sec
Over a 100-Mbps Ethernet (100,000,000 bits/sec)
= 7,372,800/100,000,000
= 0.074 sec
Over gigabit Ethernet (1000,000,000 bits/sec)
= 7,372,800/ 1000,000,000
= 0.007 sec

Question 4.
For the first scheme, since they are individually acknowledged, if a packet(P) is lost or
corrupted, it is easily detected and will be sent again. In the second scheme, if the file(F) is
lost or corrupted, the entire file will be sent again. A packet is much smaller in size in
comparison to an entire file. Thus, it is much more efficient to utilise the first scheme in
consideration of their error correction technique.
With respect to file transmission overhead, the first scheme has a linear space complexity.
The header size attached to each packet is the same regardless of their message size. The
formula works out to be (F/P)* Acknowledgement size(A). In the second scheme, the
transmission overhead is only one acknowledgement bit and results in a constant space
complexity with respect to the total packets. Also, with the first scheme's message
segmentation, the total mount of header bytes is more than the second scheme. In the first
scheme, the A must be smaller than the second scheme's A. This is determined by the tradeoff
between A and P in respect to the file's size.
Finally, for a large file, it is recommended to use the first scheme because in error correction,
it results in less bandwidth if the file is corrupt or lost. But careful consideration is needed to
find the optimum performance from choosing a balanced P and A.

5.b. This has no impact on the operations at layers k-1 or k+1.

Question 6
a.
The Open Systems Interconnect(OSI) mode has seven layers. I will describe the lowest layer of
the heirachy first.

Physical Layer
Responsible for the transmission and reception of unstructured raw bit stream over a physical
medium. It determines the correct physical medium for
transmission(electrical/optical,mechanical and functional), including the physical volts/db in
a given signal. One of its techniques is to determine whether the encoded bit will be
transmitted as digital or analog signals.

Data Link Layer

This layer basically transfers data from one node to a destination node over the physical
layer. It provides error-free transmissions to high layers by incorporating frame sequencing,
frame traffic control, frame acknowledgement, error-detection techniques, frame delimiting
and is able to determine whether the node has the rights to use the physical layer.

Network Layer
This layer decides which physical the path the data should take based on many factors, such
as conditions and priority. Also, known as routing. It also has control over the operation of the
communication's subnet. It is also responsible for frame fragmentation if the maximum
transmission unit(MTU) is deemed less than the frame size, the translation from logical
addresses to physical addresses and subnet usage accounting.

Transport Layer
An end-to-end layer that ensures data is error-free, no losses, in-order and no duplications
between. It provides message acknowledgement, message segmentation into smaller units

(reassembled by destination transport layer), message traffic control, transmission reliability

and session multiplexing(dividing into different streams). Protocols used here include TCP and
UDP.

Session Layer
This layer establishes the session between two applications on different machines and
supports their communication over the network, performs security checks, name recognition,
logging. It is also capable of using and terminating a connection.

Presentation Layer
This layer is able to re-format the data into an acceptable form to be received by the
destination's application layer. It is able to do perform character-code translations, data
conversions(bit order, integer-floating point), data compression, and data-encryption.

Application Layer
It provides services to the software on the system which requests network services. Common
functions include resource sharing, remote file access, remote printer access, network
management, electronic messaging, virtual terminals and inter-process communication.

6.b. Two Disadvantages of using layered protocol

The most significant disadvantage is the data overhead due to the processing of seven
layers(OSI model) causing degraded performance. Data overhead is built up by the multiple
headers attached to the data caused by abstraction barriers between layers. Another
disadvantage may be the complexity in implementing the standards as there are so many
layers and each requires one protocol per layer.

7.
Companies often use the known location of their users for market analysis in order to
streamline targeted advertisements specific for you. This will subject users to many unwanted
marketing strategies and may cause frustration. Sometimes these companies have a legal
obligation to provide your location details to the police for investigation. This is a privacy leak
for the user but nonetheless, compliant with the law. Another negative reason may involve
network companies that provide your data to unknown companies as a form of data gathering.
This exposes you to the risk of malware from third-party companies.Hence most of the
negative reasons are associated with an intrusion of privacy. Positive reasons include being
able to use location tracking compatible applications which provide convenience for a range
of requests. Perhaps if you were stranded or lost one day, these companies would be the first
point of contact to find your location and save your life.

8. The 3 main functions of the Data Layer Link :

1. Transfer data from the network layer on the source machine to the network layer on the
destination machine. Framing is done by taking received packets and encapsulating them into
frames for transmission. It is also the process where checksums are generated for the unit.
2. Handle transmission errors by managing the timers, sequence numbers for outgoing
frames and special control frames(acknowledgement signals).
3. Controlling the flow of data so slow receivers are not overloaded by fast senders. This
may be handled by the feedback-based flow control protocol where the receiver sends
information regarding its status and permission to request more data. Another approach is the
rate-based flow control which imposes a transmission data rate between the sender and
receiver.
Checksum is an error-detecting code which the Data Link Layer may use to find errors in the
data. It is often known as a group of check bits associated with a message. Checksum works
by attaching a numerical value based on the number of set bits in the message in the
transmitted message, often at the end of the message as complement to the sum function. By
summing the complete codeword, data bits and checksum at the receiving station and
6

checking if the total is zero(no error), errors may be detected. One example of a checksum is
a group of parity bits.

9. Selective repeat requires more buffer at the receiver. The receiver discards the first bad
frame(out-of-sequence) it receives but stores the subsequent good frames that are out-ofsequence packets in the buffer until the missing packets arrive. Only the oldest
unacknowledged frame will be resent and once that is received, the receiver will transfer all
the frames it has buffered sequentially to the network layer. This creates a window size that
is larger than 1. On the other hand, Go-Back-N only accepts frames which are in sequence and
drops the ones with unexpected sequence numbers(caused by lost frames in transmission). It
sends no acknowledgements for the discarded frames. Hence, the receiver needs a buffer
space of a single frame.