13 Things To Know For a CNIS/Administration

Professional Interview.
1.What is MTU?
MTU stands for maximum transmission
unit. This is the largest PDU (protocol data unit)
that the layer can pass on. There are certain
standards within a protocol which make it so
that the MTU can be manipulated. Not all
protocols however allow the MTU to be edited.
2. What is a VPN?
Virtual private networks are logical
networks created between pieces of
equipment. The most common instance of this
is when a user is at home and needs to
connect to their business network in order to
access the business resources.
3. What is a VLAN?
VLAN stands for Virtual Local Area Network.
Local area networks are typically housed on 1
switch. This allows a group of hosts to think
that they are on the same broadcast domain
even though they may or may not be in the
same physical area. SO devices can be
connected through different physical switches
but be tricked into thinking that they are
connected to one. It is a similar concept as
subnets.

4.What is a metric?
A metric is a unit of measurement which
helps a router determine the best path possible
for data. There are multiple metrics which can
be used and combined in order to determine
the best path such as measuring link use,
connection speed, reliability, bandwidth,
current load, hops etc
5.What is ARP/RARP?
ARP stands for Address Resolution Protocol.
RARP stands for Reverse Address Resolution
Protocol. ARP uses a request for an IP address
and translates it to a MAC address. So
computer A might say, I want to speak with
192.168.1.55 and the ARP table will tell it that
192.168.1.55 is at FF:23:AB:9A:BC. RARP works
the exact opposite. Something may say hi, Im
FF:23:AB:9A:BC I need an IP, they will then
have an IP assigned to them.
6.What is a default route?
A default route is the network route which
a router uses when it doesnt know the route
for a IP packet's destination address.
7.What is a MAC address?
MAC stands for Media Access Control. This
is a unique identifier which is assigned to

network interfaces. Whether they are wired or

wireless each has its own MAC. This pertains to
phones, computers, laptops, TVs etc. They are
formed by regulations made by the IEEE.
8.What is a broadcast storm?
A broadcast storm is essentially like a fork
bomb on switches. A node will ask switch C
what the address for node A is. If switch C
doesnt know it will ask another node, that
node then asks another. Each of those nodes
re-broadcast the message from all of the
previous nodes, therefore sending
simultaneous responses and requests to the
previous nodes which then in turn broadcast
out their answer or question. This ends up
causing a large amount of congestion on the
network.
9.What is the purpose of VRRP?
Virtual Router Redundancy Protocol (VRRP)
was designed to increase the availability of the
default Gateway. This will allow it to provide
service to hosts on the same subnet. This
increased reliability is achieved through the
process of advertising a virtual router which
the nodes can utilize. This requires multiple
Routers to pull off. One will act as a master and
the other is a slave which takes over if the
master goes down.

10.

What is a runt, Giant, and collision?

A runt is a packet which is typically
malformed causing it to be too small to
traverse the network. Ethernet and other
protocols, often require that packets be a
minimum number of bytes in order to move
across the network.
A Giant is the exact opposite; it is a packet
which is too large to move across the network
in a certain protocol. These also are caused by
faulty equipment or mal formed packets. These
however can be created by accident by a
person with malicious intent accidentally
setting a setting too high while trying to flood a
network.
With regards to all traffic over the network,
nodes determine when the network is available
.Sometimes two nodes in different places try to
send data at the same time. When this
happens the same result will happen as if two
people are trying to walk into the same house
door at the same time. BANG! A collision.

11.

Describe a TCP connection sequence.

3 way handshake is the more common
term for this. ACK SYN SYNACK. These are
Acknowledgement, Synchronization, and
Synchronization Acknowledgement. So
machine one says Hey Id like to communicate
with you Machine 2 says Ok, this is the

message number x you need to get from me so

that we are communicating on the same level
then machine one says Ok message number
x then they both can communicate with each
other.
12. What is the difference between TCP and
UDP?
TCP (Transmission Control Protocol) offers
error correction regarding messages it sends.
This makes it one of the most popular protocols
used on the internet and in networking in
general.
UDP (User Datagram Protocol) however,
does not offer this error checking, yet it is still
highly used. Why? You may ask. It is because
there are things like audio and video which we
stream which would get messed up if the
receiver were to say to the sender that it
needed packet xyz re-sent because the data
wasnt complete.
13. What is the difference between a hub,
switch, and router?
A Switch learns and directs traffic to the
correct users. It does this by reading the
physical address where the packets are being
sent to and sends it to the corresponding
machine based on its switch table. The switch
table is a table which consists of a physical

address and which switch port the address is

plugged into.
Like a switch a hub connects multiple LAN
segments and sends traffic from one place to
another. The difference though is that a hub
sends all traffic to all of its ports. So even if
message xyz is supposed to go to the
computer on port 1 it will be broadcasted to
port 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8. Or however many
ports you have.
Routers connect different segments of
networks as opposed to different segments of
LANs. They also connect different networks to
other networks. For instance you can have a
177.145.211.0 network connected to a
177.155.234.0 network. They use the actual IP
to determine where to direct traffic. What is
different about routers though is that they can
be secured much more dynamically than
switches (hubs have virtually no security). For
instance a router connects a home network to
the ISP and performs NAT (network address
translation) as a security feature.