Chapter 1

Overviews of data
communication and
networking

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000

 Data Communication
 Data communication is the exchange
of data (in the firm of 0s and 1s)
between two devices via some form
of transmission medium (such as a
wire cable). Data communication is
considered local if the
communicating devices are in the
same building or a similarly
geographical are, and is considered
remote if the devices are farther
apart.
Characteristics’ of Data communication
Delivery. The system must deliver data
to the correct destination.
Accuracy. Data that have been altered
in transmission and left uncorrected
are unusable.
Timeliness. The system must deliver
data in a timely manner. Data
delivered late are useless.
 Components of data communication :
 Message. The message is the information (data)
to be communicated
 Sender. The Sender is the device that sends the
data message.
 Receiver. The Receiver is the device that receives
the data message.
 Medium. The transmission Medium is the physical
path by which a message travels form sender to
receiver.
 Protocol. A Protocol is a set of rules that govern
data communication. It represents an agreement
between the communication devices.
  
 Application of Data Communication
network
 Marketing and sales
 Financial services
 Manufacturing
 Electronic Messaging
 Directory services
 information services
 Electronic data interchange (EDI)
 Teleconferencing
 Cellular telephone
 Cable television
 Network
 A network is a set of devices connected by media
links. A node can be a computer, printer, or any
other device capable of sending and / or receiving
data generated by other nodes on the network.
The links connecting the devices are often called
communication channels.
 Computer networking is defined as the
interconnection of computers and other
communication equipment's connected by a
communication channel.
 The communication channel (medium) will be
either wired communication channel or wireless
communication channel. Wired communication
channel includes the different cable types like
twisted pair cable, co-axial cable or fiber optic
cable. Wireless communication channel includes
 Network Criteria
 1.Performance: Performance can be measured in
many ways, including transit time and response
time.
 Transit time: is the amount of time required for a
message to travel from one device to another.
 Response time: is the elapsed time between an
inquiry and a response.
 The Performance of a network depends on a
number of factors, including the number of users,
the type of transmission medium, the capabilities
of the connected hardware, and the efficient of
the software
 Number of users
 Type of transmission medium
 Hardware
  Reliability
 In addition to accuracy of delivery, network reliability is
measured by frequency of failure, the time it takes a link to
recover form a failure, and the networks robustness in a
catastrophe.
 Frequency of failure
 Recovery time of a network after a failure.
 Catastrophe
 Security
 Network security issues include protecting data form
unauthorized access and viruses.
 Unauthorized access- Protection can be accomplished at a
number of levels. At the lowest level are user identification
codes and passwords. At a higher level are encryptions.
 Viruses.

3.8
 Data Transmission
Data may be transfer from one device to another by means of
some communication media. The electromagnetic or light
waves that transfer data from one device to another device
in encoded form are called signals. Data transmissions
across the network can occur in two forms i.e.:-
Analog Signal: - The transfer of data in the form of electrical
signals or continuous waves is called analog signal or
analog data transmission. An analog signal is measured in
volts and its frequency is in hertz (Hz).
 Advantages of Analog Signaling
 Allows multiple transmissions across the cable.

 Suffers less from attenuation.

 Disadvantages of Analog Signaling

 Suffers from EMI.

 Can only be transmitted in one direction without

sophisticated equipment.
  
 Digital Signal:-The transfer of data in the form of
digit is called digital signal or digital data
transmission. Digital signals consist of binary
digits 0 & 1. Electrical pulses are used to
represent binary digits. Data transmission
between computers is in the form of digital
signals.
 Advantages of Digital Signaling
 Equipment is cheaper and simpler than analog
equipment.
 Signals can be transmitted on a cable
bidirectional.
 Digital signals suffer less from EMI.
 Disadvantages Digital Signaling
 Only one signal can be sent at a time.
 Digital signals suffer from attenuation.
 Techniques of Data Communication
 There are two possible techniques of sending data from the
sender to receiver, i.e.:-
 Parallel Transmission: - In parallel transmission each bit of
character / data has a separate channel and all bits of a
character are transmitted simultaneously. Here the
transmission is parallel character by character.
 Serial Transmission:- In serial transmission, the data is sent
as one bit at a time having a signal channel for all the bit,
i.e.:
 Types of Serial Transmission
 On serial transmission it is very essential to know exactly
where one character ends and the next begins. The
necessary synchronization that helps determine which bit is
the first bit of the incoming character may be synchronous
or asynchronous.
 A. Asynchronous Serial Transmission
 Computer communication that occurs one bit at a time with
start and stop bits at the beginning and the end of each
character is called Asynchronous Serial Transmission. In
this type of transmission, there is no fixed time relationship
with one character.
 Advantages of Asynchronous Serial Transmission
 This type of transmission is very simple.
 This type of transmission is cheaper.
 Disadvantages of Asynchronous Serial Transmission
 This type of transmission is slow.

B. Synchronous Transmission
 In this method a clock signal is used and the sending as
well as the receiving devices is synchronized with this clock
signals. It doesn’t use start and stop bits but the character
are sent in character groups called block
 Advantages of Synchronous Transmission
 It is very fast as compared to Asynchronous Series
Transmission.
 Disadvantage of Synchronous Transmission
 It uses more expensive and complex equipment.
 Transmission Mode
 The term transmission mode is used to define the direction
of signal flow between two linked devices.
 1 Simplex:
 In simplex mode, the communication is unidirectional, as on
a one-way street. Only one of the two stations on a link can
transmit; the other can only receive.
 For Example: Keyboard and traditional monitors are both
example of simplex devices. The keyboard can only
introduce input; the monitor can only accept output.
 2 Half Duplex:
 In half duplex mode, each station can both transmit and
receive, but not at that same time. When one device is
sending, the other can only receive, and vice-versa.
 For Example: walkie-talkies and Citizen’s band (CB) radios
are both half-duplex.
  
 3 Full Duplex:
 In full duplex mode (also called duplex), both stations can
transmit and receive simultaneously. The full duplex mode
is like a two-way street with traffic flowing in both
directions at the same time.  
 TRANSMISSION IMPAIRMENT

Signals travel through transmission media, which are not

perfect. The imperfection causes signal impairment. This
means that the signal at the beginning of the medium is
not the same as the signal at the end of the medium.
What is sent is not what is received. Three causes of
impairment are attenuation, distortion, and noise.

Topics discussed in this section:

 Attenuation
 Distortion
 Noise
Figure 3.25 Causes of impairment
Attenuation
 Means loss of energy -> weaker
signal
 When a signal travels through a
medium it loses energy
overcoming the resistance of the
medium
 Amplifiers are used to compensate
for this loss of energy by
amplifying the signal.
Figure 3.26 Attenuation
Distortion
 Means that the signal changes its form
or shape
 Distortion occurs in composite signals
 Each frequency component has its own
propagation speed traveling through a
medium.
 The different components therefore
arrive with different delays at the
receiver.
 That means that the signals have
different phases at the receiver than
they did at the source.
Figure 3.28 Distortion
Noise
 There are different types of noise
 Thermal - random noise of electrons
in the wire creates an extra signal
 Induced - from motors and
appliances, devices act are
transmitter antenna and medium as
receiving antenna.
 Crosstalk - same as above but
between two wires.
 Impulse - Spikes that result from
power lines, lighning, etc.
 Data representation
techiniques
1. Text


In data communications, text is represented as a bit pattern, a

sequence of bits (Os or Is). Different sets of bit patterns
have been designed to represent text symbols.
 Each set is called a code, and the process of representing
symbols is called coding. Today, the prevalent coding system
is called Unicode, which uses 32 bits to represent a symbol
or character used in any language in the world.

3.23
 Con …
2.number
Numbers are also represented by bit patterns. However, a code
such as ASCII is not used to represent numbers; the number is
directly converted to a binary number to simplify Mathematical
operations.
3.Images
Images are also represented by bit patterns. In its simplest
form, an image is composed of a matrix of pixels (picture
elements), where each pixelis a small dot. The size of the pixel
depends on the resolution. For example, an image can be
divided into 1000 pixels or 10,000 pixels.

3.24
Con…
4.Audio
Audio refers to the recording or broadcasting of

sound or music. Audio is by nature different from

text, numbers, or images. It is continuous, not
discrete. Even when we
use a microphone to change voice or music to an

electric signal, we create a continuous signal.

5.Video

Video refers to the recording or broadcasting of a

picture or movie. Video can either be produced as a

continuous entity (e.g., by a TV camera), or it can be
a combination of images, each a discrete entity,
arranged to convey the idea of motion.
Modem
 Modem stands for modulator demodulator.
A modem changes the digital signal to an
analogue frequency, and sends this tone
across the analogue link. At the other end,
another modem receives the signal and
converts it back to digital.
 Modulation: The process a modem uses to
convert the digital data into analogue tones
which are sent over the dial up connection.
 Demodulator: The process a modem uses to
convert the analogue tones into digital data
which are sent over the dial up connection.
3.29
3.31
3.33
multiplexing
 Multiplexing is one of the bandwidth utilization
techniques
 Multiplexing is the set of techniques that allows the
simultaneous transmission of multiple signals
across a single data link.
 As data and telecommunications use increases, so
does traffic. We can accommodate increase by
continuing to add individual links each time a new
channel is needed; or wecan install higher-
bandwidth links and use each to carry multiple
 Con …

 In a multiplexed system, n lines share the bandwidth of one

link. Figure 6.1 shows
 the basic format of a multiplexed system. The lines on the
left direct their transmission streams to a
multiplexer(MUX), which combines them into a single
stream (many-to-one).At the receiving end, that stream is
fed into a DE multiplexer (DEMUX), which separates the
stream back into its component transmissions (one-to-
many) and
 directs them to their corresponding lines. In the figure, the
word link refers to the physical path. The word channel
refers to the portion of a link that carries a transmission
3.39
3.40