KTU 2019 SCHEME VERSION 1.

ECT423 COMPUTER NETWORKS

S7 ECE

QUESTION ANSWER BANK

UKF COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING AND

TECHNOLOGY, PARIPPALLY, KOLLAM

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SYLLABUS

PART A

1. What is meant by protocol in a computer network

A protocol defines the format and the order of messages exchanged between two or more
communicating entities, as well as the actions taken on the transmission and/or receipt of a
message or other event
It specifies
• Format of messages
• Meaning of messages
• Rules for exchange
• Procedures for handling problems

2. Differentiate connection less and connection oriented

Connection-oriented
a. Circuit switched
i. Persistent connection set up between sender and receiver
b. Example: telephone system
Connectionless
c. Packet switched
i. Data partitioned into packets and
sent individually from sender to receiver
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ii. Reassembled at receiver

3. Differentiate circuit switching and packet switching

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4. Compare virtual circuit networks and datagram networks

5. Explain access networks and its types

Access network—the network that physically connects an end system to the first router (also
known as the “edge router”) on a path from the end system to any other distant end system.
Residential access: point to point access
Dialup via modem
- up to 56Kbps direct access to router (often less)
- Can’t surf and phone at same time: can’t be “always on”
DSL: digital subscriber line
- deployment: telephone company (typically)
- up to 1 Mbps upstream (today typically < 256 kbps)
- up to 8 Mbps downstream (today typically < 1 Mbps)
- dedicated physical line to telephone central office

Residential access: cable modems

HFC: hybrid fiber coax

- asymmetric: up to 30Mbps downstream, 2 Mbps upstream

- network of cable and fiber attaches homes to ISP router
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- homes share access to router

- deployment: available via cable TV companies

Company access: local area networks

- company/univ local area network (LAN) connects end system to edge router
- Ethernet: 10 Mbs, 100Mbps, 1Gbps, 10Gbps Ethernet
- modern configuration: end systems connect

Wireless area networks

- shared wireless access network connects end system to router

- via base station aka “access point”
- wireless LANs:
- 802.11b/g (WiFi): 11 or 54 Mbps
- wider-area wireless access
- provided by telco operator
- ~1Mbps over cellular system (EVDO, HSDPA)
- next up (?): WiMAX (10’s Mbps) over wide area

Home networks

Typical home network components:

- DSL or cable modem

- router/firewall/NAT
- Ethernet
- wireless access point

6. Explain coaxial cable, fiber optic cable and twisted pair

Twisted pair
- two insulated copper wires
- Category 3: traditional phone wires, 10 Mbps Ethernet
- Category 5: 100Mbps Ethernet

Coaxial cable

- two concentric copper conductors

- Bidirectional
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- baseband:
- single channel on cable
- legacy Ethernet
- broadband:
- multiple channels on cable
- HFC

Fiber optic cable

- glass fiber carrying light pulses, each pulse a bit
- high-speed operation:
- high-speed point-to-point transmission (e.g., 10’s100’s Gps)
- low error rate: repeaters spaced far apart ; immune to electromagnetic noise

7. Explain HTTP message format

HTTP REQUEST MESSAGE

HTTP RESPONSE MESSAGE

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8. Explain SMTP
SMTP is the principal application-layer protocol for Internet electronic mail. It uses the reliable
data transfer service of TCP to transfer mail from the sender’s mail server to the recipient’s
mail server. As with most application-layer protocols, SMTP has two sides: a client side, which
executes on the sender’s mail server, and a server side, which executes on the recipient’s mail
server. Both the client and server sides of SMTP run on every mail server. When a mail server
sends mail to other mail servers, it acts as an SMTP client. When a mail server receives mail
from other mail servers, it acts as an SMTP server.
 SMTP uses persistent connections
 SMTP requires message (header & body) to be in 7-bit ASCII
 SMTP server uses CRLF.CRLF to determine end of message

9. Explain POP3
 POP3 is an extremely simple mail access protocol.
 It is defined in [RFC 1939], which is short and quite readable.
 Because the protocol is so simple, its functionality is rather limited.
 POP3 begins when the user agent (the client) opens a TCP connection to the mail server
(the server) on port 110.
 With the TCP connection established, POP3 progresses through three phases:
authorization, transaction, and update.

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 During the first phase, authorization, the user agent sends a username and a password
(in the clear) to authenticate the user.
 During the second phase, transaction, the user agent retrieves messages; also during this
phase, the user agent can mark messages for deletion, remove deletion marks, and
obtain mail statistics.
 The third phase, update, occurs after the client has issued the quit command, ending the
POP3 session; at this time, the mail server deletes the messages that were marked for
deletion

10. Explain IMAP

 IMAP is a mail access protocol.
 It has many more features than POP3, but it is also significantly more complex.
 An IMAP server will associate each message with a folder; when a message first arrives
at the server, it is associated with the recipient’s INBOX folder.
 The recipient can then move the message into a new, user-created folder, read the
message, delete the message, and so on.
 The IMAP protocol provides commands to allow users to create folders and move
messages from one folder to another.
 IMAP also provides commands that allow users to search remote folders for messages
matching specific criteria.
 Note that, unlike POP3, an IMAP server maintains user state information across IMAP
sessions—for example, the names of the folders and which messages are associated
with which folders.
 Another important feature of IMAP is that it has commands that permit a user agent to
obtain components of messages.
 For example, a user agent can obtain just the message header of a message or just one
part of a multipart MIME message.
 This feature is useful when there is a low-bandwidth connection (for example, a slow-
speed modem link) between the user agent and its mail server.
 With a low bandwidth connection, the user may not want to download all of the
messages in its mailbox, particularly avoiding long messages that might contain, for
example, an audio or video clip.

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11. Explain DNS

Domain Name System
 distributed database implemented in hierarchy of many name servers
 application-layer protocol: hosts, name servers communicate to resolve names (address/name
translation)
DNS services
 hostname to IP address translation
 host aliasing
• canonical, alias names
 mail server aliasing
 load distribution
• replicated Web servers: many IP addresses correspond to one name

Root DNS

com DNS org DNS edu DNS

yahoo.c pbs.org poly.edu umass.e

amazon.
om DNS du
com DNS

12. Explain DNS messages and protocols

query and reply messages, both with same message format

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PART B
1. Explain circuit switched network

 A circuit-switched network consists of a set of switches connected by physical links.

 A connection between two stations is a dedicated path made of one or more links
 each connection uses only one dedicated channel on each link.
 Each link manually divided into n channels by using frequency division
multiplexing or time division multiplexing.

 The end systems, such as computers or telephones, are directly connected to a switch
 When end system A needs to communicate with end system M, system A needs to request
a connection to M that must be accepted by all switches as well as by M itself. This is called
the setup phase; a circuit (channel) is reserved on each link, and the combination of circuits
or channels defines the dedicated path. After the dedicated path made of connected circuits
(channels) is established, data transfer can take place. After all data have been transferred,
the circuits are torn down.
o Circuit switching takes place at the physical layer.
o Before starting communication, the stations must make a reservation for the
resources to be used during the communication. These resources, such as channels
(bandwidth in FDM and time slots in TDM), switch buffers, switch processing
time, and switch input/output ports, must remain dedicated during the entire
duration of data transfer until the teardown phase.

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o Data transferred between the two stations are not packetized

o There is no addressing involved during data transfer
 Three Phases
 The actual communication requires three phases: setup, data transfer and connection teardown.
 1.Setup Phase
 Before the two parties(or multiple parties in a conference call) can communicate, a
dedicated circuit (combination of channels in links) needs to be established. The end
systems are normally connected through dedicated lines to the switches.
 System A needs to connect to system M, it sends a setup request that includes the address
of system M to switch I. Switch I finds a channel between itself and switch IV that can be
dedicated for this purpose. Switch I then sends the request to switch IV which finds a
dedicated channel between itself and switch III. Switch III informs system M of system A's
intention at this time.
 In the next step to making a connection, an acknowledgment from system M needs to be
sent in the opposite direction to system A. Only after system A receives this
acknowledgment is the connection established.
 2. Data Transfer Phase
 After the establishment of the dedicated circuit (channels), the two parties can transfer data.

3. Teardown Phase
 When one of the parties needs to disconnect, a signal is sent to each switch to
release theresources.
 Efficiency
 circuit-switched networks are not as efficient as the other two types of networks because
resources are allocated during the entire duration of the connection.
 These resources are unavailable to other connections.
 Delay
 Although a circuit-switched network normally has low efficiency, the delay in this type
of networkis minimal.
 During data transfer the data are not delayed at each switch; the resources are allocated
for theduration of the connection.
 The total delay is due to the time needed to create the connection, transfer data, and
disconnectthe circuit

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 The delay caused by the setup is the sum of four parts: the propagation time of the source
computer request (slope of the first gray box), the request signal transfer time (height of the
first gray box), the propagation time of the acknowledgment from the destination computer
(slope of the second gray box), and the signal transfer time of the acknowledgement (height
of the second gray box).
 The delay due to data transfer is the sum of two parts: the propagation time (slope of the
colored box) and data transfer time(height of the colored box),
 The third box shows the time needed to tear down the circuit.

2. Explain Datagram network

o In datagram network, each packet is treated independently of all others

o Packets in this approach are referred to as datagrams

o Datagram switching is normally done at the network layer.

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o Figure shows how the datagram approach is used to deliver four packets from on
A to station X.
o The switches in a datagram network are traditionally referred to as routers.
o In this example, all four packets (or datagrams) belong to the same message, but
may travel different paths to reach their destination. This is so because the links
may be involved in carrying packets from other sources and do not have the
necessary bandwidth available to carry all the packets from A to X. This approach
can cause the datagrams of a transmission to arrive at their destination out of order
with different delays between the packets. Packets may also be lost or dropped
because of a lack of resources.
o The datagram networks are referred to as connectionless networks. The
connectionless means that the switch (packet switch) does not keep information
about the connection state.

o Routing tables
o In this type of network each switch has a routing table which is based on the
destination address. The routing tables are are updated periodically. The destination

addresses and the corresponding forwarding output ports are recorded in the tables.

o Destination Address

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o Every packet in a datagram network carries a header that contains, among

other information, the destination address of the packet.
o Efficiency
o The efficiency of a datagram network is better than that of a circuit-switched
network; resources are allocated only when there are packet are to be
transferred.
o Delay
o Delay may be greater delay in a datagram network than in a virtual-circuit network.
o there are no setup and teardown phases, each packet may experience a wait at a
switch before it is forwarded.
o The packet travels through two switches. There are three transmission times (3T),
three propagation delays (slopes 3t of the lines), and two waiting times (w1 + w2).
We ignore the processing time in each switch. The total delay is
 Total delay = 3T + 3t+w1 + w2

3. Explain Virtual Circuit network

 A virtual-circuit network is a cross between a circuit-switched network and a date
network. It has some characteristics of both.
1. As in a circuit-switched network, there are setup and teardown phases in addition to
the datatransfer phase.
2. Resources can be allocated during the setup phase, as in a circuit-switched networks
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or ondemand, as in a datagram network.

3. As in a datagram network, data are packetized and each packet carries an address
in theheader.
4. As in a circuit-switched network, all packets follow the same path established
during the connection
5. A virtual-circuit network is normally implemented in the data link layer, while a
circuit-switchednetwork is implemented in the physical layer and a datagram network
in the network layer.

o Addressing
o In a virtual-circuit network, two types of addressing are involved: global and
local(virtual- circuit identifier).
 Global Addressing : A source or a destination needs to have a global
address anaddress that can in the scope of the network
 Virtual-Circuit Identifier :The identifier that is actually used for data
transfer is called the virtual -circuit identifier (VCI).
 A VCI, unlike a global address, is a small number that has only switch scope;
 It is used by a frame between two switches. When a frame arrives at a

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switch, it has a VCI,when it leaves, it has a different VCI.

 It is used by a frame between two switches. When a frame arrives at a

switch, it has a VCI,when it leaves, it has a different VCI.
o Three phases
o 1. Setup Phase
 Two steps are required: the setup request and the acknowledgment.
 Setup Request

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 Source A sends a setup frame to switch 1.

 Switch 1 receives the setup request frame. It knows that a frame
going from A to B goes out through port 3. The switch, in the setup
phase, acts as a packet switch it has a routing table which is different
from the switching table. The switch creates an entry in its table for
this virtual circuit, but it is only able to fill three of the four columns.
The switch assigns the incoming port (1) and chooses an available
incoming VCI
(14) and the outgoing port (3). It does not yet know the outgoing
VCI, which will be found during the acknowledgment step. The
switch then forwards the frame through port 3 to switch 2
 Switch 2 receives the setup request frame. The same events happen
here as at switch 1; three columns of the table are completed: in this
case, incoming port (1), incoming VCI (66), and outgoing port (2).
 Switch 3 receives the setup request frame. Again, three columns are
completed: incoming port (2), incoming VCI (22), and outgoing port
(3).
 Destination B receives the setup frame, and if it is ready to receive
frames from A.it assigns a VCI to the incoming frames that come
from A, in this case 77. This VCI lets the destination know that the
frames come from A, and not other sources.
o Acknowledgment

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 A special frame, called the acknowledgment frame, completes the entries

in theswitching tables.
 The destination sends an acknowledgment to switch 3. The
acknowledgment carries the global source and destination addresses
so the switch knows which entry in the table is to be completed. The
frame also carries VCI 77, chosen by the destination as the incoming
VCI for frames from A. Switch 3 uses this VCI to complete the
outgoing VCI column for this entry. Note that 77 is the incoming
VCI for destination B, but the outgoing VCI for switch 3.
 Switch 3 sends an acknowledgment to switch 2 that contains its
incoming VCI in the table, chosen in the previous step. Switch 2
uses this as the outgoing VCI in the table.
 Switch 2 sends an acknowledgment to switch 1 that contains its
incoming VCI in the table, chosen in the previous step. Switch 1
uses this as the outgoing VCI in the table.
 Finally switch 1 sends an acknowledgment to source A that contains
its incoming VCI in the table. chosen in the previous step.
 The source uses this as the outgoing VCI for the data frames to be
sent to destination B.
o 2.Data Transfer Phase

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 To transfer a frame from a source to its destination, all switches need to

have a table entry for this virtual circuit. The table, in its simplest form, has
four columns. This means that the switch holds four pieces of information
for each virtual circuit that is already set up.
 Figure shows how a frame from source A reaches destination B and how its
VCI changes during the trip. Each switch changes the VCI and routes the
frame.
o 3.Teardown Phase
 In this phase, source A, after sending all frames to B, sends a special
teardown request. Destination B responds with a teardown confirmation
switches delete the corresponding entry from their tables.
o Efficiency
 resource reservation in a virtual-circuit network can be made the setup or
can beon demand during the data transfer phase.
 advantage in a virtual-circuit network even if resource allocation is on
demand. The source can check the availability of the resources, without
actual reserving it.
o Delay

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 The packet is traveling through two switches (routers). There are three
transmission times (3T), three propagation times (3t), data transfer depicted
by sloping lines, a setup delay (which includes transmission and
propagation in two directions and a teardown delay (which includes
transmission and propagation in one direction). We ignore the processing
time in each switch.
 The total delay time is
 Total delay = 3T + 3t + setup delay + teardown delay

4. Explain different types of delay

A packet can be transmitted on a link only if there is no other packet currently being transmitted on the
link and if there are no other packets preceding it in the queue; if the link is currently busy or if there are
other packets already queued for the link, the newly arriving packet will then join the queue.

Processing Delay
The time required to examine the packet’s header and determine where to direct the packet is part of the
processing delay. The processing delay can also include other factors, such as the time needed to check
for bit-level errors in the packet that occurred in transmitting the packet’s bits from the upstream node
to router A. Processing delays A B Nodal processing Queueing (waiting for transmission) Transmission
Propagation.The nodal delay at router A in high-speed routers are typically on the order of microseconds

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or less. After this nodal processing, the router directs the packet to the queue that precedes the link to
router B. (In Chapter 4 we’ll study the details of how a router operates.)

Queuing Delay
At the queue, the packet experiences a queuing delay as it waits to be transmitted onto the link. The
length of the queuing delay of a specific packet will depend on the number of earlier-arriving packets
that are queued and waiting for transmission onto the link. If the queue is empty and no other packet is
currently being transmitted, then our packet’s queuing delay will be zero. On the other hand, if the traffic
is heavy and many other packets are also waiting to be transmitted, the queuing delay will be long. We
will see shortly that the number of packets that an arriving packet might expect to find is a function of
the intensity and nature of the traffic arriving at the queue. Queuing delays can be on the order of
microseconds to milliseconds in practice.

Transmission Delay
Assuming that packets are transmitted in a first-come-first-served manner, as is common in packet-
switched networks, our packet can be transmitted only after all the packets that have arrived before it
have been transmitted. Denote the length of the packet by L bits, and denote the transmission rate of the
link from router A to router B by R bits/sec. For example, for a 10 Mbps Ethernet link, the rate is R = 10
Mbps; for a 100 Mbps Ethernet link, the rate is R = 100 Mbps. The transmission delay is L/R. This is
the amount of time required to push (that is, transmit) all of the packet’s bits into the link. Transmission
delays are typically on the order of microseconds to milliseconds in practice.

Propagation Delay
Once a bit is pushed into the link, it needs to propagate to router B. The time required to propagate from
the beginning of the link to router B is the propagation delay. The bit propagates at the propagation speed
of the link. The propagation speed depends on the physical medium of the link (that is, fiber optics,
twisted-pair copper wire, and so on) and is in the range of 2 108 meters/sec to 3 108 meters/sec which is
equal to, or a little less than, the speed of light. The propagation delay is the distance between two routers
divided by the propagation speed. That is, the propagation delay is d/s, where d is the distance between
router A and router B and s is the propagation speed of the link. Once the last bit of the packet propagates
to node B, it and all the preceding bits of the packet are stored in router B. The whole process then
continues with router B now performing the forwarding. In wide-area networks, propagation delays are
on the order of milliseconds
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5. Explain IP stack

Application Layer
The application layer is where network applications and their application-layer protocols reside. The
Internet’s application layer includes many protocols, such as the HTTP protocol (which provides for
Web document request and transfer), SMTP (which provides for the transfer of e-mail messages), and
FTP (which provides for the transfer of files between two end systems). We’ll see that certain network
functions, such as the translation of human-friendly names for Internet end systems like www.ietf.org
to a 32-bit network address, are also done with the help of a specific application-layer protocol,
namely, the domain name system (DNS). It is very easy to create and deploy our own new application-
layer protocols. An application-layer protocol is distributed over multiple end systems, with the
application in one end system using the protocol to exchange packets of information with the
application in another end system. We’ll refer to this packet of information at the application layer as a
message

Transport Layer
The Internet’s transport layer transports application-layer messages between application endpoints. In
the Internet there are two transport protocols, TCP and UDP, either of which can transport application-
layer messages. TCP provides a connection-oriented service to its applications. This service includes
guaranteed delivery of application-layer messages to the destination and flow control (that is,
sender/receiver speed matching). TCP also breaks long messages into shorter segments and provides a
congestion-control mechanism, so that a source throttles its transmission rate when the network is
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congested. The UDP protocol provides a connectionless service to its applications. This is a no-frills
service that provides no reliability, no flow control, and no congestion control

Network Layer
The Internet’s network layer is responsible for moving network-layer packets known as datagrams
from one host to another. The Internet transport-layer protocol (TCP or UDP) in a source host passes a
transport-layer segment and a destination address to the network layer, just as you would give the
postal service a letter with a destination address. The network layer then provides the service of
delivering the segment to the transport layer in the destination host. The Internet’s network layer
includes the celebrated IP Protocol, which defines the fields in the datagram as well as how the end
systems and routers act on these fields. There is only one IP protocol, and all Internet components that
have a network layer must run the IP protocol. The Internet’s network layer also contains routing
protocols that determine the routes that datagrams take between sources and destinations. The Internet
has many routing protocols. As we saw in Section 1.3, the Internet is a network of networks, and
within a network, the network administrator can run any routing protocol desired. Although the
network layer contains both the IP protocol and numerous routing protocols, it is often simply referred
to as the IP layer, reflecting the fact that IP is the glue that binds the Internet together.

Link Layer
The Internet’s network layer routes a datagram through a series of routers between the source and
destination. To move a packet from one node (host or router) to the next node in the route, the network
layer relies on the services of the link layer. In particular, at each node, the network layer passes the
datagram down to the link layer, which delivers the datagram to the next node along the route. At this
next node, the link layer passes the datagram up to the network layer. The services provided by the link
layer depend on the specific link-layer protocol that is employed over the link. For example, some link-
layer protocols provide reliable delivery, from transmitting node, over one link, to receiving node.
Note that this reliable delivery service is different from the reliable delivery service of TCP, which
provides reliable delivery from one end system to another. Examples of linklayer protocols include
Ethernet, WiFi, and the cable access network’s DOCSIS protocol. As datagrams typically need to
traverse several links to travel from source to destination, a datagram may be handled by different link-
layer protocols at different links along its route. For example, a datagram may be handled by Ethernet
on one link and by PPP on the next link. The network layer will receive a different service from each
of the different link-layer protocols.
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Physical Layer
While the job of the link layer is to move entire frames from one network element to an adjacent
network element, the job of the physical layer is to move the individual bits within the frame from one
node to the next. The protocols in this layer are again link dependent and further depend on the actual
transmission medium of the link (for example, twisted-pair copper wire, single-mode fiber optics). For
example, Ethernet has many physical-layer protocols: one for twisted-pair copper wire, another for
coaxial cable, another for fiber, and so on. In each case, a bit is moved across the link in a different
way

6. Explain HTTP

HTTP: hypertext transfer protocol

 Web’s application layer protocol
 client/server model
• client: browser that requests, receives, (using HTTP protocol) and “displays” Web
objects
• server: Web server sends (using HTTP protocol) objects in response to requests

The HyperText Transfer Protocol (HTTP), the Web’s

application-layer protocol, is at the heart of the Web. It is defined in [RFC 1945] and [RFC 2616].
HTTP is implemented in two programs: a client program and a server program. The client program and

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server program, executing on different end systems, talk to each other by exchanging HTTP messages.
HTTP defines the structure of these messages and how the client and server exchange the messages

HTTP defines how Web clients request Web pages from Web servers and how servers transfer Web
pages to clients. When a user requests a Web page (for example, clicks on a hyperlink), the browser
sends HTTP request messages for the objects in the page to the server. The server receives the requests
and responds with HTTP response messages that contain the objects. HTTP uses TCP as its underlying
transport protocol (rather than running on top of UDP). The HTTP client first initiates a TCP
connection with the server. Once the connection is established, the browser and the server processes
access TCP through their socket interfaces. On the client side the socket interface is the door between
the client process and the TCP connection; on the server side it is the door between the server process
and the TCP connection. The client sends HTTP request messages into its socket interface and receives
HTTP response messages from its socket interface. Similarly, the HTTP server receives request
messages from its socket interface and sends response messages into its socket interface. Once the
client sends a message into its socket interface, the message is out of the client’s hands and is “in the
hands” of TCP. TCP provides a reliable data transfer service to HTTP. This implies that each HTTP
request message sent by a client process eventually arrives intact at the server; similarly, each HTTP
response message sent by the server process eventually arrives intact at the client. Here we see one of
the great advantages of a layered architecture—HTTP need not worry about lost data or the details of
how TCP recovers from loss or reordering of data within the network. That is the job of TCP and the
protocols in the lower layers of the protocol stack.

It is important to note that the server sends requested files to clients without storing any state
information about the client. If a particular client asks for the same object twice in a period of a few
seconds, the server does not respond by saying that it just served the object to the client; instead, the
server resends the object, as it has completely forgotten what it did earlier. Because an HTTP server
maintains no information about the clients, HTTP is said to be a stateless protocol. A Web server is
always on, with a fixed IP address, and it services requests from potentially millions of different
browsers.

DEPT OF ECE ECT423 CN