WAIRIRE GINA HITO _ 645510

United States International University

SST
MIS 6040:Summer 2015
Question Bank
1. List and explain the criteria of measuring effectiveness of a data
communication system in detail.
a) Delivery - For a data communication system to be considered
effective, it should be able to deliver data or information to the correct
user or device
b) Accuracy - Data may get corrupted while its being transmitted, an
effective data communication system should ensure that the data does
not get errors and its accurate enough.
c) Timeliness data should be delivered real time to the recipients e.g.
Audio data
d) Jitter- ensure that there are no variations in packets arrival time
Explain layers in the OSI model in detail.
a) Application - This layer works with the application software to provide
communications functions as required. It verifies the availability of a
communications partner and the resources to support any data transfer. It
also works with end applications such as domain name service (DNS), file
transfer protocol (FTP), hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP), Internet
message access protocol (IMAP), post office protocol (POP), simple mail
transfer protocol (SMTP), Telenet, and terminal emulation.
b) Presentation - This layer checks the data to ensure that it is compatible
with the communications resources. It ensures compatibility between the
data formats at the applications level and the lower levels. It also handles
any needed data formatting or code conversion, as well as data
compression and encryption.
c) Session - Layer 5 software handles authentication and authorization
functions. It also manages the connection between the two
communicating devices, establishing a connection, maintaining the
connection, and ultimately terminating it. This layer verifies that the data
is delivered as well.

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d) Transport - This layer provides quality of service functions and ensures

the complete delivery of the data. The integrity of the data is guaranteed
at this layer via error correction and similar functions.
e) Network - The network layer handles packet routing via logical
addressing and switching functions.
f) Data Link - Layer 2 operations package and unpack the data in frames.
g) Physical - This layer defines the logic levels, data rate, physical media,
and data conversion functions that make up the bit stream of packets
from one device to another.
2. Explain encapsulation and de-capsulation in detail.
When data is being transported from the top layer of the TCP/IP, data is
placed at the beginning of the block of data. This happens at all the
layers. When the data is received at each layer, the header data is used
to extract the data from the encapsulated data packet. The process of
packaging the data at each layer is referred to as encapsulation.
De-capsulation occurs when the header data received at each layer is
extracted from each packet and the information contained in the header
is used to locate the exact network application waiting for the data.
3. Explain multiplexing and demultiplexing in detail.
Multiplexing is the method in which multiple streams of data are combined
into one signal. This is as per the diagram below. The technology is widely
used and its main aim is to share expensive resource.

Multiple data signals are multiplexed over a single high data rate link then
demultiplexed at the othr end
There are tow main basic basic techniques in multiplexing:

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a) Frequency division multiplexing

b) Time division multiplexing
In frequency division multiplexing, the streams of data are sent through
the same transmission medium but with a different frequency band within
the bandwidth of the single transmission medium; where as in timedivision multiplexing, independent signals are transmitted and received
over a single signal path. Data Streams from different Sources are divided
into Units with same size and interleaved successively into the Time Slots.
De-multiplexing happens when the multiplexed streams of data are
separated from a single channel and routed to corresponding receivers or
destinations.
4. List and discuss 5 components of a data communication system in
detail.
a) Message Refers to the information that is to be sent across to the
recipient/ receiver. The message can either be in form of text, image, and
audio. The test is converted to binary, images are converted to pixels.
b) Sender This refers to the device used to send the information or data
message e.g. a persona l computer
c) Receiver- This is the device used to receive the data message sent across
a transmission medium. E.g. Computer
d) Transmission medium This is the physical path in which the information
or travels through from the sender to the receiver. It can either be a
wireless medium or by wire e.g. coaxial cable
e) Protocol System of rules that governs data communication and transfers
in a communication system.
5. Define and explain data representation in detail.
Data are raw facts that have processed to produce meaningful information. It
can be represented in various forms. These include:

Text This includes a combination of alphabetical letters. It is

represented by assigning a unique value for each symbol used. A plain

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text is stored using the ASCII code hen ce any message containing

ASCII characters can be presented in the form of 0s and 1s.

Numbers - This is a combination of digits ranging from 0 to 9. They are

stored in a pattern of bits

Images / Graphics They are displayed on computer screen in form of
pixels. The position of a each pixel matches its position on the screen
and the number of pixels are able to give the quality of the image to be

displayed. The color of a pixel is represented in binary code.

Audio Data can be represented in form of audio form. It can either be

recorded or broadcasted.
Video Data representation in form of movies or pictures.
6. Define dataflow?
Path taken by data within a device, network as it moves from source to
data repository or user
7. List and distinguish various types of data flow in detail.
There are three ways in which data flows in two devices are communication
with each other. This includes:
a) Simplex - This is where the communication is in one direction. One
of the devices is the sender while the other is the receiver.
b) Full duplex - This is where communication happens simultaneously
between two different devices e.g. telephone.
c) Half duplex - Communication between two devices does not happen
simultaneously. One device has to wait to receive information before
transmitting and vice versa.
8. What is computer network topology?
Computer network topology refers to the various ways in which
components are arranged in a computer network.
9. List and describe6types of physical network topologies in detail.
Physical network topology refers to the arrangement of network cables and
interconnection between the nodes and the cabling. The various physical
network topologies include

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a) Bus topology
This is the simplest network topology. All the nodes are connected to a single
cable referred to as the bus; which is the backbone of the network. All the
computers in this network topology communicate through this cable. It is
easy to setup and cheap compared to other networks. It is preferred for small
networks such as the LAN. Some of the drawbacks of this network topology
include:

Maintenance cost increases when more nodes are added to the

network.
Efficiency reduces when devices connected to it increase.
It is not preferred for networks with heavy traffic.
There is dependency on the central cable.
There is no data security since all computers receive the same

signal from the source

Difficult to troubleshoot and detect fault at individual station.
b) Star topology
In star topology there is point to point connection. Network components
connect to the hub in which it may be a hub, switch or a router. Unshielded
twisted pair Ethernet cable is used to connect the workstations to the hub.
Advantages of the star topology include:

Easy to add/ connect new nodes

Better performance. This is because the signal does not get

transmitted to all work stations

There is central management hence help in monitoring the

network.
Failure of one node does not affect the entire network
Drawbacks of the star topology include:
Failure of the central device affects the entire network.
The use of hub, a router or a switch as central device increases

the overall cost of the network.

Performance as well as the number of nodes to be added
depends on the capacity of the central device.

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c) Ring topology
In ring network, every device is connected to two other devices on either
sides forming a loop. Data travels around the network in one direction.
Sending and receiving of data takes place by help of token.
A token contains a piece of information which along with data is sent by the
source computer. This token then passes to next node, which checks if the
signal is intended to it. It receives it and passes the empty to into the
network, otherwise passes token along with the data to next node. This
process continues until the signal reaches its intended destination.
d) Mesh Topology:
Each computer and network device is interconnected with one another,
making most transmission distributed, thus even if on connection goes down
the network is up and running.
e) Tree Topology:
This connects one star network to another star network. If the main trunk
connecting the two star networks fail then the two networks will not be able
to communicate, but computers within the star network can still
communicate with each other.
f) Hybrid Topology:
This is a combination of more than one topology mentioned above. This kind
of topology is best applied in a wide area network. Since each topology has
its own strengths and weaknesses this topology can be applied to maximize
on effectiveness

10.

What is (define) switching?

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Switching refers to the controlling or routing of signals in circuits to

execute logical or arithmetic operations or to transmit data between
specific points in a network.
11. A message sent from Nairobi to New York will encounter at
least three types of switching techniques before it arrives at its
destination. Discuss three switching techniques in relation the
message
a) Packet Switching - is a digital networking communications method
that groups all transmitted data into suitably sized blocks, called
packets that are transmitted via a medium that may be shared by
multiple simultaneous communication sessions.
b) Circuit Switching - is a methodology of implementing a
telecommunications network in which two network nodes establish a
dedicated communications channel (circuit) through the network
before the nodes may communicate.
c) Message Switching - a mode of data transmission in which a message
is sent as a complete unit and routed via a number of intermediate
nodes at which it is stored and then forwarded.
12.

In CRC, if the data word if 5 bits and the codeword is 8 bits,

how many 0s need to be added to the data word to make the

dividend? What is the size of the remainder? What is the size of
the devisor?
n=k+r
8 =5 +r
8 5 =3
3 zeros need to be added to the dataword to make it dividend
The size of the remainder is 3
The size of the devisor = r + 1: 3+1=4
13. Construct a Hamming code for memory 1111000010101110 by
adding the five check bits?
1111000010101110
_ _1_111_0000101_01110
Odd
Even
110011111 110011110
110001110 110001111

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100001111 100001110
010101110 010101111
Odd 101011100000101101110
Even- 011011110000101001110
14. In a block code, a dataword is 20 bits and the corresponding
codeword is 25 bits. What are the values of k, r, and n according
to the definitions in the text? How many redundant bit are added
to each dataword.
n = size of the code word
k = size of the dataword
r = the redundant bits

n=k+r

n=25
k=20
r=n-k
25-20 redundant bits = 5
15.

Define the following 4 network terms and discuss in detail the

operation mode of each term.

Modulation Refers to the method of transferring information by adding
tht information into a carrier signal
Demodulation - Refers to the process of filtering the actual transferred
information from the received signal. The process should be exactly
compatible with the modulation method
16.

List and explain in detail 4 addressing (types/schemes) in the

TCP/IP suite.
a. Specific Address: defines an instance of a process e.g. gtalk
b. Port Address: It decodes TCP communications made between a host
port and external network.
c. Logical Address: Its also called IP address. This is the address at
which a device appears to reside from the perspective of a running
program.
d. Physical Address: its also known as link addressing. It is local to the
network to which the device is connected and unique inside it. It

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includes the frame and its used at the data link layer. Example of a
physical address is a MAC
17. Explain layers in the TCP/IP protocol suite in detail.
a) Application Layer It is the top layer of the TCP/IP model. It is
concerned with providing network services to applications. At this layer
sockets and port numbers are used to differentiate the path and
sessions which applications operate. A couple of protocols work in this
layer but the most common protocols include: HTTP. Telnet, DNS, SMTP,
FTP
b) Transport Layer This layer is concerned in the transmission or transfer
of data from one location to another. There are two main protocols that
are used in this layer. UDP and TCP. UDP is connectionless, no
windowing, there is no error detection and it is unreliable whereas TCP
is connection-oriented, there is error detection via seq, has windowing
and is reliable.
c) Data Link Layer / Network Interface Layer This is the second layer on
the TCP/IP model and it defines the protocols and hardware required to
connect a host to a physical network and to transmit data across it.
This layer performs the following tasks: Mapping, data framing,
Addressing, error detection and handling, media access control as well
as logical link control.
d) Physical Layer - This layer covers the interface between a data
transmission device and the transmission medium/network. This layer
is concerned with specifying the characteristics of the transmission
medium, the nature of the signal, the data rate and the message.
18. Compare TCP/IP protocol suite with OSI model in detail.
a) In OSI model the transport layer guarantees the delivery of packets
while in TCP/IP there is no guarantee.
b) OSI follows a horizontal approach while TCP/IP follows a vertical
approach.
c) Protocols are hidden in OSI model and are easily replaced as the
technology changes while in TCP/IP protocols is not easily replaced.
d) OSI has 7 layers while TCP/IP has 4 layers.

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e) OSI model defines services, interfaces and protocols very clearly and
makes clear distinction between them while TCP/IP is not clearly
separated its services, interface and protocols.