a) Explain to the class in layman’s terms, what the Internet is, how it functions, and its basic history.
b) Why was what happened with the government hand-off of key BNs in 1994 such a big deal?
c) Define what net neutrality. What does net neutrality mean for consumers? What does it mean for companies? Discuss each perspective in detail.
d) Major cable companies such as Time Warner and Comcast have started initiatives that go against net neutrality ideals, for instance packet shaping and bandwidth limitations. Do some additional research and make your case of the pros and cons for these actions. Do you think cable companies have ulterior motives in these cases?
Question 3
LAN, WAN, BN, MAN, DANG….
a) In layman’s terms (e.g., how fast it is to download a mp3 or a movie), describe the speed differences between a LAN and a WAN. Next, describe speeds in more technical terms.
b) Describe intranets and extranets and give personal examples from your workplace on how these technologies have been implemented.
c) Using NKU’s network infrastructure as a guiding example, explain how you think we are connected to the Internet. For each connection or network, define which the responsible party is with regards to implementation/maintenance costs. Ballpark the costs (you can Google some prices).
Question 6
When describing how a network works, we have to understand how the workload is balanced between computing devices. One way to understand telecommunications needs is by examining the application architecture, or the way the application layer software is spread out between devices.
a) Explain the four general functions at the application layer.
b) Describe the different architectures and place them in their historical context.
c) Give examples of how computing functions in your workplace, including a discussion of the advantages and disadvantages as you see them.
Question 8
Invariably, the topics that are “hot” when it comes to telecommunications change. There are several mentioned in the text that are worthy of pursuit and currently appear to be more than just a fad. For each of these topics, 1) explain what they are, bringing in other concepts from the chapter 2) create a table that summarizes the pros and cons 3) give some examples of implementations in your workplace
a) Thin-client
b) Cloud computing
c) Virtualization
d) Scalability
e) n-tier architecture