Data Communications

Chapter 8 Outline

 Switched Network
 Circuit-Switched Network
 Datagram Networks
 Virtual-Circuit Network

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Introduction
 In large networks we need some means to allow
one-to-one communication between any two
nodes.
 In LANs this is achieved using one of three
methods:
 Direct point-to-point connection (mesh)
 Via central controller (star)
 Connection to common bus in a multipoint
configuration (bus/hup)
topologies employing multipoint connections, such as a bus, are
ruled out because the distances between devices and the total
number of devices increase beyond the capacities of the media
and equipment
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Introduction

 None of the previous works in larger networks

with large physical separation or consisting of a
large number of computers
 The solution is a switching network

Switches are devices capable of creating temporary connections

between two or more devices linked to the switch. In a switched
network, some of these nodes are connected to the end systems
(computers or telephones, for example). Others are used only for
routing. Figure 8.1 shows a switched network.

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Switched Network

 Consists of a series of interlinked nodes called

switched.
 Switches are capable to create temporary
connections between two or more devices

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Traditionally, three methods of switching have been important:

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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 is normally divided into n channels by
using FDM or TDM.
 The link can be permanent (leased line) or
temporary (telephone)
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Circuit-Switched Network

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Circuit-Switched Network

 Switching take place at physical layer

 Resources
 Such as bandwidth in FDM and time slot in TDM
 Switch buffer
 Switch processing time
 Switch I/O ports
 Data transferred are not packetized, continuous flow
 No addressing involved during data transfer
In circuit switching, the resources need to be reserved during the
setup phase;
the resources remain dedicated for the entire duration
of data transfer until the teardown phase.

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Example
Communication is through 4-kHz voice channels. We assume that each
link uses FDM to connect a maximum of two voice channels. The
bandwidth of each link is then 8 kHz. Figure 8.4 shows the situation.
Telephone 1 is connected to telephone 7; 2 to 5; 3 to 8; and 4 to 6. Of
course the situation may change when new connections are made. The
switch controls the connections.

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Transmission phases
Three Phases
circuit-switched network requires three phases: connection setup, data transfer, and
connection teardown.

 Setup phase
 A dedicated circuit needs to be established
 So create dedicated channel by sending a request

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Transmission phases

 Data transfer phase

 Teardown phase
 Signal is sent to each switch to release resources
Efficiency

It can be argued that 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. In a
telephone network, people normally terminate the
communication when they have finished their conversation.
However, in computer networks, a computer can be connected to
another computer even if there is no activity for a long time. In
this case, allowing resources to be dedicated means that other
connections are deprived.
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Delay
The delay in this type of network is minimal.

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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 f

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 acknowledgment (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), which can be very
long. The third box shows the time needed to tear down the
circuit. We have shown the case in which the receiver requests
disconnection, which creates the maximum delay.

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 Advantages and Disadvantages of
Circuit Switched Services
• The advantages of circuit switched networks are
that they are simple, flexible, and inexpensive
when not used intensively.
• There are two main problems with dialed circuits.
– Each connection goes through the regular telephone
network on a different circuit, which vary in quality.
– Data transmission rates are low, from 28.8 to 56 Kbps.
• An alternative is to use a private dedicated circuit,
which is leased from a common carrier for the
user’s exclusive use 24 hrs/day, 7 days/week.
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Dedicated Circuit Networks

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 Dedicated Circuit Services (Figure 8-2)
• Dedicated circuits involve leasing circuits from
common carriers to create point to point links
between organizational locations.
• These points are then connected together using
special equipment such as routers and switches.
• Dedicated circuits are billed at a flat fee per month
for which the user has unlimited use of the circuit.
• Dedicated circuits therefore require more care in
network design than dialed circuits.
• The three basic dedicated circuit architectures are
ring, star, and mesh architectures.
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Figure 8-2 Dedicated Circuit Services 18
Datagram Networks

 Data are transmitted in discrete units called

packets
 Size of the packet depends on the protocol and
network
 Packets switched networks are connectionless,
hence no resource allocation
 Connectionless means the switch does not keep
information about the connection state.
 Datagram switching is done at network layer

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Datagram Networks

In a packet-switched network, there is no resource

reservation ;resources are allocated on demand.

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Routing table & Destination Add.

 A switch in a datagram
network uses a routing table
that is based on the
destination address.
 The destination address in the
header of a packet in a
datagram network remains
the same during the entire
journey of the packet.

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Delay

 Total Delay = 3T + 3t+ w1+ w2

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Packet Switched Networks

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 Packet Switched Services: Basic
Architecture
• Packet switched services enable multiple connections to
exist simultaneously between computers.
• With packet switching users buy a connection into the
common carrier network, and connect via a packet
assembly/ disassembly device (PAD). See Figure 8-9.
• Packets from separate messages are interleaved with other
packets for transmission (Figure 8-10).
• Organizations usually connect to a packet network by
leasing dedicated circuits from their offices to the packet
switched network’s point-of-presence (POP).

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Figure 8-9. Packet Switched Services 25
Figure 8-10. Packet Switching 26
 Packet Routing Methods

• There are two methods for routing packets:

– A datagram is a connectionless service which adds a
destination and sequence number to each packet, in
addition to information about the data stream to which
the packet belongs. Individual packets can follow
different routes before being reassembled on the
destination host.
– In a virtual circuit the packet switched network
establishes an end-to-end circuit between the sender
and receiver. All packets for that transmission take the
same route over the virtual circuit that has been set up
for that transmission.

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Permanent and Switched Virtual Circuits
• Two types of virtual circuits, permanent (PVCs)
and switched (SVC), are available from common
carriers. PVCs are far more common.
• Although established using software, setting up or
taking down a PVC takes days or weeks to do.
• Each PVC has two data rates: a committed
information rate (CIR), which is guaranteed and
a maximum allowable rate (MAR), which sends
data only when the extra capacity is available.
• Packets sent at rates exceeding the CIR are
marked discard eligible (DE), and discarded if the
network becomes overloaded, in which case they
may need to be retransmitted. 28
 Packet Switched Service Protocols

• There are five protocols in use for packet

switched services:
– X.25
– Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM)
– Frame Relay
– Switched Multimegabit Data Service (SMDS)
– Ethernet/IP packet networks

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 X.25
• The oldest packet switched service is X.25, a
standard developed by ITU-T. X.25 offers
datagram, switched virtual circuit, and permanent
virtual circuit services.
• X.25 uses the LAPB and PLP protocols at the data
link and network layers, respectively.
• X.25 is a reliable protocol, meaning it performs
error control and retransmits bad packets.
• Although widely used in Europe, X.25 is not in
widespread use in North America. The primary
reason is the low transmission speed, now 2.048
Mbps (up from 64 Kbps).
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Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM)
• Asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) is one of the
fastest growing new WAN technologies, and is
similar to frame relay.
• ATM is an unreliable protocol, meaning no error
control is done by the ATM protocol as data is
moves through the network.
• Instead, error control must be handled by another
network layer (typically the transport layer, which
handles end-to-end communications).

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Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM)
• Three important ATM features are:
– ATM uses fixed length, 53 byte ‘cells’ (5 bytes
of overhead and 48 bytes of user data), which is
more suitable for real time transmissions.
– ATM provides extensive quality of service
information that enables the setting of very
precise priorities among different types of
transmissions (i.e. voice, video & e-mail).
– ATM is scaleable, since basic ATM circuits are
easily multiplexed onto much faster ones.

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Figure 8-11 33
Figure 8-12 Digital Island’s WAN
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 Frame Relay
• Frame relay is a packet switching technology
that transmits data faster than X.25 but slower
than ATM.
• Like ATM, Frame relay encapsulates packets,
so packets are delivered unchanged through the
network.
• Also like ATM, Frame relay networks are
unreliable (although they are capable of doing
error checking, this is not enough to make
Frame relay reliable).
• Common carriers offer frame relay with
different transmission speeds: 56 Kbps to 45
Mbps.
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Switched Multimegabit Data Service (SMDS)
• Switched multimegabit data service (SMDS) is
another unreliable packet service like ATM and
frame relay.
• Most, but not all, RBOCs offer SMDS at a variety of
transmission rates, ranging from 56 Kbps up to 45
Mbps.
• SMDS is not standardized and offers no clear
advantages over frame relay.
• For this reason, it is not a widely accepted protocol
and offers no advantages over frame relay. Its future
is uncertain.
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 Ethernet/IP Packet Networks
• Recently, Internet startups began offering
Ethernet/IP services over MAN/WAN networks.
• All other MAN/WAN services; X.25, ATM,
Frame Relay and SMDS use different protocols
from Ethernet, so data must be translated or
encapsulated before it is sent over these networks.
• Companies offering Ethernet/IP have set up their
own gigabit Ethernet fiber optic networks in some
large cities, bypassing common carrier networks.
• Ethernet/IP packet network services currently
offer CIR speeds from 1 Mbps to 1 Gbps at 1/4
the cost of more traditional services.
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Virtual-Circuit Network

 Packets form a single message travel along the

same path.
 Characteristics
 Three phases to transfer data
 Resources can be allocated during setup phase
 Data are packetized and each packet carries an
address in the header
 All packets follow the same path
 Implemented in data link layer

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Virtual-Circuit Network

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Addressing

 Global addressing
 Source and destination needs unique addresses
 Virtual-circuit identifier

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Transmission phases

 Setup phase
 A switch creates an entry for a virtual circuit.
 Request
 acknowledgment

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Setup

42
acknowledgment

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Data transfer and teardown phases

After sending all frames, a special frame is send to end the

connection

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Efficiency

 In virtual-circuit switching, all packets

 belonging to the same source and
 destination travel the same path;
 But the packets may arrive at the destination
with different delays if resource allocation is on
demand.

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Delay

 Total delay = 3T + 3ζ+ setup delay +

teardown delay

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Virtual Private Networks

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 Virtual Private Networks
• Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) use PVCs that
run over the Internet but appear to the user as
private networks.
• Packets sent over these PVCs, called tunnels, are
encapsulated using special protocols that also
encrypt the IP packets they enclose.
• The growing popularity of VPNs is based on their
low cost and flexibility.
• There are two important disadvantages of VPNs:
– the unpredictability of Internet traffic
– the lack of standards for Internet-based VPNs, so that
not all vendor equipment and services are compatible.
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Basic VPN Architecture (Figure 8-13)
• Each location connected to a VPN is first connected to the
ISP providing the VPN service using a leased circuit, such
as T-1 line which connects to the ISP’s PVCs at ISP access
points.
• Outgoing packets from the VPN are sent through specially
designed routers or switches.
• The sending VPN device encapsulates the outgoing packet
with a protocol used to move it through the tunnel to the
VPN device on the other side.
• The VPN device at the receiver, strips off the VPN packet
and delivers the packet to the destination network.
• The VPN is transparent to the users, ISP, and the Internet
as a whole; it appears to be simply a stream of packets
moving across the Internet.
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 ISP
VPN Access
Device Server

Office Telephone
Line

VPN Employee’s
Device Home
Internet

Backbone VPN Tunnel

VPN Tunnel
Office
VPN
Device

Figure 8-13 VPN Network

Backbone
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 VPN Types
• Three types of VPN are in common use: intranet
VPNs, extranet VPNs and access VPNs.
– An intranet VPN provides virtual circuits between
organization offices over the Internet.
– An extranet VPN is the same as an intranet VPN
except that the VPN connects several different
organizations, e.g., customers and suppliers, over the
Internet.
– An access VPN enables employees to access an
organization's networks from a remote location.

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 Packet from the client computer
Packet in transmission through the Internet

SMTP
TCP
IP
PPP SMTP
TCP
IP
L2TP PPP
ATM IP

ISP
Telephone
Line VPN
Access Device
Server

Employee’s
Home
Packet from the VPN

SMTP
TCP
IP
PPP

Internet

VPN
Device Access
Server
VPN Tunnel

Fig. 8-14 VPN encapsulation of packets Backbone

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References

 BehrouzA. Forouzan , “Data

Communications and Networking”,
4rdEdition, Chapter8, 2007

 Sheet all even problems at the end of chapter 8

form page 236 to 240

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Thanks

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