CIS 390
Comp 390 Final Highlights
University of the Fraser Valley Page 1
Comp 390 – Data Communications
Final Highlights
(updated on Dec. 6th)
TextBook: Computer Networks, by Andrew Tanenbaum and David Wetherall, 6th Ed.
This review highlights topics that have been covered. The list is not meant to be an exhaustive
summary of all material discussed and is intended to be a general study guide. The concepts,
terminology and keywords listed below are the ones that I consider them to be the most
important. You should understand the materials well enough to describe, compare, contrast,
use or apply them. For instance, you may be asked to describe/explain the concepts, to
compare two concepts, or to apply the concept for a simple case study.
The Final exam covers from the beginning of the course to what I’ve taught last lecture, i.e.
Chapter 1 to 6 from textbook, plus the PPTs, homework and assignments. Naturally, the
concepts of data communications in later chapters are building from the concepts of the earlier
chapters.
The Final Exam consists of two parts: Part I (M/C, T/F, and fill-in-the-blank questions) 1/3
mark, and Part II (written questions) 2/3 mark.
*** Part I will be tested first, and then Part II. If you’re late, then you will not be allowed to take
Part I and/or Part II. ***
In Part I:
• Students will be assigned 45 sec. per question.
• Majority of questions will be M/C, and a limited number of questions fill-in-the-blank
questions.
• Students have to do the questions in sequence, i.e. cannot go back to check the answers.
Thus, make sure that you pick an answer(s) BEFORE clicking next.
In Part II: *** you must use your own wordings! *** No copying of any
kind.
• You must FULLY explain your answer, and show ALL the steps.
Rules:
• You’re required to connect to Blackboard Collaborate Ultra (the virtual
classroom) at ALL TIME during the exam, and respond to the instructor if
requested. (Otherwise, you will miss some important exam information.)
• It is an open book exam. Both parts of the exam are closed Internet
searches and closed discussions.
• All students must take the exam physically separate from the other
classmates in this course.
(*** Thus, if you live with your classmate in this course, then you must inform the instructor at least one
week in advance. ***)
• Late submission will NOT be accepted. You must submit your work before
the due date and time.
Comp 390 Final Highlights
University of the Fraser Valley Page 2
One of the Recommended Study Methods:
1. Read the chapter notes and the chapter side-by-side.
2. Scan the Basic_Math.pdf file.
3. Thoroughly study the group assignments and individual homework, and
make sure that you fully understand each one of the questions.
4. Review topics covered and mentioned here.
Highlight topics that have been covered:
Chapter 1 ppt Internet Appliances & Delays (from Kurose)
• “Fun” Internet appliances
• A Service view of the Internet
• Packet Transmission Delay or Time
• Packet switching: Store-and-forward, queuing delay, packet loss.
• Network-core functions: routing and forwarding
• Packet switching vs circuit switching
• Four sources of packet delay
• Queuing delay: traffic intensity
• traceroute
• Packet loss
• Throughput: instantaneous, average, bottleneck link
TEXTBOOK:
Chapter 1:
• 1.1 Uses of networks: Client Server Model vs peer-to-peer, Person-to-Person Communication,
E-Commerce, Entertainment, Internet of Things
• 1.2 Types of Networks: Broadband Access Networks, Mobile and Wireless Access Networks,
Content Providers Networks (CDN), Transit Networks, Enterprise Networks
• 1.3 Network Technology: PANs, LANs, Home networks, MANs, WANs (VPN and SD-WANs),
Internetworks
• 1.4 Examples of Networks: The Internet, ARPANET, NSFNET, The Internet Architecture,
Mobile networks, Packet switching vs Circuit Switching, 1G, 2G, 3G, 4G, 5G cellular networks
design, MIMO, WiFi (ISM, APs, ad hoc, Multipath fading, OFDM, CSMA, WEP, WPA, LTE-
U)
• 1.5 Network Protocols: Design goals (reliability, resource allocation, evolvability, Security),
Protocol layering (Layers, Protocols, Peers, Interfaces, Network Architecture, Protocol Stack)
• Connections and Reliability: Connection-oriented Service vs Connectionless
• Service Primitives: Service Primitives
• The Relationship of Services to Protocol
• 1.6 Reference Models:
• OSI Reference Model (Application, Presentation, Session, Transport, Network, Data Link, and
Physical Layer), TCP/IP Reference Model (Link or Network Access, Internet (IP and ICMP),
Transport (TCP and UDP), and Application Layer)
• A Critique of the OSI Model and Protocols: Apocalypse of the two elephants, bad design, bad
implementation, and bad politics.
• A Critique of the TCP/IP Reference Model and Protocols
• 1.7 Standardization: De facto, De jure, WiFi Alliance, ONF
• Who’s Who in Telecom: ITU-T (Telecom, CCITT), ITU-R (Radio)
Comp 390 Final Highlights
University of the Fraser Valley Page 3
• Who’s Who in International Standards: IAB, RFCs, IETF, IRTF, RFCs, Proposed standard,
Draft standard, Internet Standard, W3C
• 1.8 Policy, Legal, and Social Issues : Online Speech (Communications Decency Act, DMCA)
• Net Neutrality : zero rating
• Security : DDoS, botnet, Spam, Phishing
• Privacy : Profiling, Tracking, Cookies, Browser fingerprining, location privacy
• Disinformation :
• 1.9 Metric units: you should know and understand all prefixes from 10^12 Tera to 10^(-12)
pico
Chapter 2
• 2.1 Guided Transmission Media: Persistent storage, Twisted pairs (Category, Full-duplex,
Half-duplex, UTP), Coaxial Cable, Power Lines, Fiber Optics (Multimode vs Single modem
dispersion, solitons, LEDs vs lasers, Fiber vs Copper)
• 2.2 Wireless Transmission: Electromagnetic Spectrum (Frequency f, Wavelength λ, Speed c,
c = λf ), Frequency Hopping Spread Spectrum, Direct Sequence Spread Spectrum, Ultra-
Wideband Communication.
• 2.3 Using the Spectrum for Transmission: Radio Transmission (path loss), Microwave (> 100
MHz, Directional, Multipath fading), Infrared Transmission, Light Transmission
• 2.4 From Waveforms to Bits:
• Theoretical Basis for Data Communication (Fourier Analysis, Bandwidth-Limited Signals
(bandwidth, baseband, passband, voice-grade line ≈ 3 KHz, Maximum Data Rate of a Channel
(Nyquist’s theorem, Shannon’s theorem, SNR, dB)
• Digital Modulation:
• Baseband Transmission (Encoding – NRZ, NRZI, Manchester, Bipolar), Bandwidth
Efficiency (Symbol rate vs Bit rate), Clock recovery(4B/5B, Scrambler), Balanced Signals
• Passband Transmission (ASK, FSK, PSK, QPSK, Constellation Diagram, QAM-16, QAM-
64, Gray Code
• Multiplexing: FDM (Guard Band, OFDM, Guard time), TDM (not STDM), CDM (Spread
spectrum, chips, chip sequence, orthogonal, Walsh codes) WDM (Dense WDM).
• 2.5 The Public Switched Telephone Network:
• Structure of the Telephone System (End Office, Local Loop, Toll Offices, Trunks)
• The Local Loop: Telephone Modems (Modem, TCM, V.90, V.92) , ADSL ( xDSL, broadband,
DMT, POTS), and FTTX (FTTH, PON)
• Trunks and Multiplexing (PCM, companding)
• T-Carrier: Multiplexing Digital Signals on the Phone Network, T1 Carrier, inband vs out-of-
band signaling
• Multiplexing Optical Networks: SONET/SDH
• Switching: Circuit vs Packet Switching, queuing delay.
• 2.6 Cellular Networks:
• Common Concepts: Cells, Handoff, Paging
• First-Generation (1G) Technology: Analog Voice: AMPS
• Second-Generation (2G) Technology: Digital Voice: D-AMPS, GSM, CDMA
• GSM: The Global System for Mobile Communications: SIM Card
• Third-Generation (3G) Technology: Digital Voice and Data: WCDMA (UMTS), Soft vs Hard
Handoff
• Fourth-Generation (4G) Technology: Packet Switching: LTE, VoIP, RAN, VoLTE
• Fifth-Generation (5G) Technology: Ultra-densification and offloading (picocells, femtocells),
Increased bandwidth with millimeter waves, Increased spectral efficiency through advances in
massive MIMO.
Comp 390 Final Highlights
University of the Fraser Valley Page 4
• 2.7 Cable Networks: A History of Cable Networks(CATV), Broadband Internet Access Over
Cable (HFC Networks, CMTS), DOCSIS, Nodes and Minislots)
• 2.8 Communication Satellites (Transponders): Geostationary Satellites: GEO, Station
keeping, VSATs, Medium-Earth Orbit Satellites, Low-Earth Orbit Satellites
• 2.9 Comparing Different Access Networks:
• Terrestrial Access Networks: Cable, Fiber, and ADSL
• Satellites Versus Terrestrial Networks
• 2.10 Policy at the Physical Layer: Spectrum Allocation (Beauty contest, Lottery, Auction, ISM
and U-NII bands), The Cellular Network, The Telephone Network (BOCs, LATAs, LECs,
IXCs, POP, Local number portability)
Chapter 3:
• 3.1 Data Link Design issues: Frames, Services provided to the Network Layer,
• Framing methods: Byte Count, Byte Stuffing, Bit Stuffing, and coding violations, PPP, HDLC,
preamble), Error control, Flow Control (feedback-based and rate-based)
• 3.2 Error Detection and Correction: Error-correcting Codes, Error-detecting Codes, Erasure
channel
• Error-Correcting Codes: Block Code, Systematic Code, Linear Code, Codeword, Code
rate, Hamming Distance, Hamming codes (Error Syndrome), Binary convolutional codes
(Soft-decision vs Hard-decision decoding), Reed-Solomon codes, Low-Density Parity Check
codes.
• Error-Detecting Codes: Parity (Interleaving), Checksums, CRCs (Polynomial code,
generator polynomial)
• 3.3 Elementary Data Link Protocols: Basic Transmission and Receipt (frame header: kind,
seq, ack, and info)
• Simplex Link-Layer Protocols: Utopia: No Flow Control or Error Correction, Adding
Flow Control: Stop-and-Wait, Adding Error Correction: Sequence Numbers and ARQ.
• 3.4 Improving Efficiency: Goal: Bidirectional Transmission (Piggybacking), Multiple Frames
in Flight (Sliding Windows: Sending window, Receiving window), Examples of Full-Duplex,
Sliding Window Protocols (One-Bit Sliding Window, Go-Back-N (bandwidth-delay product),
Link Utilization, Pipelining), Selective Repeat (cumulative acknowledgement)
• 3.5 Data Link Protocols in Practice: Packet over SONET (PPP – Framing, LCP, NCP, HDLC,
ADSL (ATM, cells, ALL5, PPPoA), DOCSIS
Chapter 4 – MAC Sublayer:
• Channel Allocation problem: Static and Dynamic channel allocations, Slotted time and
Continuous time, Poisson distribution
• Multiple access protocols: ALOHA vs Slotted ALOHA, CSMA, 1-Persistent CSMA, Non-
persistent CSMA, p-persistent CSMA, CSMA/CD
• Collision-free protocols: Bit-map protocol, Token passing and Binary countdown
• Limited-contention protocols: Adaptive tree walk protocol
• Wireless LAN protocol: Hidden station problem and Exposed station problem, CSMA/CA,
MACA (with Collision Avoidance) and MACAW (MACA for Wireless)
• Ethernet: classic vs switched, cabling, Manchester encoding, MAC protocol, Binary
exponential backoff algorithm, Ethernet performance, Fast Ethernet, 4B/5B, Gigabit Ethernet
(carrier extension, frame bursting), 8B/10B, 10 Gigabit Ethernet, 64B/66B, 40 and 100 G
Ethernet, carrier-grade Ethernet.
• Wireless LANs, Infrastructure mode (Aps), ad hoc mode, MIMO, MU-MIMO, Frame
structure, association, SSID, WPA2, 802.1X, WEP, QoS
Comp 390 Final Highlights
University of the Fraser Valley Page 5
• Bluetooth, pairing, piconet, scatternet, profiles, adaptive frequency hopping, secure simple
pairing.
• DOCSIS, ranging request.
• Bridges and switches: Backward learning and Spanning tree algorithm, Flooding, Cut-
through switching
• Transparent/spanning tree bridges, Source routing bridges (from notes)
• Repeaters, hubs, bridges, switches, routers, and gateways
• Virtual LANs, Centralized wiring, Broadcast storm, IEEE 802.Q
• 802.1Q, Frame structure
Chapter 5 – The Network Layer:
• Network Layer design issues: Store-and-forward packet switching, Services provided to the
Transport Layer, Internet camp vs Telecom camp
• Label switching
• Virtual circuit networks vs Datagram networks
• Routing algorithms: Dynamic vs Static, The Optimality Principle, Sink tree, Shortest path
routing (Djikstra), Flooding, Distance Vector Routing (Bellman-Ford), the Count-to-Infinity
Problem and the Split Horizon, Link State Routing, Hierarchical routing, Broadcast routing,
reverse path forwarding, Multicast routing, Anycast routing.
• Traffic Management (Congestion Management): Goodput, Open loop vs Closed loop,
Approaches congestion management, Provisioning, Traffic-aware routing, Admission Control,
Load shedding (milk and wine), Traffic Shaping (Service Level Agreement (SLA), traffic
policing, Leaky bucket and Token bucket), Active queue management (Congestion avoidance,
RED (Random Early Detection), Choke packets, Explicit Congestion Notation, Hop-by-Hop
backpressure)
• QoS & Application QoE: Application QoS Requirements (Flow, Jitter, Buffering),
Overprovisioning, Packet Scheduling (FIFO or FCFS, fair queueing, WFQ (Weighted Fair
Queuing), flow specification, M/M/1 queue), Integrated Services (RSVP), Differentiated
Services (expediated forwarding, assured forwarding).
• Internetworking: How networks differ, Tunneling, Internetwork routing (IGP, EGP, BGP,
AS, and Routing Policy), Gateways, MPLS, Tunnelling, Intradomain vs interdomain, Packet
Fragmentation (MTU (Max. Transmission Unit), transparent vs nontransparent),
• Software-Defined Networking(SDN), control plane (Open flow), data plane (programmable
hardware, protocol-independent switch architecture), programmable network telemetry.
• Network Layer in the Internet (10 principles)
• IPv4: Header, Addressing, Subnets, CIDR (Classless InterDomain Routing), Classful and
special addressing, NAT, Private addresses, IPv4 vs IPv6
• Internet control protocols: ICMP, ARP, RARP, BOOTP and DHCP
• MPLS, tag switching, LSR (Label Switched Router), forwarding vs switching, LER (Label
Edge Router), FEC (Forwarding Equivalence Class)
• OSPF, AS, IGP, EGP, RIP, IS-IS, BGP, Multicasting
Extra PPT – Module 11: IPv4 Addressing
• Describe the structure of an IPv4 address including the network portion, the host portion, and the
subnet mask.
• Compare the characteristics and uses of the unicast, broadcast and multicast IPv4 addresses.
• Explain public, private, and reserved IPv4 addresses.
• Explain how subnetting segments a network to enable better communication.
• Calculate IPv4 subnets for a /24 prefix.
• Terms and Commands: prefix length, logical AND, network address, broadcast address, first usable
Comp 390 Final Highlights
University of the Fraser Valley Page 6
address, last usable address, unicast, broadcast, and multicast transmissions, private addresses, public
addresses, Network Address Translation (NAT), loopback addresses, Automatic Private IP
Addressing (APIPA) addresses, classful addressing (Class A, B, C, D, and E), Internet Assigned
Numbers Authority (IANA), Regional Internet Registries (RIRs), broadcast domains, subnets, octet
boundary, variable-length subnet mask (VLSM)
Extra PPT – Module 12: IPv6 Addressing
• Explain the need for IPv6 addressing.
• Explain how IPv6 addresses are represented.
• Compare types of IPv6 network addresses.
• Explain how to Configure static global unicast and link-local IPv6 network addresses.
• Explain how to configure global unicast addresses dynamically.
• Terms and Commands: Hextet, Link-local address (LLA), ipv6 address, show ipv6 interface brief,
SLAAC, Router advertisement, Router solicitation, EUI-64, Solicited node multicast
Chapter 6 – Transport Layer:
• Transport entity
• Service provided to the Upper layers, service provider and service user
• Transport service primitives, TPDU, Berkeley sockets
• Elements of transport protocols, Addressing (TSAP and NSAP), portmapper, initial
connection protocol, processor server (inetd in UNIX)
• Connection establishment (Three-way Handshake), forbidden region, PAWS (Protection
Against Wrapped Sequence numbers)
• Connection release (The Two-army Problem),
• Flow control and error control: fixed sized, variable sized, one large circular buffering,
dynamic buffer allocation
• Multiplexing vs inverse Multiplexing, Crash Recovery
• Congestion control: goodput, onset of congestion, Max-min fairness, convergence
• Regulating the sending rate: control law, AIMD, TCP friendly
• Wireless issues
• UDP: Header, source port, destination port, length and checksum, pseudoheader
• Jitter, buffer, remote procedure call (RPC), Real-time transport protocol (RTP).
• TCP: Service model (Socket), path MTU discovery, TCP Header (source port, destination port,
seq. #, ACK #, length, CWR, ECE, URG, ACK, PSH, RST, SYN, FIN, checksum, urgent
pointer, options (MSS, window scale, timestamp, SACK).
• Connection establishment: SYN flood and SYN cookies
• Connection release (FIN)
• TCP Sliding window: window probe packet, delayed ACK, Nagle’s algorithm, Silly window
syndrome, cumulative ACK
• Timer: RTO, Persistence timer, Keepalive timer
• TCP congestion control: congestion window vs flow control window, congestion collapse, ACK
clock, slow start, slow start threshold, duplicate ACKs, fast retransmission, TCP Tahoe, fast
recovery, TCP Reno