Section 3.1: Computer Network Protocols

Learning Objectives

After completing this section, you should be able to

• describe some widely used network protocols and how they work;
• identify the network layer used in each.

Tasks

• Study Chapter 4 of the TD textbook.
• Complete hands-on Project 4-1.
• Complete Case Project 4-1.

Study Questions

You may want to use the Personal Study Space wiki to answer these questions, which may require some Internet research. You can also post comments and queries in the Unit 3 Forum.

1. What is a protocol?
2. What are some commonly used protocols?
3. What is multicasting?
4. What are routable protocols?
5. What is a multiprotocol network?
6. What is TCP/IP? Is it a single protocol?
7. What are subprotocols?
8. What layers are in the TCP/IP reference model? What does each layer do?
9. What subprotocols of the TCP/IP suites are TCP/IP core protocols?
10. What is the Internet Protocol (IP)? What layer does it belong to?
11. What is a data frame? What is an IP datagram? What is a TCP segment? What are the relationships between them?
12. What is the structure of an IP datagram? What is each of the components used for?
13. Why is IP an unreliable, connectionless protocol?
14. What layer does the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) belong to? What is TCP responsible for?
15. What is the structure of a TCP segment? What is each of the components for?
16. What are the differences between the OSI reference model and the TCP/IP network reference model?
17. What protocols are in the core of the TCP/IP protocol suite?
18. What does the TCP do at the Transport layer?
19. What is a port?
20. What are the differences between TCP and UDP protocols? Why is TCP said to be a connection-oriented protocol, whereas UDP is described as a connectionless protocol?
21. What does the Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP) do?
22. What does the Address Resolution Protocol (ARP) do?
23. What are some commonly used application protocols in the TCP/IP protocol suite?
24. How are network nodes addressed in TCP/IP?
25. What is a TCP/IP class A address? How many network nodes can be addressed in TCP class A?
26. What is a TCP/IP class B address? How many network nodes can be addressed in TCP class B?
27. What is a TCP/IP class C address? How many network nodes can be addressed in TCP class C?
28. What is a loopback address?
29. If one needs a class of IP addresses, where should the request be sent?
30. What is a firewall? How can it be used allow computers within a private computer network to access the Internet?
31. What is a static/dynamic IP address?
32. What is DHCP?
33. What is the IPX/SPX protocol?
34. What is the relationship between the OSI reference model and IPX/SPX?
35. What does the IPX protocol do, and at which layer?
36. What does SPX protocol do, and at which layer?
37. What is the structure of an IPX datagram?
38. What is the structure an SPX packet?
39. What is the SAP protocol? What does it do?
40. What is the NCP protocol? What does it do?
41. How are network nodes addressed in IPX/SPX?
42. What is NetBIOS? What does it do and at which layer?
43. What is NetBEUI? What does it do and at which layer?
44. Why is NetBIOS non-routable?
45. How are network nodes addressed in NetBIOS?
46. What is Bonjour?
47. What is binding in computer networks?
48. How do you install network protocols on a Windows machine?
49. What protocols do you need to install in order to access to the Internet?