Networking Infrastructure Assignment: BTEC Level 5 HND Diploma in Computing, Exams of Data Communication Systems and Computer Networks

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ASSIGNMENT FRONT SHEET

Qualification BTEC Level 5 HND Diploma in Computing Unit number and title Unit 2: Networking Infrastructure Submission date 14/11/2020 Date Received 1st submission 14/11/ Re-submission Date 21/11/2020 Date Received 2nd submission 21/11/ Student Name HA TY PHU^ Student ID GCC Class GCC0803 Assessor name LAM NHUT KHANG Student declaration I certify that the assignment submission is entirely my own work and I fully understand the consequences of plagiarism. I understand that making a false declaration is a form of malpractice. Student’s signature Grading grid

P1 P2 P3 P4 P5 P6 P7 P8 M1 M2 M3 M4 D1 D2 D

❒ Summative Feedback: ❒ Resubmission Feedback:

Grade: Assessor Signature: Date: Signature & Date:

LO1: Examine networking principles and their protocols. LO 2: Explain networking devices and operations. LO3: Design efficient networked systems. LO4: Implement and diagnose networked systems. Assignment Brief You are employed as a Network Engineer by Nguyen Networking Limited, a high-tech networking solution development company, which have branches in Ho Chi Minh City, Hanoi, Da Nang and Can Tho. The company has been contracted to implement a networking project from a local educational institute. The specification of the project is given below: People: 200 students, 15 teachers, 12 marketing and administration staff, 5 higher managers including the head of academics and the programme manager, 3 computer network administrators. Resources: 50 student lab computers, 35 staff computers, 3 printers Building: 3 floors, all computers and printers are on the ground floor apart from the IT labs – one lab located on the first floor and another located on the second floor

As a first task, the CEO of the company Mr. Nguyen has asked you to investigate and explain networking principles, protocols and devices and submit a report. Part 1 You will need to produce a report that includes the following:

1. An introduction to provide an overview of your report.
2. Benefits and constraints of different types of networks and networking standards.
3. The impact of network topology, speed of communication and bandwidth requirements.
4. Effectiveness of networking systems.
5. Discussion on operating principles of networking devices and server types and networking software.
6. Discuss the relationship of workstation hardware with networking software.
7. Explore a range of server types and justify the selection of a server, considering a given scenario regarding cost and performance optimization.
8. For the given specification, identify the topology protocol for the efficient utilization of a networking system. The CEO Mr. Nguyen is happy with your first report and now he has asked you to analyze the specification from the institution, as given earlier.

ASSESMENT CRITERIA Learning Outcomes and Assessment Criteria Pass Merit Distinction LO1 Examine networking principles and their protocols LO1 & 2 D1 Considering a given scenario, identify the topology protocol selected for the efficient utilization of a networking system. P1 Discuss the benefits and constraints of different network types and standards. P2 Explain the impact of network topology, communication and bandwidth requirements. M1 Compare common networking principles and how protocols enable the effectiveness of networked systems. LO2 Explain networking devices and operations P3 Discuss the operating principles of networking devices and server types. P4 Discuss the inter-dependence of workstation hardware with relevant networking software. M2 Explore a range of server types and justify the selection of a server, considering a given scenario regarding cost and performance optimisation.

LO3 Design efficient networked systems P5 Provide a logical/physical design of the networked system with clear explanation and addressing table. P6 Evaluate the design to meet the requirements. M3 Install and configure network services and applications on your choice. D2 Design a maintenance schedule to support the networked system. LO4 Implement and diagnose networked systems P7 Implement a networked system based on a prepared design. P8 Document and analyse test results against expected results. M4 Recommend potential enhancements for the networked systems. D3 Use critical reflection to evaluate own work and justify valid conclusions.

P1 Discuss the benefits and constraints of different network

types and standards.

A. Overview

A1. Definition of network

that payment details could get in the wrong hands. Moreover, personal information such as name, phone number and home address may be accessed by anyone with hacking knowledge, making the internet unsafe.  Virus and Malware: If even one computer on a network gets infected with a virus, there is a possibility for the other systems to get infected too. Viruses can spread on a network easily, because of the inter-connectivity of various devices. Besides, multiple systems with shared resources are the best propagating ground for viruses. Likewise, if malware unintentionally gets installed on the central server, all connected clients to the server in the network will inevitably get infected. Spam remains to be a setback on the internet. There is also a risk of hacking, predominantly with wide area networks where security measures are needed to prevent such misuse, e.g. a firewall which adds to cost of network implementation.  Lack of Robustness: If the core file server of a computer network fails, the entire system may become useless. If there is a failure in the main connecting server or a bridging device in the network, the entire network will come to a halt. For larger networks, the central server must be a powerful computer, which habitually renders setting up and maintenance particularly costly.  Needs an Efficient Handler: Managing a big network is complex which requires training and generally a network manager needs to be hired. The technical competences and expertise needed to operate and oversee a computer network is substantially high. Correspondingly, network connection and configuration is also a tiresome task and the responsibility that comes with such a job is high.  Lack of Independence: As networks generally have a centralized server and dependent clients, the client users usually do not have any control whatsoever. Centralized decision making can occasionally impede how a client user desires to use his computer. (Anon., n.d.) B. Network types:

B1. By geographic location.

 PAN (Personal Area Network): is a the computer network that connects computers/devices within the range of an individual person. As PAN provides a network range within a person’s range typically within a range of 10 meters (33 feet) it is called as Personal Area Network. A Personal Area Network typically involves a computer, phone, tablet, printer, PDA (Personal Digital Assistant) and other and other entertainment devices like speakers, video game consoles etc. There are many advantages of LAN over MAN and WAN, such as LAN’s provide excellent reliability, high data transmission rate, they can easily be managed, and shares peripheral devices too. Local Area Network cannot cover cities or towns and for that Metropolitan Area Network is needed, which can connect city or a group of cities together. Further, for connecting Country or a group of Countries one requires Wide Area Network. (Anshika Goyal, 2019)  Local Area Network (LAN) LAN or Local Area Network connects network devices in such a way that personal computer and workstations can share data, tools and programs. The group of computers and devices are connected together by a switch, or stack of switches, using a private addressing scheme as defined by the TCP/IP protocol. Private addresses are unique in relation to other computers on the local network. Routers are found at the boundary of a LAN, connecting them to the larger WAN. Data transmits at a very fast rate as the number of computers linked are limited. By definition, the connections must be high speed and relatively inexpensive hardware (Such as hubs, network adapters and Ethernet cables). LANs cover smaller geographical area (Size is limited to a few kilometers) and are privately owned. One can use it for an office building, home, hospital, schools, etc. LAN is easy to design and maintain. A Communication medium used for LAN has twisted pair cables and coaxial cables. It covers a short distance, and so the error and noise are minimized. Early LAN’s had data rates in the 4 to 16 Mbps range. Today, speeds are normally 100 or 1000 Mbps. Propagation delay is very short in a LAN. The smallest LAN may only use two computers, while larger LANs can accommodate thousands of computers. A LAN typically relies mostly on wired connections for increased speed and security, but wireless connections can also be part of a LAN. The fault tolerance of a LAN is more and there is less congestion in this network. For example: A bunch of students playing Counter Strike in the same room (without internet). (Anshika Goyal, 2019)  Metropolitan Area Network (MAN) MAN or Metropolitan area Network covers a larger area than that of a LAN and smaller area as compared to WAN. It connects two or more computers that are apart but resides in the same or different cities. It covers a large geographical area and may serve

(MKS075, 2020)

 A System Area Network (SAN) is a high-performance, connection-oriented network that can link a cluster of computers. A SAN delivers high bandwidth (1 Gbps or greater) with low latency. A SAN is typically switched by hubs that support eight or more nodes. The cable lengths between nodes on a SAN range from a few meters to a few kilometers. (Tedhudek, 2017)  VPN (Virtual Private Network):  VPN stands for Virtual Private Network (VPN), that allows a user to connect to a private network over the Internet securely and privately. VPN creates an encrypted connection that is called VPN tunnel, and all Internet traffic and communication is passed through this secure tunnel.  Virtual Private Network (VPN) is basically of 2 types: Remote Access VPN: Remote Access VPN permits a user to connect to a private network and access all its services and resources remotely. The connection between the user and the private network occurs through the Internet and the connection is secure and private. Remote Access VPN is useful for home users and business users both. An employee of a company, while he/she is out of station, uses a VPN to connect to his/her company’s private network and remotely access files and resources on the private network. Private users or home users of VPN, primarily use VPN services to bypass regional restrictions on the Internet and access blocked websites. Users aware of Internet security also use VPN services to enhance their Internet security and privacy. Site to Site VPN: A Site-to-Site VPN is also called as Router-to-Router VPN and is commonly used in the large companies. Companies or organizations, with branch offices in different locations, use Site-to-site VPN to connect the network of one office location to the network at another office location. (pp_pankaj, 2019)  Internet: The internet is a global network of computers that works much like the postal system, only at sub-second speeds. Just as the postal service enables people to send one another envelopes containing messages, the internet enables computers to send one another small packets of digital data. (Anon., n.d.)

B2. Role capabilities

Client/Server: This model are broadly used network model. In Client-Server Network, Clients and server are differentiated, Specific server

and clients are present. In Client-Server Network, Centralized server is used to store the data because its management is centralized.In Client- Server Network, Server respond the services which is request by Client. (MKS075, 2020)

management, monitoring, maintenance, and security services are done through the cloud. One example is using a SaaS-based firewall to protect an on-premises network. Cloud-based networking: in cloud-based networking, the entire network is in the cloud. This includes network management resources and physical hardware. Cloud-based networking is used to provide connectivity between applications and resources deployed in the cloud. (Glossary, 2019) Cluster: Cluster computing refers that many of the computers connected on a network and they perform like a single entity. Each computer that is connected to the network is called a node. Cluster computing offers solutions to solve complicated problems by providing faster computational speed, and enhanced data integrity. The connected computers execute operations all together thus creating the impression like a single system (virtual machine). This process is termed as transparency of the system. Based on the principle of distributed systems, this networking technology performs its operations. And here, LAN is the connection unit. This process is defined as the transparency of the system. Cluster computing goes with the features of:  All the connected computers are the same kind of machines  They are tightly connected through dedicated network connections  All the computers share a common home directory. Clusters’ hardware configuration differs based on the selected networking technologies. Cluster is categorized as Open and Close clusters wherein Open Clusters all the nodes need IP’s and those are accessed only through the internet or web. This type of clustering causes enhanced security concerns. And in Closed Clustering, the nodes are concealed behind the gateway node and they offer increased protection. (WatElectronics, 2020)

Centralization: is computing done at a central location, using terminals that are attached to a central computer. The computer itself may control all the peripherals directly (if they are physically connected to the central computer), or they may be attached via a terminal server. Alternatively, if the terminals have the capability, they may be able to connect to the central computer over the network. The terminals may be text terminals or thin clients, for example. It offers greater security over decentralized systems because all of the processing is controlled in a central location. In addition, if one terminal breaks down, the user can simply go to another terminal and log in again, and all of their files will still be accessible. Depending on the system, they may even be able to resume their session from the point they were at before, as if nothing had happened. (Wikipedia, n.d.) Virtualization: Virtualization uses software to create an abstraction layer over computer hardware that allows the hardware elements of a single computer—processors, memory, storage and more—to be divided into multiple virtual computers, commonly called virtual

List and discuss some protocols: DNS, HTTP, SMTP, POP3, IMAP, TCP/IP, ICMP, ARP,

RARP....

 DNS: Domain Name System (DNS) is a distributed Internet directory service. DNS is used mostly to translate between

domain names and IP addresses and to control Internet email delivery. Most Internet services rely on DNS to work, and if DNS fails, web sites cannot be located and email delivery stalls. DNS has two independent aspects:

1. It specifies the name syntax and rules for delegating authority over names. The basic syntax is: local.group.site
2. It specifies the implementation of a distributed computing system that efficiently maps names to addresses. (Javvin Technologies Inc., 2004-2005) The DNS process, simplified, works as follows:  A browser, application or device called the DNS client, issues a DNS request or DNS address lookup, providing a hostname such as “example.com”.  The request is received by a DNS resolver, which is responsible for finding the correct IP address for that hostname. The DNS resolver looks for a DNS name server that holds the IP address for the hostname in the DNS request.  The resolver starts from the Internet’s root DNS server, moving down the hierarchy to Top Level Domain (TLD) DNS servers (“.com” in this case), down to the name server responsible for the specific domain “example.com”.  When the resolver reaches the authoritative DNS name server for “example.com”, it receives the IP address and other relevant details, and returns it to the DNS client. The DNS request is now resolved. The DNS client device can connect to the server directly using the correct IP address.

(Anon., 2020)

 HTTP: The Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) is an application-level protocol with the lightness and speed necessary for

distributed, collaborative, hypermedia information systems. HTTP has been in use by the World-Wide Web global information initiative since 1990. HTTP allows an open-ended set of methods to be used to indicate the purpose of a request. It builds on the discipline of reference provided by the Uniform Resource Identifier (URI), as a location (URL) or name (URN), for indicating the resource on which a method is to be applied. Messages are passed in a format similar to that used by Internet Mail and the Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (MIME). HTTP is also used as a generic protocol for communication between user agents and proxies/gateways to other Internet protocols, such as SMTP, NNTP, FTP, Gopher and WAIS, allowing basic hypermedia access to resources available from diverse applications and simplifying the implementation of user

agents. The HTTP protocol is a request/response protocol. A client sends a request to the server in the form of a request method, URI, and protocol version, followed by a MIME-like message containing request modifiers, client information, and possible body content over a connection with a server. The server responds with a status line, including the message’s protocol version and a success or error code, followed by a MIME-like message containing server information, entity meta information, and possible entitybody content. The first version of HTTP, referred to as HTTP/0.9, was a simple protocol for raw data transfer across the Internet. HTTP/1.0, as defined by RFC 1945, improved the protocol by allowing messages to be in the format of MIME-like messages, containing meta information about the data transferred and modifiers on the request/response semantics. However, HTTP/1.0 does not sufficiently take into consideration the effects of hierarchical proxies, caching, the need for persistent connections, or virtual hosts. “HTTP/1.1” includes more stringent requirements than HTTP/1.0 in order to ensure reliable implementation of its features. There is a secure version of HTTP (S-HTTP) specification, which will be discussed in a separate document.

(Javvin Technologies Inc., 2004-2005)

 SMTP: Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) is a protocol designed to transfer electronic mail reliably and efficiently.

SMTP is a mail service modeled on the FTP file transfer service. SMTP transfers mail messages between systems and provides notification regarding incoming mail. SMTP is independent of the particular transmission subsystem and requires only a reliable ordered data stream channel. An important feature of SMTP is its capability to transport mail across networks, usually referred to as “SMTP mail relaying”. A network consists of the mutually-TCP-accessible hosts on the public Internet, the mutually-TCP-accessible hosts on a firewall-isolated TCP/IP Intranet, or hosts in some other LAN or WAN environment utilizing a non-TCP transport-level protocol. Using SMTP, a process can transfer mail to another process on the same network or to some other network via a relay or gateway process accessible to both networks. In this way, a mail message may pass through a number of intermediate relay or gateway hosts on its path from sender to ultimate recipient. The Mail eXchanger mechanisms of the domain name system are used to identify the appropriate next-hop destination for a message being transported.