ype yYou are the network administrator for a group of 18 groundwater hydrologist

Question

ype yYou are the network administrator for a group of 18 groundwater hydrologists who work in two adjacent buildings. Their company works with new housing construction all over the United States to determine if there is enough local ground water to support a new housing development. Each hydrologist has her or his own computer workstation. Two use computers running Linux, three use Macintosh computers, and the rest use computers running Windows XP or Windows 2000. These hydrologists work with a variety of software, including word processing, research databases, spreadsheets, mapping software, and mathematical calculation software. The buildings in which the hydrologists work are not networked, but the company plans to network each building and connect both networks. The company plans to network each building and connect both networks. The company also has decided to purchase a Linux server and a NetWare server for all of the hydrologists to access. Both servers will be in a secure computer room in one of the buildings. Also, the company plans to connect to an Internet service provider so that each hydrologist can easily access the Internet. Explain how you would handle the following immediate concerns. Using complete sentence answer the following questions:

1. What type of network, Ethernet or token ring, do you believe should be implemented?

2. What topology should be installed?

3. What equipment will have to be purchased in order for each hydrologist's computer to be connected to the network?

4. What protocols will you need to set up on each server and on all of the workstations? Why will you need these particular protocols? our homework question here, such as "Help me understand this chemistry problem..."

Explanation / Answer

1. The ideal type of network would be ethernet. Token Ring is an obsolete technology that has a maximum transmission rate of 16 Mb/s. Compare that to ethernet which commonly supports up to 1 Gb/s transmission rates. The only advantage token ring had at one time over ethernet is collision avoidance via the usage of a token passed amongst all connected devices. However this advantage only exists when comparing token ring performance to ethernet using hubs. Ethernet based switches do not suffer this problem because each link on an ethernet switch is considered a collision domain and thus collisions are not a problem for switched ethernet networks. 2. When implementing ethernet a star topology is what should be used. A star topology in this implementation would consist of end devices being connected to a switch which would then be connected to another switch in the other building. Bus or Ring topologies are not appropriate to the type of equipment being used here. A mesh topology would be prohibitively expensive as well as difficult to implment with the given technology. 3. Each workstation as well as each server will require at least one NIC. Each building should one at least one ethernet switch and more if redundancy is a concern. There should be some kind of media interface for a connection between the adjacent buildings. My first choice of media to use between two adjacent buildings would be fibre. This would require fibre interfaces on each switch that connects the two adjacent buildings. This is attractive because of the throughput possible that will allow a seamless LAN connection between both buildings. If this is not possible a point to point wireless solution may be appropriate using directional antennas to connect the two buildings. This may not be the best solution if throughput is a concern. A third option includes installing a local router in each building and use a WAN connection to connect the two buildings. This is not the best solution because it will result in monthly charges to keep the connection up and will not be able to offer the throughput that a direct fibre connection could offer. If the buildings are actually less than 100 meters apart from their termination points in the network closets of each building than copper can be used in the same way that I have advocated fibre. 4. In the past multiple network protocols would be necessary since Linux and Windows based computers used TCP/IP and Macintosh computer used Appletalk. Also Novell Netware servers used IPX/SPX. However all modern applications of these Operating systems include TCP/IP support.

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