Computer Networking Fundamentals - To The Point

What is Computer Network?

A computer network is a collection of two or more computers with communication between them through a medium. The communication medium can be through radio waves, wires, infrared, optical fibers etc.

Computer network is an integral part of our daily lives, with the most important reason being that of communication. The use of computer networking is to share resources like fax machines, printers, modems, files etc., and its other uses are database server, computer server, email, chat, internet etc. 

What is Server?

The computer to which the resources are attached is called the server and the other computers that access the resource are called clients. In peer-to-peer computer networks there are no servers.

Network Classification (Network Type)

The computer networks are classified, depending upon the size, as 

• Local Area Networks (LAN)
• Wide Area Networks (WAN)
• Metropolitan Area Networks (MAN)
• Personal Area Networks (PAN)

Network Topology (How it looks like)

The topology is the way the computer networks and network resources are connected or arranged. Network Topology can be classified as:

• Point to point
• Bus Topology
• Ring Topology
• Star Topology
• Tree Topology
• Mesh Topology
• Hybrid Topology

The networking hardware basically consists of wiring, network cards and a hub. Computer network cards are required so that one computer can understand what the other computer is “talking”. Network cards have a unique MAC address to identify computers on a computer network. Hubs connect all the computers in the network. Hubs can also be used to connect to other hubs to increase the size of the computer network. Two computers can be connected using Ethernet cards or phone lines or power lines for communication.

    As the number of computers in an office or a home increases, so do the number of cables, so wireless networking is a viable solution. In wireless networking radio transreceivers (A transmitter and receiver housed together in a single unit and having some circuits in common) or infrared signals are used to communicate between computers and devices. Examples of wireless networking include Wi-fi and Bluetooth technology.