Weekly outline

  • General

  • 24 September - 30 September

    Introduction to this course. Introduction to physical networks and communication. How to find and read networking information. Network layering. Link level basics.

    Reading: Chapter 1

  • 1 October - 7 October

    All about Ethernet. Addressing. Link layer concepts and protocols. Switching and routing. Encapsulation. 802.11. PPP.

    Reading: Chapter 3.

  • 8 October - 14 October

    IP. IPv4 and IPv6. IP addressing. Internet delivery mechanisms and promises. Structure of an IP packet. UDP, TCP, ICMP basics. IP routing basics.

    Reading: Chapter 2, 5

  • 15 October - 21 October

    UDP. Protocol implementation using UDP. Mechanisms for protocol design: windowing, retransmits, compression, implicit transmission. UNIX UDP programming.

    Reading: Chapter 10

  • 22 October - 28 October

    TCP. Stream protocol design. Reliability and timing. Message boundaries and escaping.

    Reading: Chapter 12, 15

  • 29 October - 4 November

    More about TCP. Details of windowing, retransmission, timing. Connection setup. Structure of a TCP packet.

    Reading: Chapter 13, 14

  • 5 November - 11 November

    Address and name resolution. ARP, DHCP, DNS.

    Readings: Chapter 4, 6, 11

    • 12 November - 18 November

      How packets move through the Internet. Gateways, routing, NAT, firewalls. Broadcast and multicast. More about ICMP. TCP congestion control.

      Reading: Chapter 7, 9, 16

      No Class Meeting Monday 12 November: Veterans Day (observed).

    • 19 November - 25 November

      Network security. Cryptography and protocol security fundamentals. Threat models. Expected value analysis. Common points of attack.
      Reading: Chapter 18

      Wednesday: Lab

    • 26 November - 2 December

      Application layer: TELNET, FTP, SMTP, HTTP. Review.

      Reading: RFCs 854, 959, 2821, 2616. [Do not read in too much detail, but get an overview of how each protocol works. Use supplementary information as appropriate to help with this.]

    • 3 December - 9 December

      Final Exam: Monday 3 December 2012 7:30-9:00PM in our normal classroom.