Course Title: Network Communications
Credit Value: 3 semester credits
Class Hours: Tuesdays 5:45 pm to 9:00 pm
Room: OWS 257
Instructor: Dan Oelke
Email: Dan@oelke.com -or- droelke@stthomas.edu
Plain text preferred.
Phone: 763-241-8604 - home
763-268-3382 - daytime
Office hours: After class or by appointment
Class website: http://personal1.stthomas.edu/droelke/
Course Objectives: Basic understanding of communications technology. Understand the communication
industry's vernacular. Understanding of OSI reference model. More detailed
knowledge of different physical and transport layer technologies.
Required Text: Data Communications and Networking - 2nd Edition
By: Behrouz Forouzan - McGraw-Hill
Grading Policy: 2 take-home quizzes (aka homework) before midterm- 10% each
Midterm - 25%
2 take-home quizzes after midterm - 15% each
Final - 25%
Optional 5th homework as a grade booster if your grade is B- or lower (at discretion of the instructor.)
A 100-90%
B 89-80%
C 79-70%
F 70-
Attendance Policy: Attendance will be taken. Please call or email in advance if you know you will be
missing.
Knowledge Base: Lecture notes & handouts.
Almost everything presented in class will be available on website.
Voice and Data Communications Handbook
Regis "Bud" Bates & Donald Gregory - McGraw-Hill
Newton's Telecom Dictionary by Harry Newton
Computer Networks by Andrew S. Tanenbaum
Course Outline:
Week 1 Jan 29 Introduction to Communications & Basic concepts
Chapter 1-3
Week 2 Feb 5 Encoding and Transmission of Data
Chapters 4-5
Homework #1 given
Week 3 Feb 12 Transmission Media, Multiplexing and Error Detection and Correction
Chapters 6-7
Homework #1 due
Week 4 Feb 19 Multiplexing Error Correction, T1, Traffic Engineering
Chapters 8-9
Homework #2 given
Week 5 Feb 26 Data Link Protocols, Media Access Sublevel
Chapters 10-11
Homework #2 due
Week 6 Mar 5 Local Area Networks
Chapters 12 & 14
Week 7 Mar 12 Midterm
Week 8 Mar 19 Switching, ISDN & X.25, Frame Relay, ATM,
Chapters 14-19
Mar 26 Spring Break
Week 9 Apr 2 Telephony & Sonet/SDH
Chapter 20 & lecture notes
Homework #3 given
Week 10 Apr 9 Networking & Internetworking, Transport layer
Chapters 20-21
Homework #3 due
Week 11 Apr 16 TCP/IP
Chapters 24 & 25
Homework #4 given
Week 12 Apr 23 Selective Presentation & Application layers
Chapters 23 & 25
Homework #4 due
Week 13 Apr 30 Wireless technologies - Cell, LMDS, Data, LEO
Lecture notes
Week 14 May 7 Final
Course outline subject to change
Work Submission Guidelines
All Homework must be emailed to droelke@stthomas.edu using plain text. A sample homework submission can be
found on web site. Homework may be checked electronically for compliance with the Academic Integrity policy.
All homework is due by class time one week after it is assigned. Homework not in by the due date will be accepted
for reduced credit at the instructor's discretion.
Cooperation on homework is ok. Plagiarism or copying is not ok. Do not copy answers from another person. See
section at end of syllabus on Academic Integrity. Copying from the book, from a website, or from another student
will result in zero credit for the entire assignment.
Miscellaneous Administrative Notes
Set phasers to stun - All cell phones, pagers, etc turned off or set to vibrate. No calls during tests.
No printing documents during class time. Use of computers is ok - but only as long as it doesn't disrupt class.
Everyone should bring pencil, and ruler for diagrams to midterm and final.
Academic Integrity
Academic integrity is defined as not cheating and not plagiarizing; honesty
Cheating
In cases of cheating, the instructor will impose a minimum sanctions of failure of work involved. The instructor will inform the student and the director of the program in writing of:
1. the nature of the offense,
2. the penalty imposed within the course;
3. the recommendation of the instructor as to whether further disciplinary action by the director is
warranted.
If the instructor or the director of the program determines that further disciplinary action is warranted, a disciplinary
hearing shall be commenced at the request of either the instructor or the director. (If there is a previous offense of
this nature on the student's record, a hearing is mandatory.)
Plagiarism
The following statement of plagiarism is reprinted here for the use of faculty and students.
Reprinted from Writing: A College Handbook, James A.W. Heffernan and John E. Lincoln. By permission W. W.
Norton & Company, Inc., Copyright 1982 by W.W. Norton & Company, Inc.
Plagiarism is the dishonest act of presenting the words or thoughts of another writer as if they were your own.
You commit plagiarism whenever you use a source in any way without indicating that you have used it. If you
quote anything at all, even a phrase, you must put quotation marks around it, or set it off from your text; if you
summarize or paraphrase an author's words, you must clearly indicate where the summary or paraphrase begins and
ends; if you use an author's idea, you must say that you are doing so. In every instance, you must also formally
acknowledge the written source from which you took the material.
The only time you can use a source without formal acknowledgment is when you refer to a specific phrase,
statement, or passage that you have used and acknowledged earlier in the same paper. If the writer has already
formally acknowledged the specific source of the material, there is no need to acknowledge it again in the
conclusion. Nor is there any need to enumerate the sources of a summary statement based on several different
passages that have been used earlier in the paper and have already been acknowledged. But you are free to skip the
acknowledgment only when you are referring a second time to exactly the same material. When you use new
material from a source already cited, you must make a new acknowledgment.
Here are examples of various kinds of plagiarism. In each instance, the source is a passage from p. 102 of E.R.
Dodd's The Greek and the Irrational (Berkeley, 1971; reprinted: Boston: Beacon, 1957). First here is the original
note, copied accurately from the book.
Functions, Dodds 12, p. 102
"If the waking world has certain advantages of solidary and continuity its social opportunities are terribly restricted.
In it we need as a rule, only the neighbors whereas the dream world offers the chance of intercourse, however
fugitive, with our distant friends, our dead and gods. For normal men it is the sole experience in which they escape
the offensive and incomprehensible bondage of time and space."
And here are five ways of plagiarizing this source: (If you have any questions about plagiarism, ask the
instructor)
1. Word-for-word continuous copying without quotation marks or mention of the author's name.
Dreams help us satisfy another important psychic need - our need to vary our social life. This need is
regularly thwarted in our waking moments. If the waking world has certain advantages of solidity
and continuity, its social opportunities are terribly restricted. In it we need, as a rule, only the
neighbors, whereas the dream world offers the change of intercourse, however fugitive, with our
distant friends, our dead, and our gods. We awaken from such encounters feeling refreshed, the
dream having liberated us from the here and now...
2. Copying many words and phrases without quotation marks or mention of the author's name.
Dreams help us satisfy another important psychic need - our need to vary our social life. In the
waking world our social opportunities, for example, are terribly restricted. As a rule, we usually
encounter only the neighbors. In the dream world, on the other hand, we have the chance of meeting
our distant friends. For most of us it is the sole experience in which we escape the bondage of time
and space....
3. Copying an occasional key word or phrase without quotation marks or mention of the
author's name.
Dreams help us satisfy another important psychic need - our need to vary our social life. During our waking hours
our social opportunities are terribly restricted. We see only the people next door and our business associates. In
contrast, whenever we dream, we can see our distant friends. Even though the encounter is brief, we awaken
refreshed, having freed ourselves from the bondage of the here and now...
4. Paraphrasing without mention of the author's name.
Dreams help us satisfy another important psychic need - our need to vary our social life. When
awake, we are creatures of this time and this place. Those we meet are usually those we live near and work with.
When dream ing, on the other hand, we can meet far-off friends. We awaken refreshed by our flight from the here
and now.
5. Taking the author's idea without acknowledging the source.
Dreams help us to satisfy another important psychic need - the need for a change. They liberate us from the here and now, taking us out of the world we normally live in....
Electronic submissions are ok. Printed submissions are better for feedback. I will email back a grade for Electronic submissions with minimal comments. Printed submissions will get more written comments.