Lecture 1: Computer Networks Overview
Computer Networks Overview
- The lecturer (and tutor)
- Phil Scott. I will normally be in my office during working
hours. My office phone number is 5444 7277.
See also, electronic mail.
- Textbooks and references
- In particular, how come there's no text book? What should we
do in relation to buying a book? Are there other sources of
information for this subject?
- Assessment
- Comes in two parts:
- The Exam
- Assignments. In particular, watch for the first assignment.
This subject is offered in this mode in first semester only.
It means that you can study Computer Networks from home in
a "kind of" distance education environment. All subject
material (including tutorial solutions) will
be available on the Web, and students can dial in to the campus
or connect to the Web pages via their own local Internet Service
Provider.
Students taking the unit in this mode normally attend the campus for
a number of Saturday afternoon meetings through the semester. At
these sessions, we generally work through the tutorial sheets and
discuss the subject material. It's regarded as
the student's own responsibility to read and understand the lecture
material on the Web.
Conventional Classroom Offering
For those students who are resident at or near the Bendigo
campus, the subject is also being offered in conventional
classroom mode.
Issues which are relevant to this mode of delivery are:
- When are the lectures?
- Wednesday at 9am and Friday at 11am.
- Can the lecture times be changed?
- No. Absolutely not. Well, maybe...
- What happens with tutes?
- You have to choose one tute to follow the Wednesday lecture
(Group A tutes), and
one for the Friday lecture (Group B tutes). Tutes
always follow the lecture. This is a bit weird in
2000, because it means
that the four tutes on Tuesday cover the material in the preceding
Friday lecture. You can now register for tutorials in this unit
using our new
On-line Tute Registration
System. Please use this facility, and report any problems
which you may have with it. You need to your LTU login
name and student number for authentication
using this system, but NOT your LTU password.
Support Services
The Subject Area
Computer Networks are the biggest Big New Thing for decades.
They are now of central importance to all of Information Technology.
With the recent explosive growth of the Internet, they are rapidly
becoming of crucial importance to all of modern society.
It is absolutely certain that you will need to know about networks
and network technology to survive in the IT workplace.
This subject aims to give a solid overview of the technologies
and philosophies that are needed to understand how computer networks
are built, and can be used. It also examines, in part, why some
apparently illogical things are the way they are, and how human
foibles can affect technology.
One crucial aspect of the subject is that it will
not shy away from discussion of the "P" word (politics) where
this is necessary to understand the technology.
This lecture is also available in
PostScript format.
There is no tutorial for this lecture.
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Copyright © 2000 by
Philip Scott,
La Trobe University.