Networked Information Systems COMP6340
Course overview
Course description
This course studies networking fundamentals including LANS, MANS, WANS, the Internet, intranets, extranets and the WWW, with the focus being the Internet. The topics covered include: hardware, software, network topologies, architecture and protocols; network and web applications; website design and construction; information architecture; standards; privacy, security, firewalls and reliability; systems integration; network monitoring and management; and professional ethics and social issues.
Course content
This course studies networking fundamentals including LANS, MANS, WANS, the Internet, intranets, extranets and the WWW, with the focus being the Internet. The topics covered include: hardware, software, network topologies, architecture and protocols; network and web applications; website design and construction; information architecture; standards; privacy, security, firewalls and reliability; systems integration; network monitoring and management; and professional ethics and social issues.
Rationale
The driving force behind adopting open systems has been the explosive growth of networked applications. The upper (user) layers of networking contain some technical content that is not met elsewhere in this IT program, but is of importance to applying networking (particularly remote operations, managing data representation in communication, system and software architectures for networked hypertext and mobile code). A descriptive approach of network applications viewed as services, with few details of protocols, serves both the information systems and computer science streams. The computing technology in this area also addresses the technical issues of multi-layered software architecture, data transport, security, introductory aspects of distributed software, and the technical-social issue of standardisation of software. This area exemplifies a broader view of technical information technology standards and their place in defining or delaying the progress of implementations and applications.
Ideas
This course is responsible for
- TCP/IP reference model
- data representation independence: abstract syntax notation, transfer syntax, encapsulation of formatted data in transport and delivery protocols
- data compression
- data security and authentication: elementary encryption, methods for security in electronic mail and document exchange
- common applications: electronic mail, file transfer protocols, hypertext transport protocol, mobile code services
- web technologies: HTML, style sheets, forms, plugins, Javascript, Java and cookies
- Web design: intranet, internet, extranet, navigation, accessibility
- Standardisation issues
Topics
The following topics will be addressed.
- introduction to open systems, TCP/IP reference model
- foundations of Internet applications
- electronic mail/message handling system
- hypertext transfer protocol, WWW system architecture and operation
- data encryption and security
- server side scripts, mobile code
- HTML, CSS
- Web design
- standards - ISO, Internet and other open models; conformance and acceptance
Technical skills
At the end of this course, the student will have a largely descriptive and comparative knowledge of networking, the Internet, some of the major networking applications software and its potential in distributed information systems, web design and issues of standardisation and conformance.
Textbooks
Prescribed Text Book
Fitzerald, J. and Dennis, A. Business Data Communications and Networking, 10th edition, John Wiley, 2009.
Recommended Reading
Tanenbaum, A.S. Computer Networks, 4th edition, Prentice-Hall, 2002.
Workload
Thirty one-hour lectures and six two-hour tutorial/laboratory sessions.
