INFO 330 – Computer Networking Technology I
Spring 2015
Professor:
E-mail:
Office and Phone:
Office Hours:
Course Location
and Dates:
Text:
Web site:
Jennifer Booker, Ph.D.
gbooker@drexel.edu Please include course no. and assignment in subject!
Rush 334, 215-895-1004
Tuesdays and Thursdays from 12 to 1 pm, or by appointment.
LECTURE: Rush Hall 205 on MWF from 9:00 to 9:50 am
LAB: Thursdays in Rush 205, from 1:00 to 2:50 pm
Required: Kurose, James F. and Ross, Keith W., Computer Networking: A
Top-Down Approach, 6/E, ISBN 9780132856201, Addison-Wesley, 2013.
NOTE: The fifth edition is also usable (ISBN: 0136079679, 2009).
Lab instructions will be provided in class.
Additional references and general course information (e.g. grading policies,
etc.) are available on my web site: http://cci.drexel.edu/faculty/gbooker/
Be sure to read General Course Information!
See also my summary of networking protocols, which is frequently used.
COURSE OVERVIEW
This course is about communication between computers – an introduction to
application
networking. Our primary guide to understanding networking will be
examination of the Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) reference model
transport
(ISO/IEC 7498-3:1997 et al), as implemented in the world’s dominant set of
protocols, Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP).
network
In order for any software application to communicate with another computer, it
has to send a message through the stack of layers shown at right to get to the
link
physical means of communication (electricity flowing through an Ethernet
wire, or a wireless network signal, for examples). The signal gets to the other
physical
computer (and we’ll look into routing and other possible steps along the way),
(Image from
and the message has to work its way up the stack to an application on the other
the text, 3/E.)
computer.
We’ll focus in this course on the application, transport, network and link layers, and the
protocols associated with each of them.
COURSE ASSESSMENT
The course’s evaluation is based on four homework assignments to help refine and demonstrate
your understanding of the material from the text, two quizzes, and six labs. The four
assignments and two quizzes are all done individually, the labs may be done in pairs.
The quizzes each cover two chapters of the book (1-2 and 3-4), so they are not cumulative. They
will consist of multiple choice questions, and short answer or application questions. They are
comprehensive, in that they cover all of the material, except the portions noted in study guides.
This outline is tentative, and topics may change or be reorganized due to the direction and flow of the class.
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Assignments are due as follows:
Assignment Activity
1
2
3
4
Labs
Assigned
Date
Weighting
During
Due
Networking Overview
Week 2
4/20/2015
10%
Application Layer
Week 5
10%
5/8/2015
Quiz 1
15%
5/13/15
Transport Layer
Week 7
5/20/15
10%
Quiz 2
6/1/15
15%
Network & Link Layers
Week 11
6/11/15
15%
Lab 1 to Lab 6
About Weekly Given in lab
25%
100%
The fourth Assignment counts as a take-home final, and is drawn from chapters 4 and 5.
Class participation is not graded, but is highly recommended to enhance your understanding of
the material. You are responsible for course schedule changes which are announced in class.
COURSE OUTLINE
Text
Lab
Chapters*
3/30/2015 Computer Networks and the Internet
1 (all)
4/6/2015 Computer Networks and the Internet
1 (all)
4/13/2015
[No class this week]
4/20/2015 Application Layer
2 (skip 2.7)
1
4/27/2015 Application Layer
2 (skip 2.7)
2
5/4/2015 Transport Layer
3
3
Quiz 1 on Monday
5/11/2015
3
4
Transport Layer
5/18/2015 Network Layer
4
5/25/2015 Network Layer
4
5
5
Quiz 2 on Monday
6/1/2015
6
Link Layer
1-5
6/8/2015 Finals week
th
th
* Chapters are the same in the 5 and 6 editions of the text.
Reading will not skip the programming aspects of the text.
Week Monday is
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
Topics
If we finish Chapters early, we’ll start the following material immediately.
This outline is tentative, and topics may change or be reorganized due to the direction and flow of the class.
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IST courses may be recorded and streamed for educational use.
Class lectures (not labs) will be recorded using the Echo 360 capture system.
Recorded classes may be viewed on Blackboard (https://learn.dcollege.net/) under the
Class Capture link.
LABS
The labs will focus on hands-on application of the concepts discussed in lecture, using a packet
capture utility called WireShark (formerly known as Ethereal). The likely lab topics are:






Lab 1.
Lab 2.
Lab 3.
Lab 4.
Lab 5.
Lab 6.
Introduction to WireShark packet analysis
HTTP (Application Layer)
DNS (Application Layer)
TCP (Transport Layer)
IP (Network Layer)
DHCP (Network & Link Layers)
Lab Objective
The objective of this lab is for INFO 330 students to develop a practical understanding of the
computer networking concepts learned in the lecture portion of the course by seeing network
protocols in action and observing and manipulating the sequence of messages exchanged
between two protocol entities for various purposes.
Lab Assignments
Laboratory assignments are to be completed during each laboratory period, and are due when
stated in the lab instructions. They represent 25% of your overall INFO 330 grade.
This outline is tentative, and topics may change or be reorganized due to the direction and flow of the class.
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