Networking Concepts - Introduction

In this section I tried to give answers to the following questions:
Further topics:

What is a network?
A sophisticated definition is not needed here by now. Roughly spoken a computer network is a set of at least two computers together with a physical connection between them (though figuratively one would assume to have at least three units connected before calling it a network).
This connection must have been deliberately set up in order to allow data exchange and/or resource sharing.
According to that definition, two computers sharing one monitor are a network, whereas a dual-processor Pentium Pro (where the processors share main memory) is not.

Why do we connect computers?
Connecting computers comes along with three major advantages:
  • A quick and easy possibility to communicate (exchanging emails, sending faxes, contacting staff members via messaging etc.)
  • The possibility to work together on a single file/database
    There are databases that are far too big to be maintained by a single person. Many people must be allowed to update data at the same time.
  • Reducing costs by sharing expensive hardware
    Instead of supplying every workstation with one printer it is cheaper to have one large printer shared by all of the staff. But it is not only possible to share printers but also drives (e.g. for backup purposes), special hardware like scanners and CD-writers, or even calculating power.
© 2000 Peter Gallert, last updated on 22 August 2000