Learning outcomes

After studying this course, you should be able to:

• evaluate technical descriptions of communication protocols and demonstrate an understanding of their operation

• describe the characteristics of circuit-switched and packet-switched networks, and of connectionless and connection-oriented modes in packet-switched networks

• describe the role played by primitives in the OSI reference model

• explain how ‘vertical’ and ‘horizontal’ communication takes place in the OSI reference model

• describe the main functions of the principal protocols in the TCP/IP architecture.