Advanced Networking AA11-12

Welcome to the 2011/2012 edition of this course. It is one of the core courses characterizing the "Internet Technolgy" area. Indeed, it is at the core of it, since our topic is the Internet itself, its architecture, its technologies, its limitations, its strengths and ... its bugs.

We will explore some topics in the three main layers:

  • The Network layer (IP)
  • The Transport layer (TCP)
  • The Application layer (multimedia management and handling)
I will teach most of the classes, but we will have the opportunity to have some in-depth seminars by other researchers.

BillBoard Posting

  • Lessons are in room A 107, Tuesday 4.30-6.30 PM and Thursday 8:30--10:30 AM.

 

Program and Methodology

Please, refer to ESSE3 for the formalities and the official program.

Our program this year will conduct us from IP routing and Multicast to TCP congestion problems up to some fundamental multimedia protocols in the internet like SIP (and some H.323), to NATting techniques, and P2P IPTV systems.

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Textbook

We do not have, as usual, a single official textbook. The reason is that finding 'advanced' topics in textbooks is not easy, if at all possible.

Some good basic networking books exist that cover all the material you are supposed to know from basic networking courses and also some of the material we cover.

Here are a couple of them:

  • Douglas Comer, Computer Networks and Internets (with Internet Applications), Prentice Hall
  • Andrew S. Tanenbaum, Computer Networks, Prentice Hall
  • James Kurose, Keith W. Ross, Computer Networking, a top down approach, Addison Wesley.

Douglas Comer also wrote several advanced books on many different facets of the Internet.These books are very good and cover all our material ... indeed much more than we actually do.

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Exams

A project plus oral complement. Projects, as we discussed in class can be "practical" or theoretical. They can be done in groups. The effort per person should be around 2-3 weeks work. After the project is finished you can have the oral part. There is no fixed date to finish the exam, but to record it you MUST register before on ESSE3, so please remember to do that.
There is no fixed schema to assign the grade: to have a high vote you must do a good project and a good oral!! In general if the project is not satisfactory, I prefer to ask you to do additional work rather than jeopardizing the result. On the other hand, I'd like to see you one single time at the oral, so please, do not underestimate it.

Projects Assignment

There is nothing like a "list of projects". Projects are assigned on-demand, based on your interests and attitudes. So:

  1. Select one or more topics of the course that you liked more or find out other topics on networking that you are interested in;
  2. Think if you prefer doing a project "hands on" or more theoretic (normally a survey on the State of the Art);
  3. Send me an e-mail shortly (no more than 10 lines) describing your interests and thoughts to take an appointment;
  4. Decide the projects details with me;
  5. Enjoy it !!!!

Forthcoming Exam Dates

  • Thursday Jan. 19
  • Wednesday Feb. 8

Please remember to register for the exam BEFORE finishing the project and taking the oral exam , otherwise we can't register the grade. I will use the ESSE3 on-line registration.

The dates above are just the bureaucratic date, you can take the oral any time making an appointment with me a few days (4-5 at least) in advance. Remember that you have to finish the project before taking the oral part of the exam. The oral will cover all we did in class, and is noramlly in form of a discussion, often joining together different parts and taking the notions there as an excuse to broaden the subject and investigate how familiar you have become with networking concepts.

Refer to ESSE3 for the remaining bureaucracy.

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Material and Slides

Advice: RFCs pointers are offered for additional in-depth study, the ones indicated are normally not the only one related to one argument, but they are the "founding" ones. Study is expected to complement lessons, not to "learn by hart" the RFCs, which is useless since they are full of details not really necessary to understand a protocol, but necessary to guarantee interoperability in implementation.

Internet pointers, when appropriate and given, can be used to complements the notes taken in class. Please, try to avoid "googling around" with keywords of the lessons, because you end up finding tons of bad (often wrong!!) material and wasting a lot of time.

  • Introduction to the course and recap of fundamental notions on network and transport layers
  • Routing in the Internet: RIP, OSPF and BGP. Use the RIP-2 RFC as a sample and reference on how internet standards and protocols are defined ... sometimes it is faster to look at the original source than to browse and read three different books to really understand how a protocol works!
  • Multicasting: the problem of multicast routing and delivery, Steiner Trees and Spanning Trees, IGMP, MOSPF, PIM, Multicasting in AdHoc Networks. NEW enhanced version posted Oct. 10, 2011.

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Meeting Me

The most obvious place to query, ask for clarifications, rise doubts and so on is the class, so that everybody can intervene and be aware of clarifications. Moreover, our lessons can be influenced by your questions and curiosities, so expressign them in class can lead to a "personalized" course in the end.
Further minor queries can be done at the end (or before) the lesson.
If additional time is needed for complex queries or long problems send me an e-mail for an appointment. Try to specify the reason in the e-mail, this helps me preparing the answer and helps you formalizing it. Please, avoid dropping-by the office. Normally I cannot receive you on the fly and the only result is a waste of time. I do not set up a formal receiving hour: you can come at any time, just take an appointment.
If you have small quick doubts I can also try to solve them via e-mail, so that you don't need to come to my office for a 30 second answer!

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