Spring 2010
ENSC 895 SPECIAL TOPICS II: COMMUNICATION NETWORKS

(3-0-0)
TOPICS WEEK IN REVIEW ASSIGNMENTS EXAMS TEXTBOOKS

SCHEDULE STAFF PROJECTS TOOLS WEB SITES INFO

This course is taught together with ENSC 427. Please refer to the ENSC 427 web page for details.
Current count of email messages related to ENSC 895 exchanged this term: 222.
Course description: This course covers the techniques needed to understand and analyze modern data communications networks. It covers the basic architecture of packet networks and their network elements (switches, routers, bridges), and the protocols used to enable transmission of packets through the network. It addresses techniques for collection, characterization, and modeling of traffic in packet networks. It covers aspects of traffic management, such as various call admission control and congestion control algorithms in high-speed packet networks and the influence of traffic on network performance.

This is a project oriented graduate course. Students will be introduced to various algorithms and software tools for simulating packet networks: OPNET (OPNET Technologies), ns-2 network simulator (Lawrence Berkeley Labs), Ptolemy (UC Berkeley), and AutoClass (NASA). S-PLUS (Insightful) tool for statistical analysis of traffic data will be also available.

Pre-requisites: Successful completion of ENSC 427-3 or permission of the instructor.

TOPICS:
WEEK IN REVIEW:
ASSIGNMENTS:
Posted weekly by Friday. Due the following week on Sunday (firm deadline).
EXAMS:
MIDTERM EXAMS:
Wednesday, February 10, 2010, 14:30 - 15:20, AQ 3005
Wednesday, March 31, 2010, 14:30 - 15:20, AQ 3005

FINAL EXAM:
No final exam.

PROJECT REPORTS, PRESENTATIONS, AND DEMOS:

  • Web page describing your project and five references are due March 14, 2010 (midnight: 11:59 PM + 1 minute).
  • Interim report is due March 14, 2010 (midnight: 11:59 PM + 1 minute).
  • Project class presentations will be held in class during the week of April 19, 2010.
  • Demos will be scheduled during the week of April 19, 2010.
  • Final written report (electronic version, hard copy, and web pages) are due on Sunday, April 25, 2010 (midnight: 11:59 PM + 1 minute). (Please note that ENSC homework assignment boxes are located in the ASB Atrium.)
    The final project grading policy
    The final project grading form (all)
    The final project grading form (presentation)
    The final project grading form (demo)
    The final project grading form (report)
    Presentation schedule
    Demo schedule
    GRADING:
    Assignments 10%, Midterms 10% (Midterm #1 = 5% and Midterm #2 = 5%), class presentation 10%, demo presentation 10%, and final project 60%.
       Click here to see your scores and the midterm exam 1 and midterm exam 2, distribution charts.
    TEXTBOOKS:

    Recommended reading:
  • J. Kurose and K. W. Ross, Computer Networking: A Top-Down Approach, 4/E Addison Wesley, 2008.
  • J. Kurose and K. W. Ross, Computer Networking: A Top-Down Approach Featuring the Internet: 3/E, Addison Wesley, 2005.
  • J. Walrand and P. Varaiya, High-performance Communication Networks, 2/e, Morgan Kaufmann, 2000
        (online version).
  • A. Leon-Garcia and I. Widjaja, Communication Networks: Fundamental Concepts and Key Architectures, 2nd edition, McGraw-Hill, 2004.
  • S. Keshav, Engineering Approach to Computer Networking: ATM Networks, the Internet, and the Telephone Network, Addison Wesley, 1997.
  • J. Walrand, Communication Networks, A First Course, 2/e, McGraw-Hill, 1998.
  • D. Bertsekas and R. Gallager, Data Networks, Second edition, Prentice Hall, 1992.
  • L. L. Peterson and B. Davie, Computer Networks, A Systems Approach, 3rd edition, Morgan Kaufmann, 1999.

    • Other related sources:
  • T. G. Robertazzi, Computer Networks and Systems, Queuing Theory and Performance Evaluation, Third edition, Springer Verlag, 2000.
  • M. De Prycker, Asynchronous Transfer Mode: Solutions for Broadband ISDN, Ellis Horwood, 1991.
  • I. Katzela, Modeling and Simulating Communication Networks, A Hands-on Approach Using OPNET, Prentice Hall, 1999.

    • Check the status of the books on reserve for ENSC 895 by typing "ENSC 895" (with the space) in the search window.

    JOURNALS:
  • IEEE Communications Surveys & Tutorials
  • IEEE Network, The magazine of global information exchange
  • IEEE Communications Magazine
  • ACM Computer Communication Review
  • IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communications
  • IEEE/ACM Transactions on Networking
    SCHEDULE:
    Lectures:
    M 14:30 - 16:20 in AQ 3003
    W 14:30 - 15:20 in AQ 3005
    Ljiljana Trajkovic ljilja at cs.sfu.ca

    Projects:
    ENSC Graduate Computer room: ASB 10802 (open lab).

    PROFESSOR:

    TEACHING ASSISTANT:

    COMPUTING HELP:

    PROJECTS:
    ENSC 895 project teams
    ENSC 895 Spring '10 project proposals
    ENSC 895 Spring '10 projects

    Samples of past projects:
    Research with OPNET at SFU
    ENSC 427 Spring '09 projects
    ENSC 835/CMPT 885 Spring '09 projects
    ENSC 835/CMPT 885 Spring '08 project
    ENSC 835/CMPT 885 Spring '06 projects
    ENSC 835/CMPT 885 Fall '03 projects
    ENSC 833/CMPT 885 Spring '03 projects
    ENSC 835/CMPT 885 Spring '02 projects
    ENSC 833/CMPT 885 Spring '01 projects
    ENSC 894/CMPT 885 Spring '00 projects
    Instructions for in class presentations of your ENSC 895 final projects
    Instructions for writing ENSC 895 final project reports

    SOFTWARE TOOLS:
  • ENSC and CMPT host names
  • Running tools remotely
  • Setting the environments:
         OPNET: version 14.0.A, version 12.0.A, version 11.0.A, and version 10.5.A
         ns-2      Ptolemy      AutoClass      Splus
  • ns-2 simulator and documentation
      BlueHoc: Bluetooth Performance Evaluation Tool
      Network Designer (NetDes) with ns Java applet
  • OPNET main page
  • Autoclass
  • Ptolemy
  • J-Sim (formerly known as JavaSim)
  • Omnet++
  • S-PLUS for Unix, S-PLUS for Windows, and R.

    TRAFFIC TRACES:
    Locally available short traces:

  • Star Wars data:
      VBR Frames: trace and its description.
      MPEG Frames: trace and its description.
      Trace for ns StarWars trace for ns (14 MBytes) and its description.
  • News recorded video data: news.IPB, news.I, news.P, news.B, and their description.
  • Short extracts from Bellcore Ethernet traces:
      tpAug89_2000.TL, pOct89_2000.TL, OctExt_2000.TL, and their description.
    FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS (FAQ)
    Email messages with hints and answers to some frequently asked questions:
    FAQ in 2010
    FAQ in 2009
    FAQ in 2008
    FAQ in 2006
    FAQ in 2003
    FAQ in 2002
    FAQ in 2001
    FAQ in 2000
    WEB SITES OF INTEREST:
  • ENSC 427 Spring 2009
  • Computer Networking: A Top-Down Approach Featuring the Internet, 2/e
  • Communication Networks Laboratory and More about Communication Networks Laboratory
  • UCB EE228a Communication Networks: Internet, Ethernet, ATM Slides
        In case you have problems accessing it from UCB, here is the local file.
    Online courses:
  • Prof. Shiv Kalyanaraman's Online Audio and Video Lectures on Computer Networking
    Acronyms:
  • Dictionary of Acronyms in Communications and Informatics (DACI)
  • http://www.its.bldrdoc.gov:80/fs-1037/
  • http://www.csrstds.com/acro-a-d.html
    General references:
  • What is page
    Documents:
    Internet Requests for Comments (RFC) site:
  • IETF
    Organizations:
  • International Telecommunication Union
  • The Internet Engineering Task Force
  • The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers
  • American National Standards Institute (ANSI)
  • European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI)
  • Gigabit Ethernet Alliance
  • Digital Audio Visual Council (DAVIC)
    Forums:
  • ATM Forum
  • ADSL Forum
  • Frame Relay Forum (FRF)
  • Multiservice Switching Forum (MSF)
  • North American ISDN Users Forum (NIUF)
    Other resources:
  • MPLS Resource Center
  • World of SNMP and Network Management
  • Optical Networking Page
  • The SONET Home Page
  • Protocols for Adaptive Mobile and Wireless Networking
  • CDMA Development Group
  • National Laboratory for Applied Network Research (NLANR)
  • Cisco networking page
    Daily news of interest:
  • Wired News: DoS: Defense Is the Best Offense
    Tools:
  • Ethereal: A network protocol analyzer
  • GNU Zebra: Free routing software
    Sites with traffic traces:
  • StarWars traces from Telcordia (not available)
  • StarWars trace for ns (not available)
  • MPEG-4 and H.263 encoded videos from TU Berlin
  • Internet Traffic Archive
  • Traces from the National Laboratory for Applied Network Research
    Fun things:
  • RFC 1121
  • RFC 1149
  • RFC 2100
  • UC Berkeley EECS20: Structure and Interpretation of Signals and Systems
    INFO:
    TOPICS WEEK IN REVIEW ASSIGNMENTS EXAMS TEXTBOOKS

    SCHEDULE STAFF PROJECTS TOOLS WEB SITES INFO

    Created by
    Ljiljana Trajkovic
    ljilja at cs.sfu.ca
    Last modified: Monday, April 26, 2010 6:20:40 PM PDT.