Switched Networks

This week we leaned two chapters called Switched Networks and Switch Configurations. Switches are devices that are used to connect several devices in the same network. They direct and control data flow at the access layer of networks. Nowadays, networks are developing every day to deal with business problems better. Users expect to get instant access to information, video and audio resources everywhere, at anytime and anywhere. For this, different devices have to work together and collaboration is needed. Therefor to build such advanced services we need robust routing and carefully designed switching infrastructure. Switching networks chapter was about to build such network design models and understanding how LAN switches build forwarding tables and use MAC address information to effectively transfer data between hosts. The traditional three-layer design model consist of core, distribution and access layer and each of this has specific functions, which provide modularity, resiliency and flexibility. In some networks distribution and core layers are not separated. Switches build their switch tables using MAC addresses of destination. And to reach this destination there two switching methods called store-and-forward and cut-through. First method waits until entire frame is received, checks for errors and then forwards if frame is valid, while cut-through method starts to forward frame after receiving destination MAC address and without checking for errors. Switches have full-duplex communication by default, which helps to prevent collisions between frames. This is short summary for topic.