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Data Communication Networking Devices: Operation, Utilization and LAN and WAN Internetworking
Computer Communications 24 (2001) 453
www.elsevier.com/locate/comcom
Book Review Data Communication Networking Devices: Operation, Utilization and LAN and WAN Internetworking Gilbert Held; Fourth Edition, John Wiley & Sons, 1999 hardbound, ISBN 0-471-97515-X. Networking experts, with rare exceptions, have shown little interest in the documentation of their professional experiences even though they have been encountering new phenomena in their craft almost everyday. Gilbert Held is one of these exceptions. A renowned specialist, who designed and built one success story after another, often shares his vast experience in many of his well-engineered books such as this one on networking, data communication and internetworking devices. Developments of networking, particularly the Internet, over the last 15 years or so testi®es to the so-called Metcalfe's law: ªValue of a computer network grows as the square of the number of connected elementsº. At the same time, traf®c analysis shows that data communication has already occupied more volume than voice transmission. In addition, it is almost accepted that the next generation networks will represent the convergence of multiple independent networks, including voice, video and data, where internetworking will play a major role. Therefore, in its fourth edition too, this book is as relevant and topical as it was in its ®rst edition which came out one and half decade ago. The book is a collection of both networking and internetworking principles underlying our current understanding of this ®eld. It also presents a methodical picture of the ways in which a multitude of data communication building blocks can be put to their best usage. Network designers will be immensely bene®ted by this book. As the title suggests, the emphasis of the book is on the devices and equipments which most of the books on networking try to evade in the name of complexity. Here lies the jugglery of Gilbert Held who has the courage to churn out such a huge book (850 pages) on practical aspects of networking and make people read it without any hiccup. The book contains seven chapters, each comprising several sections and subsections. Compared to the previous edition, the latest edition boasts of two brand new chapters (2 and 3) and a major enhancement of the ®rst chapter. Contextually, the book can be divided into three major parts: (a) WAN (Chapters 1, 2, 4 and 6); (b) LAN (Chapters 3 and 5); and (c) specialized devices (Chapter 7). Each chapter is followed by a number of review questions, which are very helpful for a reader to judge his/her understanding of the chapter. I personally like Chapter 7 very much and wish it had more pages to explain the new devices in minute operational detail.
A major drawback of the book is that there is no serious discussion on wireless/mobile data communication. Moreover, the author offers little examination of issues such as proxy server, radio modem, VSAT. Moreover, Chapter 1 has become too heavy with sixteen sections accommodated under one heading. It can be divided into two chapters: sections 1 through 12 and section 16 forming one chapter, and sections 13 through 15 forming another. In addition, the heading of Chapter 1 is somewhat misappropriate. Are these concepts not applicable for LAN? The author writes well, his examples are interesting and there is no lacuna in his technical arguments. The text is illustrated with many ®gures, some of which are, however, not up to the mark as one expects from such a book. They could have been improved by modern image processing techniques. The text also contains some typographical errors. For instance, in page 168, Q.1.5.1 should be ªdataº). In page 210, Table 2.3 shows ªSNMPº (it should be ªSMTPº). In page 563, last line reads ªpassing the passing theº (repeated!). Despite these small aberrations, the book is worth reading and buying. Experts will catch its subtleties. Students will recognize the main theme. However, being aimed at networking specialists such as designers or managers, this book should not be prescribed for the beginners. At some places, it assumes a considerable exposure to networks as a prerequisite. Though it can be used for a graduate course on networking, in my opinion, it is more of a handbook nature than of a textbook. However, content-wise, the book provides a lot of information that cannot be found in other books on data communication and networking. For that reason, anyone wishing to try their hand in practical networking should not miss this book at any cost. It will provide answers to their various queries in an easily discernible way. In that sense, this book is really a comprehensive one, covering almost all aspects of data communication and networking, starting from the device level and ending with the user level. It is to be hoped that we shall see more books like this from the author in the coming years too. D. Saha* Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Jadavpur University, Calcutta 700 032, India E-mail address: [email protected]
* Tel.: 191-33-4131766; fax: 191-33-473-1138.
0140-3664/01/$ - see front matter q 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved. PII: S 0140-366 4(00)00228-0
www.elsevier.com/locate/comcom
Book Review Data Communication Networking Devices: Operation, Utilization and LAN and WAN Internetworking Gilbert Held; Fourth Edition, John Wiley & Sons, 1999 hardbound, ISBN 0-471-97515-X. Networking experts, with rare exceptions, have shown little interest in the documentation of their professional experiences even though they have been encountering new phenomena in their craft almost everyday. Gilbert Held is one of these exceptions. A renowned specialist, who designed and built one success story after another, often shares his vast experience in many of his well-engineered books such as this one on networking, data communication and internetworking devices. Developments of networking, particularly the Internet, over the last 15 years or so testi®es to the so-called Metcalfe's law: ªValue of a computer network grows as the square of the number of connected elementsº. At the same time, traf®c analysis shows that data communication has already occupied more volume than voice transmission. In addition, it is almost accepted that the next generation networks will represent the convergence of multiple independent networks, including voice, video and data, where internetworking will play a major role. Therefore, in its fourth edition too, this book is as relevant and topical as it was in its ®rst edition which came out one and half decade ago. The book is a collection of both networking and internetworking principles underlying our current understanding of this ®eld. It also presents a methodical picture of the ways in which a multitude of data communication building blocks can be put to their best usage. Network designers will be immensely bene®ted by this book. As the title suggests, the emphasis of the book is on the devices and equipments which most of the books on networking try to evade in the name of complexity. Here lies the jugglery of Gilbert Held who has the courage to churn out such a huge book (850 pages) on practical aspects of networking and make people read it without any hiccup. The book contains seven chapters, each comprising several sections and subsections. Compared to the previous edition, the latest edition boasts of two brand new chapters (2 and 3) and a major enhancement of the ®rst chapter. Contextually, the book can be divided into three major parts: (a) WAN (Chapters 1, 2, 4 and 6); (b) LAN (Chapters 3 and 5); and (c) specialized devices (Chapter 7). Each chapter is followed by a number of review questions, which are very helpful for a reader to judge his/her understanding of the chapter. I personally like Chapter 7 very much and wish it had more pages to explain the new devices in minute operational detail.
A major drawback of the book is that there is no serious discussion on wireless/mobile data communication. Moreover, the author offers little examination of issues such as proxy server, radio modem, VSAT. Moreover, Chapter 1 has become too heavy with sixteen sections accommodated under one heading. It can be divided into two chapters: sections 1 through 12 and section 16 forming one chapter, and sections 13 through 15 forming another. In addition, the heading of Chapter 1 is somewhat misappropriate. Are these concepts not applicable for LAN? The author writes well, his examples are interesting and there is no lacuna in his technical arguments. The text is illustrated with many ®gures, some of which are, however, not up to the mark as one expects from such a book. They could have been improved by modern image processing techniques. The text also contains some typographical errors. For instance, in page 168, Q.1.5.1 should be ªdataº). In page 210, Table 2.3 shows ªSNMPº (it should be ªSMTPº). In page 563, last line reads ªpassing the passing theº (repeated!). Despite these small aberrations, the book is worth reading and buying. Experts will catch its subtleties. Students will recognize the main theme. However, being aimed at networking specialists such as designers or managers, this book should not be prescribed for the beginners. At some places, it assumes a considerable exposure to networks as a prerequisite. Though it can be used for a graduate course on networking, in my opinion, it is more of a handbook nature than of a textbook. However, content-wise, the book provides a lot of information that cannot be found in other books on data communication and networking. For that reason, anyone wishing to try their hand in practical networking should not miss this book at any cost. It will provide answers to their various queries in an easily discernible way. In that sense, this book is really a comprehensive one, covering almost all aspects of data communication and networking, starting from the device level and ending with the user level. It is to be hoped that we shall see more books like this from the author in the coming years too. D. Saha* Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Jadavpur University, Calcutta 700 032, India E-mail address: [email protected]
* Tel.: 191-33-4131766; fax: 191-33-473-1138.
0140-3664/01/$ - see front matter q 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved. PII: S 0140-366 4(00)00228-0