CS456/556 - Internet Services - Week 3 Assignment

1. What is the role of a modem?
2. Why are modems used in pairs?
3. Do a pair of modems permit 1-way or 2-way communication?
4. Although users think that the Internet can transfer individual characters, each character must be represented as a sequence of _______________________
5. A popular code used to represent characters on the Internet has the acronym _____________
6. What does the following ASCII message say? 1001000 1100101 1101100 1101100 1101111 0101110
7. How many unique characters can be represented by a code that only uses two bits per character? How many can be devised with three bits? with five bits?
8. Consult a reference manual to learn more about ASCII. Give an example of a natural language that cannot be represented easily in ASCII (e.g., English is a natural language). Explain why.
9. Visit a local computer store and ask to see (a) a modem, and (b) a serial line interface used to connect a printer to a computer. Which is larger? Which has more complex electronic components?
10. How many characters can be entered with a standard computer keyboard? (Hint: look at the ASCII encoding and consider how the SHIFT and CONTROL keys work.)
11. What value parity bit will be assigned to the string 0101001 using even parity?
12. LAN stands for ________ ________ ________
13. LAN is often used to connect computers inside a _______________________
14. What hardware does a computer need to attach to a LAN?
15. Must all computers that attach to a given LAN operate at the same speed?
16. If the wires from one LAN are attached to the wires from another, will the resulting network permit communication over a longer distance?
17. If one of the computers attached to a LAN loses power, can other computers still use the LAN to communicate?
18. Read about computers from Apple Computer Corporation. What LAN technology comes built into each Apple computer?
19. Read more about Ethernet LAN hardware. What is the maximum distance an Ethernet LAN can accommodate?
20. WAN stands for ________ ________ ________
21. Under what circumstances does an organization use a WAN?
22. Are more LANs or WANs in use? Why?
23. The U.S. government agency that funded initial Internet research was named ___________
24. The Internet project investigated ways to interconnect multiple ___________________
25. The name of Internet communication software is _______________________
26. A technology that is available for all vendors is called ___________________
27. Some WANs use satellites that orbit above the earth to pass information from one country to another. Assuming a signal travels at the speed of light, how long does it take for a signal to travel 20,000 miles to a satellite and back down? Does the time surprise you? (Remember that a computer can perform several million operations per second.)
28. Does your computer connect to a LAN or a WAN?

    ---

29. Automated search services examine data on multiple _______________________
30. Give two examples, other than those in the text, that show how scanning for a search term can produce unwanted selections.
31. When a user gives the archie search service the key square, what is the user asking archie to find?
32. When a user gives a Web search service such as Lycos the key square, what is the user asking the search service to find?
33. If your site has a Web server, ask your site manager to install a new page that contains an unusual sequence of characters. Then test periodically to see how long a search service takes to learn about the new page.
34. After the previous exercise, ask your site manager to delete the page that was inserted. Do search services still report the page? If so, try selecting the page. What happens? What does the experiment suggest that Internet users should know?
35. Will automated search work for non-English documents? Why or why not?
36. Can a search service find pictures that match a given description (e.g., can one ask a search service to find images that contain faces)? Why or why not?

Bulletin Board Discussion
[post your answers to the bulletin board for CS456/556 - Internet Services by 4:00 p.m. MDT/MST Monday]
Answer these questions in your own words.

1. Find out which LAN technologies your organization uses.
   • Why was each technology selected?
   • How many LANs does your organization have?
   • How many computers attach to each LAN?
2. Find out whether your organization uses a WAN.
3. EXTRA CREDIT: Ask a telephone company how much it costs to lease a T1-speed communication line across your country. What is the monthly charge? Does it surprise you?
4. Ask friends and colleagues who have used an automated search service if the service ever retrieves unexpected pages. Do the results surprise you? Explain.
5. Give examples of common English phrases that a search service would not understand.
6. Try the same search term with all the search services listed in the chapter. Which service retrieves the most pages? the fewest? the best?

Homework
(Due before class on Sept. 10, 2001) The following assignment is intended to show you the basics of e-mail and listservs. [e-mail your answers to summers_wayne@ColumbusState.edu by 4:00 p.m. Monday, Sept. 10, 2001]

1. Write your name (First and Last) in ASCII with the first letter of each part of your name captialized only.
2. Find two different definitions of LAN on the Internet and send them in your e-mail.
3. The following assignment is intended to show you the basics of the WWW. Send your answers to these questions by e-mail to summers_wayne@ColumbusState.edu

   You have applied and been accepted into the Peace Corps.

   1. Find a website that describes Peace Corps and answer the following questions:
      1. When was the Peace Corps founded?
      2. Who is the current director of the Peace Corps?
      3. How many countries now have Peace Corps volunteers?
   2. You have been assigned to Malaysia. Answer the following questions:
      1. What is the population of Malaysia?
      2. Who is the leader of the government in Malaysia?
      3. What is the monetary unit in Malaysia?

   3. You need to get your financial affairs in order before you leave the country. Explore a money management and investment site. Determine what resources are available to help you manage your money. Send me the URL of the investment's site home page for future reference.

Click here to return to Wayne's World's homepage: