A computer network is a system for communication among two or more computers.
Computer networks may be categorized with respect to range:
- personal area network (PAN)
- local area network (LAN)
- metropolitan area network (MAN)
- wide area network (WAN)
Computer network applications may be categorized with respect to the functional relationships between components:
- client-server
- multitier architecture
- peer-to-peer
Computer networks may be categorized with respect to network topologies:
- star network
- grid network
- toroidal networks and hypercubes
- tree and hypertree networks
Computer networks may be implemented using a variety of protocol stack architectures, computer buses or combinations of media and protocol layers, incorporating one or more of:
- ARCNET
- DECNET
- Ethernet
- IP
- TCP
- Appletalk
- Token Ring
- IPX
- FDDI
- HIPPI
- Myrinet
- ATM
- RS-232
- IEEE-488
- USB
- IEEE 1394, aka Firewire, iLink
- X.25
- Frame relay
- Bluetooth
- IEEE 802.11
- System network architecture
References
Andrew S. Tanenbaum, "Computer Networks" (ISBN: 0133499456).
This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Computer_network"