Chapter 7
Describe how online search technologies are used for marketing.
(p. 276) Search engines have become major advertising platforms and shopping tools by offering what is now called search engine marketing. Searching for information is one of the web's most popular activities; it is estimated that 242 million people in the United States will use search engines by 2019 and 215 million will use mobile search by that time. With this huge audience, search engines are the foundation for the most lucrative form of online marketing and advertising: search engine marketing. It has the highest click- through rate and the highest return on ad investment.
Describe the features of a simple network and the network infrastructure for a large company.
A simple network consists of two or more connected computers. Basic network components include computers, network interfaces, a connection medium, network operating system software, and either a hub or a switch. The networking infrastructure for a large company relies on both public and private infrastructures to support the movement of information across diverse technological platforms. It includes the traditional telephone system, mobile cellular communication, wireless local area networks, videoconferencing systems, a corporate Web site, intranets, extranets, and an array of local and wide area networks, including the Internet. This collection of networks evolved from two fundamentally different types of networks: telephone networks and computer networks.
Define an analog and a digital signal.
Analog: a continuous waveform that passes through a communications medium and has been used for voice communication. Traditionally used by telephone handsets, computer speakers, or earphones. Digital: a discrete, binary waveform, rather than a continuous waveform, represented by strings of two states: one bits and zero bits, which are represented as on-off electrical pulses. Computers use digital signals and require a modem to convert these digital signals into analog signals that are transmitted across telephone lines, cable lines, or wireless media.
Define Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, WiMax, and 3G, 4G, and 5G networks.
Bluetooth: Standard for wireless personal area networks that can transmit up to 722 Kbps within a 10-meter area. Wi-Fi: Stands for "wireless fidelity" and refers to the 802.11 family of wireless networking standards. WiMax: Popular term for IEEE Standard 802.16 for wireless networking over a range of up to 31 miles with a data transfer rate of up to 75 Mbps. Stands for Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access. 3G: Cellular networks based on packet-switched technology with speeds ranging from 144 Kbps for mobile users to more than 2 Mbps for stationary users, enabling users to transmit video, graphics, and other rich media in addition to voice. 4G: Recent wireless communication technology capable of providing between 1 Mbps and 1 Gbps speeds; up to 10 times faster than 3G networks. 5G: Next wireless technology evolution, supporting transmission of huge amounts of data in the gigabit range, with fewer transmission delays and the ability to connect many more devices (such as sensors and smart devices) at once than existing cellular systems.
Define and describe VoIP and virtual private networks and explain how they provide value to businesses.
Voice over IP (VoIP): Facilities for managing the delivery of voice information using the Internet Protocol (IP). VoIP offers the advantage of avoiding tolls charged by local and long-distance telephone networks. VoIP provides businesses an opportunity to reduce costs because they no longer have to maintain separate networks or provide support services and personnel for each different type of network. It gives organizations flexibility because phones can be added or moved to different offices without rewiring or reconfiguring networks. Virtual Private Network (VPN): A secure connection between two points across the Internet to transmit corporate data. Provides a low-cost alternative to a private network. VPNs are low-cost alternatives to private WANs. VPNs give businesses a more efficient network infrastructure for combining voice and data networks.
Define WSNs, explain how they work, and describe the kinds of applications that use them.
wireless sensor networks (WSNs): networks of interconnected wireless devices with built-in processing, storage, and radio frequency sensors and antennas that are embedded into the physical environment to provide measurements of many points over large spaces. Wireless sensor networks are valuable for monitoring environmental changes, traffic patterns, security incidents, or supply chain events. Wireless sensor networks can be placed in the field for years without any maintenance or human intervention. That reduces costs to businesses using them.
Describe the capabilities of each and for which types of applications each is best suited.
• Bluetooth: Access very limited; useful for creating small personal area networks. • Wi-Fi: Access is limited to 30-50 meters; useful for creating small local area networks • WiMax: Access is limited to a range up to 31 miles: useful for creating wide area networks • 3G networks: Access is available on major cellular telephone carriers that have configured their networks for 3G services. • 4G networks: Provides premium quality for voice, data, and streaming video from cellular telephone carriers.
List and describe the principal Internet services.
• E-mail—person-to-person messaging; document sharing. • Newsgroups—discussion groups on electronic bulletin boards. • Chatting and instant messaging—interactive conversations. • Telnet—logging on to one computer system and doing work on another. • File Transfer Protocol (FTP)—transferring files from computer to computer. • World Wide Web—retrieving, formatting, and displaying information (including text, audio, graphics, and video) using hypertext links.
Distinguish between a LAN, MAN, and WAN.
LAN: A telecommunications network that requires its own dedicated channels and that encompasses a limited distance, usually one building or several buildings in close proximity. MAN: Network that spans a metropolitan area, usually a city and its major suburbs. Its geographic scope falls between a WAN and a LAN. WAN: Telecommunications network that spans a large geographical distance. It May consist of a variety of cable, satellite, and microwave technologies. EX. The Internet.
Define RFID, explain how it works, and describe how it provides value to businesses.
Radio Frequency Identification (RFID): Technology using tiny tags with embedded microchips containing data about an item and its location to transmit short-distance radio signals to special RFID readers that then pass the data on to a computer for processing. RFID gives businesses an opportunity to further automate their supply chain networks. The technology allows more data on an RFID chip than typical barcodes. RFID systems track each pallet, lot, or unit item in a shipment. The technology helps companies improve receiving and storage operations by improving their ability to "see" exactly what stock is stored in warehouses or on retail store shelves.
Name and describe the principal technologies and trends that have shaped contemporary telecommunications systems.
Contemporary digital networks and the Internet are based on three key technologies: client/server computing, the use of packet switching, and the development of widely used communications standards (the most important of which is Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol, or TCP/IP) for linking disparate networks and computers. Client/server computing has extended to networking departments, workgroups, factory floors, and other parts of the business that could not be served by a centralized architecture. The Internet is based on client/server computing. Packet switching technology allows nearly full use of almost all available lines and capacity. This was not possible with the traditional dedicated circuit-switching techniques that were used in the past. TCP/IP is a suite of protocols that has become the dominant standard of network communications. Having a set of protocols for connecting diverse hardware and software components has provided a universally agreed upon method for data transmission.
Explain how the Domain Name System (DNS) and IP addressing system work.
The Internet is based on the TCP/IP networking protocol suite. Every computer on the Internet is assigned a unique Internet Protocol (IP) address, which currently is a 32-bit number represented by four strings of numbers ranging from 0 to 255 separated by periods. A domain name is the English-like name that corresponds to the unique 32-bit numeric IP address for each computer connected to the Internet. The Domain Name System (DNS) converts IP addresses to domain names so that users need to specify only a domain name to access a computer on the Internet instead of typing the numeric IP address. DNS servers maintain a database containing IP addresses mapped to their corresponding domain names. When a user sends a message to another user on the Internet, the message is first decomposed into packets using the TCP protocol. Each packet contains its destination address. The packets are then sent from the client to the network server and from there on to as many other servers as necessary to arrive at a specific computer with a known address. At the destination address, the packets are reassembled into the original message.
Define the Internet, describe how it works, and explain how it provides business value.
The Internet is the world's most extensive public communication system. It's also the world's largest implementation of client/server computing and internetworking, linking millions of individual networks all over the world. Most homes and small businesses connect to the Internet by subscribing to an Internet service provider. An Internet service provider (ISP) is a commercial organization with a permanent connection to the Internet that sells temporary connections to retail subscribers. The Internet enables employees to gain remote access to the company's internal systems through its Web site. They are able to provide better service customers and suppliers, improve operational efficiency, increase productivity, lower operational costs, have a broader market base, and reach more individual customers on a global scale by establishing a Web presence. The cost of e-mail and other Internet services tend to be far lower than equivalent voice, postal, or overnight delivery costs, making the Internet a very inexpensive communication medium. It is also a very fast method of communication, with messages arriving anywhere in the world in a matter of seconds or minutes.
List and describe alternative ways of locating information on the web.
• Search engines are a facility on the Web that helps you find sites with the information and/or services you want. Examples: Google, Yahoo!, and MSN. • Intelligent agent shopping bots use intelligent agent software for searching the Internet for shopping information. Examples: MySimon and Froogle. • Blogs are informal yet structured Web sites where subscribing individuals can publish stories, opinions, and links to other Web sites of interest. • Rich Site Summary or Really Simple Syndication (RSS) is a simple way for people to have content they want pulled from Web sites and fed automatically to their computers, where it can be stored for later viewing. It's commonly used with blogs. • Wikis are collaborative Web sites where visitors can add, delete, or modify content on the site, including the work of previous authors. • Web 2.0 provides second-generation interactive Internet-based services that enable people to collaborate, share information, and create new services online. Web 2.0 software applications run on the Web itself instead of the desktop and bring the vision of Web-based computing closer to realization. Web 3.0 (Semantic Web) reduces the amount of human involvement in searching for and processing Web information. It's still in its infancy but promises to establish specific meanings for data on the Web, categories for classifying the data, and relationships among classification categories.
