Introduction to Networking Mod 7 Network Architecture Quiz

What is the downtime per day for a system showing 99.9% availability?

1 minute and 26 seconds.

Lewis has been hired as an assistant to the head network administrator. He needs to understand the basic functioning of certain STP (Spanning Tree Protocol) features that will block BPDUs (Bridge Protocol Data Units) on any port serving network hosts. Which of the following will he use for such purposes?

A BPDU guard.

Which of the following is a distinct network of storage devices that communicate directly with each other and with other portions of the network?

A SAN.

The Centre for Equity Studies is a not-for-profit organization in Staten Island, New York, working in the human rights sector. Currently, because of the pandemic, the employees work from home. They work in association with three other initiatives, all of them involved in the same sector. Hence, there are a lot of resources that are routinely shared among all of them but not with the general public. You have been assigned the task of selecting one cloud model, keeping in mind the working conditions and the requirements of the users. Which of the following would suit this organization the most?

A community cloud. In a community cloud model, service is shared between multiple organizations but is not available publicly. Organizations with common interests, such as regulatory requirements, performance requirements, or data access, might share resources in this way.

Ross is running a small data entry back office, for which he has contracted you for network management. Ross has made it very clear that because he has just started the company he wants to cut down on expenses wherever he can. One such option involves the router-he wants to exchange the router with a similar but less expensive alternative. Which of the following will you refer to Ross in such a situation?

A layer 3 switch. Layer 3 switches are less expensive than routers and are designed to work on large LANs, providing faster layer 3 traffic management within the confines of a known network architecture.

Which of the following will help evenly distribute traffic to each device in a cluster so every device carries a portion of the load?

A load balancer.

Which of the following switches can be configured via a command-line interface or a web-based management GUI (graphical user interface)?

A managed switch.

Scott & Wayne Law Associates is a private law firm in Atlanta specializing in cases involving violation of environmental laws. The firm currently has approximately 50 employees who all work on various matters and in different departments. You have been hired as a network administrator and tasked with finding a suitable cloud model for the firm. The firm is looking for a comparatively low-cost cloud model that can be accessed only by the employees and senior management but not its clients or third parties. Which of the following cloud models would you choose?

A private cloud.

You have been hired as an assistant to the head network administrator in an ISP (Internet service provider). While setting up the network for one of your clients, he wants you to check whether sufficient security precautions have been taken to ensure none of the customer's switches becomes the ISP's root bridge. Which of the following will you use in this scenario to ensure that the appropriate security measures have been taken?

A root guard. A root guard prevents switches beyond the configured port from becoming the root bridge; hence, this will ensure the security measures have been taken.

In order to achieve the utmost fault tolerance, as a network administrator, you want to ensure that critical devices are all equipped with redundant NICs, routers, and processors, which are able to immediately assume the duties of an identical component in case one of the components fails. Which of the following will help you ensure these devices contain the necessary components you require?

Automatic failover. Each critical device requires redundant NICs, power supplies, cooling fans, and processors, all of which should ideally be able to immediately assume the duties of an identical component, a capability known as automatic failover.

You have been working as the network administrator for JP Steels. In order to cut down on operating costs, you plan to install a firewall's OS (operating system) in a VM on an inexpensive server, instead of purchasing an expensive hardware firewall to protect a LAN. Hence, you no longer require a firewall that runs on its own OS. Which of the following firewalls will you purchase in this scenario?

Barracuda's Cloudgen firewall device. Barracuda's Cloudgen firewall is a virtual firewall that emulates a hardware firewall, and it's hosted in a virtualized environment and should ideally be used in this scenario.

In which of the following modes will a vNIC access a physical network using the host machine's NIC?

Bridged mode. In bridged mode, a vNIC accesses a physical network using the host machine's NIC.

Which of the following protocols allows a pool of computers or interfaces to share one or more IP addresses?

CARP.

Which of the following terms refers to the technique of grouping redundant resources such as servers so they appear as a single device to the rest of the network?

Clustering.

For over a decade, Ramanathan has been working as a network engineer in an MNC that uses FC (Fibre Channel) networking architecture. His primary duty is to ensure that there are no issues in the network connections between servers and SAN (storage area network) devices, so that maximum throughput is achieved at all times. Recently, one of the connections of the FC device to the network malfunctioned, which Ramanathan has to fix. Analyze which of the following Ramanathan should do in this scenario.

Connect the FC devices to the network through HBAs. In the FC networking architecture, FC devices connect with the network through HBAs (host bus adapters) instead of NICs, so Ramanathan must make the connection using HBAs.

Jasper Infotech have an issue with their network system-a malfunctioning NIC on a router caused network outages. They have hired you specifically to ensure that the network system does not collapse when there is an unexpected hardware or software malfunction. Which of the following terms will you refer to while fixing this issue for Jasper Infotech?

Fault tolerance. A key factor in maintaining the availability of network resources is fault tolerance, or the capacity of a system to continue performing despite an unexpected hardware or software malfunction.

Basil Telecommunications have hired you as a network manager for providing a network system that will include redundant processors, backup generators, and earthquake-resilient installation. You have decided that the average downtime per year cannot be more than 5 minutes 15 seconds. Which of the following will you use in this scenario?

Five 9s. Five 9s or 99.999% offers a downtime of 0.4 seconds per day and 5 minutes and 15 seconds per year, so this should be used in this scenario.

Which of the following creates and manages a VM (virtual machine) and allocates hardware resources for the host and any of its guest VMs?

Hypervisor.

Cloud computing offers many significant advantages and opportunities for expansion, but it has its disadvantages as well. Which of the following options is the cheapest and simplest alternative to a cloud?

Internet.

James has been appointed as the service manager in one of the outlets for Grason Communication, which sells switches and routers. A client approaches James with a query from a network provider who is requesting for an alternative router that is less expensive and will work within layer 5 and layer 7 in the OSI (open systems interconnection) model. Analyze which of the following options James should present to his client in this scenario.

Layer 4 switches. Layer 4 switches operate anywhere from layer 4 to layer 7, and they're known as content switches or application switches. Moreover, the ability to interpret higher-layer data enables switches to perform advanced filtering, keep statistics, and provide security functions. A layer 4 switch should be presented to the client in this scenario.

You have been working with an ISP (Internet service provider) as a network engineer. You have made multiple WAN (wide area network) connections over a period of time. Recently, you have received complaints from various clients about network failure, which is having an effect on their day-to-day business. This network failure is primarily caused by some bugs in a few of the network devices. In order to protect your clientele, you have decided to provide an additional information sheet that will specifically state the amount of time you will take to fix the issue. Which of the following will you use to calculate the average amount of time required to repair the faulty device?

MTTR. The MTTR (mean time to repair) is the average amount of time required to repair a device once it fails.

Which cloud characteristic allows a provider to limit or charge by the amount of bandwidth, processing power, storage space, or client connections available to customers?

Measured service. In measured service, a provider might limit or charge by the amount of bandwidth, processing power, storage space, or client connections available to customers.

As a network administrator, you want to modernize your network with modular software running on standard server platforms. You want to start by replacing traditional, custom-designed network equipment. You also wish to have flexible, cost-saving options for many types of network devices, including virtual servers, data storage, load balancers, and firewalls. Which of the following will you use in such a scenario?

NFV. NFV provides flexible, cost-saving options for many types of network devices, including virtual servers, data storage, load balancers, and firewalls.

As a network administrator of your company, you have decided to implement redundant connections between network devices to solve problems like network bottlenecks. You have decided to implement this change so that multiple network interfaces and ports can act as one logical interface and focus on increasing total throughput and better load balancing. Which of the following will you use to implement this change in your Windows devices?

NIC teaming. The seamless combination of multiple network interfaces or ports to act as one logical interface on Windows devices is known as NIC teaming.

Glenn, who is working as a network engineer, has been instructed to automate many tasks to work together in a complex and lengthy workflow. What is the term for this process?

Orchestration. When you convert more of your cloud maintenance and security tasks into code that can be run from scripts, you can automate many tasks to work together in a complex and lengthy workflow, which is called orchestration.

As a developer, you need frequent access to multiple platforms during the development process. Rather than purchasing and maintaining a separate device for each platform, you have decided to avail the cloud service option. You are looking to build and test the applications within these virtual, online environments, which are tailored to the specific needs of the project. The cloud service model should have servers that provide only the resources needed to run an application and also allow customers to run their code directly in the cloud without having to manage a server environment at all. Which of the following cloud service models do you think would be appropriate considering your requirements?

PaaS.

Which of the following cloud models makes resources available to users through a WAN connection?

Private cloud. In a private cloud model, service is established on an organization's own servers in its own data center or established virtually for a single organization's private use and made available to users over a WAN connection through some type of remote access.

Which of the following protocols can detect and correct link failures in milliseconds?

RSTP. RSTP (Rapid Spanning Tree Protocol), defined in IEEE's 802.1w standard, can detect and correct for link failures in milliseconds.

You run a website called Offhand that sells exclusive handmade home decor items. On Mother's Day, the website unexpectedly receives a burst of traffic following the marketing campaign designed for this occasion. Thankfully, you are equipped with a good cloud service model and hence you are able to increase the cloud resources the website needs without disrupting your web services. Which of the following cloud characteristics helped you manage the situation easily?

Rapid elasticity. Rapid elasticity means resources can be changed quickly and dynamically, even automatically in response to changing demands.

You have been working as a network administrator at Yong Solutions, which is an ISP (Internet service provider). The switches used in the storage network of the ISP essentially use the STP (Spanning Tree Protocol) for detecting link failures. You have been asked to upgrade the STP because repeated reports of network transmissions being bogged down have been received. Which of the following will you use in this scenario?

SPB. Protocols designed to replace STP, such as SPB, operate at layer 3 instead of or in addition to layer 2, making them more compatible with various types of technologies like the connection protocols used on storage networks.

Krypton Spares and Parts is an MNC dealing in motorcycle spare parts. The administration department of the company has constantly been complaining of severe network issues, and you have been hired to fix the issues. On inspection, it has come to your notice that these network fluctuations are primarily because of flooding attacks from broadcast and multicast traffic. Which of the following do you plan on using to fix this issue?

Storm control. Storm control is a flood guard that protects against flooding attacks from broadcast and multicast traffic. Storm control monitors network traffic at one-second intervals to determine if the traffic levels are within acceptable thresholds. Any time traffic exceeds the predefined threshold, all traffic is dropped for the remainder of the time interval.

Which of the following is a multipath link-state protocol?

TRILL. TRILL (Transparent Interconnection of Lots of Links) is a multipath, link-state protocol developed by the IETF.

You already have a running network in your organization, but because of the recent influx of network traffic and as a network engineer, you want to take a more organized approach in designing the network so that every device can function optimally. You have decided to add highly efficient multilayer switches to pass traffic in and out of a few backbone ports as quickly as possible. Which of the following layers of the network architecture will you use to bring in this change to your network?

The core layer. The core layer consists of highly efficient multilayer switches or routers that support the network's backbone traffic. Typically, no filtering or routing is performed at this layer so as to minimize the processing required of these switches. Surprisingly, this layer is considered the simplest layer and doesn't need switches with lots of ports. These switches simply need to pass traffic in and out of a few backbone ports as quickly as possible.

Which of the following planes is made up of the physical or virtual devices that receive and send network messages on their way to their destinations?

The infrastructure plane.

You are working as one of the network administrators of Wells & Welsh Associates. The company wants to provide network administrators with more centralized control of network settings and management. For this reason, the department has decided to use an SDN (software-defined networking) controller to allow network administrators to remotely manage network devices and monitor data collected about these devices. Which plane of the SDN will enable you to allow such a feature?

The management plane. While not a typical layer for network communication, this plane could be considered as a part of the control plane. It allows network administrators to remotely manage network devices, monitor those devices, and analyze data collected about the devices.

Valentina is employed under the network management team at Iris Global Services, which is a software management firm. Following a recent hacking attempt at its office, the network administrator wants her to cross-check whether security precautions have been enabled on the STP interfaces so that the information transmitted by the BPDUs can be protected. On inspection, she discovers that the security precautions have not been configured. Analyze what Valentina should do in order to prevent a rogue switch or computer connected to one of these ports from hijacking the network's STP paths.

Use a BPDU guard to block BPDUs. A BPDU guard will block BPDUs on any port serving network hosts, such as workstations and servers, and thereby ensure that these devices aren't considered as possible paths. BPDU guards also enhance security by preventing a rogue switch or computer connected to one of these ports from hijacking the network's STP paths. Hence, Valentina should consider this option.

You, as a network administrator, plan on running a trial for a beta version of an application. The idea is to install the application on a guest machine. You plan on doing this because you would rather have the untested software cause errors on the guest machine than on the host. Which of the following will you use in this instance?

VirtualBox. You will need to run it on a virtual machine and so VirtualBox seems to be the ideal choice for this scenario. VirtualBox allows up to eight vNICs per VM.

Blue Whale is an e-commerce website that has hired you as part of the network management team. The network administrator has delegated one of his tasks to you, which requires you to allow and configure more than one MAC address in one of the ports. Which of the following commands will help you complete the task at hand?

allowed-mac. By default, the table allows only one MAC address to be active on the port. However, a network administrator can allow more MAC addresses per port using the allowed-mac command.

Which of the following network technologies uses a transport layer protocol that runs on top of TCP to allow fast transmissions over LANs, WANs, and the Internet?

iSCSI.

As a network administrator of Wheeling Communications, you have to ensure that the switches used in the organization are secured and there is trusted access to the entire network. In order to maintain this security standard, you have decided to disable all the unused physical and virtual ports on your Huawei switches. Which of the following commands will you use to bring your plan to action?

shutdown. You have to use the shutdown command to disable all the unused physical and virtual ports on your Huawei switches.