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Course Objectives

This course seeks to expose students to the basic innards of the Internet, and in particular the main protocols and technologies that are responsible for its operation.

After taking the course, a student will be familiar with the details of several protocols and mechanisms that are instrumental to the Internet's operation. These include mechanisms for deciding where to forward a packet based on its IP address (lookup mechanisms), the protocol used to map names to addresses (DNS), the protocols that coordinate routing decisions across the Internet (routing protocols such as OSPF, IS-IS, EIGRP and BGP), the implementation and operation of virtual private networks (MPLS and MP-BGP), as well as a number of more quantitative techniques under the broad umbrella of traffic engineering.

The course focuses on the conceptual aspects of these protocols and mechanisms, and is best taken in conjunction with the TCOM Lab (TCOM 504) that will offer a more hands-on perspective.