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IEEE STANDARDS:
 The institute of electrical and electronic Engineers (IEEE) publishes several widely accepted LAN-
recommended standards. These standards, collectively known as IEEE 802.
 Various IEEE 802 standards are as
 IEEE 802.2 Logical Link Control(LLC)
 IEEE 802.3 Ethernet
 IEEE 802.3z Gigabit Ethernet
 IEEE 802.11 Wireless Network

Figure: IEEE standard for LANs

Data Link Layer:

 The data link layer in the IEEE standard is divided into two sublayers: LLC and MAC.
Logical Link Control (LLC)
 Data link control handles framing, flow control, and error control.
 In IEEE Project 802, flow control, error control, and part of the framing duties are collected into one
sublayer called the logical link control.
 Framing is handled in both the LLC sublayer and the MAC sub layer.
 The LLC provides one single data link control protocol for all IEEE LANs.
 A single LLC protocol can provide interconnectivity between different LANs because it makes the
MAC sublayer transparent.
Framing:
 LLC defines a protocol data unit (PDU) .
 The header contains a control field ; this field is used for flow and error control.
 The two other header fields define the upper-layer protocol at the source and destination that uses
LLC.
 These fields are called the destination service access point (DSAP) and the source service access
point (SSAP).
 In other words, a frame defined in HDLC is divided into a PDU at the LLC sublayer and a frame at
the MAC sublayer, as shown in Figure.

Figure: HDLC frame compared with LLC and MAC frames

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Media Access Control (MAC):

 IEEE Project 802 has created a sublayer called media access control that defines the specific access
method for each LAN.
 For example, it defines CSMA/CD as the media access method for Ethernet LANs and the token
passing method for Token Ring and Token Bus LANs.
 In contrast to the LLC sublayer, the MAC sublayer contains a number of distinct modules; each
defines the access method and the framing format specific to the corresponding LAN protocol.
Physical Layer:
 The physical layer is dependent on the implementation and type of physical media used.
 IEEE defines detailed specifications for each LAN implementation.
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STANDARD ETHERNET:
 The original Ethernet was created in 1976 at Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center (PARC).
 Since then, it has gone through four generations: Standard Ethernet (l0 Mbps), Fast Ethernet
(100 Mbps), Gigabit Ethernet (l Gbps), and Ten-Gigabit Ethernet (l0 Gbps)

Figure: Ethernet evolution through four generations

MAC Sublayer:
 MAC sublayer frames data received from the upper layer and passes them to the physical layer.
Frame Format:
 The Ethernet frame contains seven fields.
 Ethernet does not provide any mechanism for acknowledging received frames, making it what is
known as an unreliable medium. Acknowledgments must be implemented at the higher layers.

Figure: 802.3 MAC frame

 Preamble. The first field of the 802.3 frame contains 7 bytes (56 bits) of alternating 0s and 1s that
alerts the receiving system to the coming frame and enables it to synchronize its input timing.
 Start frame delimiter (SFD). The second field (l byte: 10101011) signals the beginning of the
frame. The SFD warns the station or stations that this is the last chance for synchronization. The last
2 bits is 11 and alerts the receiver that the next field is the destination address.
 Destination address (DA). The DA field is 6 bytes and contains the physical address of the
destination station or stations to receive the packet.
 Source address (SA). The SA field is also 6 bytes and contains the physical address of the sender of
the packet.
 Length or type. This field is defined as a type field or length field.
 Data. This field carries data encapsulated from the upper-layer protocols. It is a minimum of 46 and
a maximum of 1500 bytes.
 CRC. The last field contains error detection information.
Frame Length:
 Ethernet has imposed restrictions on both the minimum and maximum lengths of a frame.

Figure: Minimum and maximum lengths

 An Ethernet frame needs to have a minimum length of 512 bits or 64 bytes.
 Part of this length is the header and the trailer.
 If we count 18 bytes of header and trailer (6 bytes of source address, 6 bytes of destination
address, 2 bytes of length or type, and 4 bytes of CRC), then the minimum length of data from
the upper layer is 64 - 18 = 46 bytes.
 If the upper-layer packet is less than 46 bytes, padding is done.
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 The standard defines the maximum length of a frame 1518 bytes.

 If we subtract the 18 bytes of header and trailer, the maximum length of the payload is 1500
bytes.
Note: Frame length: Minimum: 64 bytes (512 bits) Maximum: 1518 bytes (12,144 bits)
Addressing:
 Each station on an Ethernet network has its own network interface card (NIC).
 The NIC fits inside the station and provides the station with a 6-byte physical address. As shown in
Figure, the Ethernet address is 6 bytes (48 bits), normally written in hexadecimal notation, with a
colon between the bytes.

Figure. Example of an Ethernet address in hexadecimal notation

Unicast, Multicast, and Broadcast Addresses:
 A source address is always a unicast address-the frame comes from only one station.
 The destination address, however, can be unicast, multicast, or broadcast.
 Figure shows how to distinguish a unicast address from a multicast address.
 If the least significant bit of the first byte in a destination address is 0, the address is unicast;
otherwise, it is multicast.
 A unicast destination address defines only one recipient; the relationship between the sender and the
receiver is one-to-one.
 A multicast destination address defines a group of addresses; the relationship between the sender and
the receivers is one-to-many.
 The broadcast address is a special case of the multicast address; the recipients are all the stations on
the LAN.
 A broadcast destination address is forty-eight 1s.

Figure: Unicast and multicast addresses

Physical Layer:
 The Standard Ethernet defines several physical layer implementations; four of the most common,
are shown in Figure

Figure: Categories of Standard Ethernet

10Base5: Thick Ethernet:
 The first implementation is called 10Base5, thick Ethernet, or Thicknet.
 10Base5 was the first Ethernet specification to use a bus topology with an external transceiver
(transmitter/receiver) connected via a tap to a thick coaxial cable.
 The transceiver is responsible for transmitting, receiving, and detecting collisions.
 The transceiver is connected to the station via a transceiver cable that provides separate paths for
sending and receiving.
 This means that collision can only happen in the coaxial cable
 The maximum length of the coaxial cable must not exceed 500 m

Figure: 10Base5 implementation

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10Base2: Thin Ethernet:

 The second implementation is called 10Base2, thin Ethernet, or Cheapernet.
 10Base2 also uses a bus topology, but the cable is much thinner and more flexible.
 The cable can be bent to pass very close to the stations.
 In this case, the transceiver is normally part of the network interface card (NIC), which is installed
inside the station.

Figure: 10Base2 implementation

10Base-T: Twisted-Pair Ethernet:
 1OBase-T uses a physical star topology.
 Two pairs of twisted cable create two paths (one for sending and one for receiving) between the
station and the hub. Any collision here happens in the hub.
 Compared to 10Base5 or 10Base2, we can see that the hub actually replaces the coaxial cable as far
as a collision is concerned.
 The maximum length of the twisted cable here is defined as 100 m, to minimize the effect of
attenuation in the twisted cable.

Figure: 10Base-T implementation

10Base-F: Fiber Ethernet:
 Although there are several types of optical fiber 10-Mbps Ethernet, the most common is called
10Base-F.
 10Base-F uses a star topology to connect stations to a hub.
 The stations are connected to the hub using two fiber-optic cables.

Table: Summary of Standard Ethernet implementation