Wide area network

A wide area network (WAN) is a telecommunications network or

computer network that extends over a large geographical distance. Wide
area networks are often established with leased telecommunication
circuits.[1]

Business, education and government entities use wide area networks to

relay data to staff, students, clients, buyers, and suppliers from various
locations across the world. In essence, this mode of telecommunication
allows a business to effectively carry out its daily function regardless of
location. The Internet may be considered a WAN.[2]

Related terms for other types of networks are personal area networks
(PANs), local area networks (LANs), campus area networks (CANs), or metropolitan area networks (MANs) which are usually
limited to a room, building, campus or specific metropolitan area respectively
.

Contents
Design options
Connection technology
List of WAN types
See also
References
External links

Design options
The textbook definition of a WAN is a computer network spanning regions, countries, or even the world.[3] However, in terms of the
application of computernetworking protocols and concepts, it may be best to view WANs as computer networking technologies used
to transmit data over long distances, and between dif
ferent LANs, MANs and other localised computer networking architectures. This
distinction stems from the fact that common LAN technologies operating at lower layers of the OSI model (such as the forms of
Ethernet or Wi-Fi) are often designed for physically proximal networks, and thus cannot transmit data over tens, hundreds or even
thousands of miles or kilometres.

WANs do not just necessarily connect physically disparate LANs. A CAN, for example, may have a localized backbone of a WAN
technology, which connects different LANs within a campus. This could be to facilitate higher bandwidth applications or provide
better functionality for users in the CAN.[4]

WANs are used to connect LANs and other types of networks together so that users and computers in one location can communicate
with users and computers in other locations. Many WANs are built for one particular organization and are private. Others, built by
Internet service providers, provide connections from an organization's LAN to the Internet. WANs are often built using leased lines.
At each end of the leased line, a router connects the LAN on one side with a second router within the LAN on the other. Leased lines
can be very expensive. Instead of using leased lines, WANs can also be built using less costly circuit switching or packet switching
methods. Network protocols including TCP/IP deliver transport and addressing functions. Protocols including Packet over
SONET/SDH, Multiprotocol Label Switching (MPLS), Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) and Frame Relay are often used by
service providers to deliver the links that are used in WANs. X.25 was an important early WAN protocol, and is often considered to
be the "grandfather" of Frame Relay as many of the underlying protocols and functions of X.25 are still in use today (with upgrades)
by Frame Relay.[5]

Academic research into wide area networks can be broken down into three areas: mathematical models, network emulation and
network simulation.

Performance improvements are sometimes delivered viawide area file servicesor WAN optimization.

Connection technology
Many technologies are available for wide area network links. Examples include circuit switched telephone lines, radio wave
transmission, and optic fiber. New developments in technologies have successively increased transmission rates. In ca. 1960, a
110 bit/s (bits per second) line was normal on the edge of the WAN, while core links of 56 kbit/s to 64 kbit/s were considered fast. As
of 2014, households are connected to the Internet with Dial-Up, ADSL, Cable, Wimax, 4G or fiber. The speeds that people can
currently use range from 28.8 Kilobits per second through a 28K modem over a telephone connection to speeds as high as 100
Gigabits per second over an Ethernet100GBaseY connection.

AT&T plans to start conducting trials in the year 2017 for businesses to use 400 Gigabit Ethernet.[6] Researchers Robert Maher, Alex
Alvarado, Domaniç Lavery & Polina Bayvel of University College London were able to increase networking speeds to 1.125 Terabits
per second.[7] Christos Santis, graduate student Scott Steger, Amnon Yariv, Martin and Eileen Summerfield developed a new laser
[8] If these two technologies were combined, then a transfer speed of up to 4.5
that quadruples transfer speeds over fiber optic cabling.
Terabits per second could potentially be achieved, although it is unlikely that this will be commercially implemented in the near
future.

List of WAN types

ATM
Cable modem
Dial-up
DSL
Frame relay
ISDN
Leased line
SD-WAN
SONET
X.25

See also
Asynchronous Transfer Mode
Cell switching
Frame Relay
Internet area network (IAN)
ISDN
Label Switching
Local area network (LAN)
Low Power Wide Area Network (LPWAN)
Metropolitan area network (MAN)
Packet switching
SONET/SDH
Storage area network (SAN)
 Wide area application services
Wide area file services
Wireless wide area network
X.25

References
1. "A WAN Is a Wide Area Network. Here's HowThey Work" (https://www.lifewire.com/wide-area-network-816383).
Lifewire. Retrieved 2017-04-21.
2. Groth, David and Skandler, Toby (2005). Network+ Study Guide, Fourth Edition. Sybex, Inc. ISBN 0-7821-4406-3.
3. Forouzan, Behrouz. Data Communications and Networking. McGraw-Hill. p. 14. ISBN 9780073376226.
4. http://www.conceptdraw.com/examples/campus-area-networks
5. https://searchenterprisewan.techtarget.com/definition/frame-relay
6. "AT&T Aims to Quadruple Network Speeds for Businesses with 400 Gigabit Ethernet Data T rials for More Bandwidth
and Faster Video Streaming" (http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/att-aims-to-quadruple-network-speeds-for-
businesses-with-400-gigabit-ethernet-data-trials-for-more-bandwidth-and-faster-video-streaming-300353419.html).
www.prnewswire.com. October 28, 2016.
7. Maher, Robert; Alvarado, Alex; Lavery, Domaniç; Bayvel, Polina (11 February 2016)."Increasing the information
rates of optical communications via coded modulation: a study of transceiver performance" (http://www.nature.com/a
rticles/srep21278). Scientific Reports. 6 (1). doi:10.1038/srep21278 (https://doi.org/10.1038%2Fsrep21278).
PMC 4750034 (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4750034) . PMID 26864633 (https://www.ncbi.nlm.ni
h.gov/pubmed/26864633).
8. "A New Laser for a Faster Internet - Caltech"(https://www.caltech.edu/news/new-laser-faster-internet-42090).

"What is WAN (wide area network)? - Definition from WhatIs.com". SearchEnterpriseWAN. Retrieved 2017-04-21.

External links
Cisco - Introduction to WAN Technologies

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