UNIVERSITY EXAMINATIONS: 2017/2018
EXAMINATION FOR THE DEGREE OF BACHELOR OF SCIENCE IN
INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY/BACHELOR OF SCIENCE IN
INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATIONS TECHNOLOGY/BACHELOR
OF SCIENCE IN APPLIED COMPUTING
BIT2311 BCT2102 BAC2501 NETWORK SYSTEMS DESIGN AND
MANAGEMENT
FULL TIME/PART TIME/DISTANCE LEARNING
DATE: APRIL 2018 TIME: 2 HOURS
INSTRUCTIONS: Answer Question One & ANY OTHER TWO questions.
QUESTION ONE [30 MARKS]
a) Discuss in detail the following concepts as used in hierarchical network designs:
(i) User community analysis 4 Marks
(ii) Data stores and data server analysis 4 Marks
b) A company has considered creating a network for their complex that has just been
completed. The building is composed of six floors including the ground floor. You have
been tasked to be the designer of this network which will later be connected to the rest of
the company network. It is assumed that you will base your design on Ethernet and all the
floors will be cabled. It is further assumed that each floor will have approximately 380
computers. On each floor, there will be administrative computers which must be
separated from the student computers.
(i) What four critical goals would inform your network design? 4 Marks
(ii) What is the minimum number of wiring closets you would create for this
particular network? 1 Mark
(iii) Where would you place your MDF and why? 3 Marks
(iv) Assuming that the average UTP cable run for each computer is 50 metres. How
many reels of UTP cable would you require for wiring the whole building? Show
your working. 4 Marks
c) A wide variety of software and hardware tools are available to make troubleshooting easier.
These tools may be used to gather and analyze symptoms of network problems and often
provide monitoring and reporting functions that can be used to establish the network
baseline. Explain any three of these tools 6 Marks
d) (i) Two buildings on the Ruaraka campus of KCA University must be connected to
use Ethernet with a bandwidth of at least 100 Mbps. Our main concern is about possible
problems from voltage potential differences between the two buildings. Explain which
media type should be used for the connection 2 Marks
(ii) You are installing IP phones in a new office. The phones and office computers
connect to the same device. To ensure maximum throughput for the phone data sessions,
the company needs to make sure that the phone traffic is on a different network from that
of the office computer data traffic. What is the best network device to which to directly
connect the phones and computers and what technology should be implemented on this
device? 2 Marks
QUESTION TWO [20 MARKS]
a) Your company has a class C network address of 200.10.57.0. You want to subdivide your
physical network into 5 subnets (A, B, C, D and E). You will need at least 20 hosts per
subnet. Based on the given information, fill in the table below. 12 Marks
b) Explain how the following diagrams help in troubleshooting a network.
(i) Physical Network Diagram 4 Marks
(ii) Logical Network Diagram 4 Marks
QUESTION THREE [20 MARKS]
a) Describe the procedure you would follow in isolating problems at the physical layer.
6 Marks
b) With the aid of a well-labelled diagram, describe in detail the procedure you would
follow in laying your cabling between the work areas and the wiring closets.
6 Marks
c) To efficiently diagnose and correct network problems, a network engineer needs to know
network baseline. This information is captured in documentation. Network
documentation include 3 components: Network configuration table, End-system
configuration table and Network topology diagram. Discuss briefly the contents of each
of these three documents. 6 Marks
d) What is port security in relation to switches? 2 Marks
QUESTION FOUR [20 MARKS]
a) (i) What does a switch do if a frame arrives and the destination MAC address is not
in its MAC address table? 1 Mark
(ii) What does a switch do with a broadcast frame? 1 Mark
(iii) You replace a hub with a layer 2 switch. How does this affect collision domains?
1 Mark
(iv) You replace a hub with a layer 2 switch. How does this affect broadcast domains?
1 Mark
(v) Why do routers typically add more latency than switches? 2 Marks
b) Describe any three rules will help ensure that the structured cabling design projects are
both effective and efficient. 6 Marks
c) Discuss the three most common causes of network congestion. 6 Marks
d) Differentiate between a server-based and client/server network. 2 Marks
QUESTION FIVE [20 MARKS]
a) Briefly describe five factors that must be taken into account when deciding what type of
Network Operating System to install on a network. 5 Marks
b) What three goals does a security policy meet? 3 Marks
c) State any five benefits of a security policy to an organization 5 Marks
d) Describe four guidelines for creating effective network documentation 4 Marks
e) There are three key factors that influence network uptime/availability. State these three
factors and illustrate how they affect availability. 3 Marks
