Network Engineering

Duration

30h Th, 12h Labo., 30h Proj.

Number of credits

Lecturer

Benoît Donnet, Guy Leduc

Language(s) of instruction

English language

Organisation and examination

Teaching in the second semester

Schedule

Schedule online

Units courses prerequisite and corequisite

Prerequisite or corequisite units are presented within each program

Learning unit contents

This course aims at deepening the knowledge and understanding of networks. It explains advanced network architectures, routing protocols, and mechanisms used to improve the quality of service of a network and better engineer its traffic.

Table of Content:

Part 1: Advanced Routing and Forwarding

• Chap. 1: Internet Architecture (B. Donnet)
• Chap. 2: Advanced Interdomain Routing (B. Donnet)
• Chap. 3: Intradomain Multicast Routing (G. Leduc)
• Chap. 4: MutiProtocol Label Switching (MPLS) (B. Donnet)
• Chap. 5: MPLS Virtual Private Networks (G. Leduc)

• Quality of Network Service
• Scheduling, Shaping/Policing, Packet Dropping
• QoS Guarantees and Resource Reservation (RSVP)
• Standard QoS Architectures

• Chap. 1: Generalities
• Chap. 2: Load Balancing
• Chap. 3: Multihoming
• Chap. 4: Interdomain TE with BGP

Learning outcomes of the learning unit

At the end of the course students will understand in depth advanced routing and forwarding techniques (from BGP to multicast and MPLS),  how networks can provide some quality of service, and how networks traffic can be engineered.

Practically, students will be able to configure routing in large networks.  Network performance with QoS will be studied through network simulation.  Students will also learn how to configure a router to provide QoS.

The assignments bring out self-learning and team work capabilities, and help improve the writing skills of the students.

Teaching, and all support material, in English allow students to improve their knowledge and skills in this langage.

This course contributes to the learning outcomes I.1, I.2, II.1, II.2, III.1, III.2, IV.1, IV.2, IV.3, IV.4, VI.1, VI.2, VII.1, VII.2, VII.4, VII.5, VII.6 of the MSc in computer science and engineering.

Prerequisite knowledge and skills

A good knowledge of basics of Computer Networking (INFO0010 or equivalent) is required.

Planned learning activities and teaching methods

The course is organized as follows

• Lectures describing in details the theoretical and practical aspects of the course
• Lab sessions to be done individually.  Each lab ends with a small report to be submitted (a simple text file to fill in with answers).
• Assignments in teams of 2 students. 

Mode of delivery (face to face, distance learning, hybrid learning)

Face-to-face course


Additional information:

The face-to-face lectures are complemented by lab sessions and assignments (carried out remotely). The course is entirely given in English.

Recommended or required readings

Slides, labs and assignments subjects are available on the course web page.

The following books have been used for building the course:

• James F. Kurose and Keith W. Ross. Computer Networking - A Top-Down Approach (8th Edition), Pearson, 2020.
• N. Wang, K. Hon Ho, G. Pavlou, M. Howarth.  An Overview of Routing Optimization for Internet Traffic Engineering.  In IEEE Communications Surveys & Tutorials.  10(1), pg. 36-56.  April 2008.
• J. W. Stewart.  BGP4: Inter-Domain Routing in the Internet.  Addison-Wesley, 1998.

Exam(s) in session

Any session

- In-person

oral exam


Additional information:

The evaluation is threefold:

• Labs are evaluated (a simple text file to fill in during/right after the lab with students' answers). They account for 20% of the final grade.
• Assignments account for 20% of the final grade.
• The oral exam (on the theoretical part of the course) accounts for 60% of the final grade.  Note that the oral exam will require the student to answer 2 questions (one based on material taught by G. Leduc, the other by B. Donnet).

Work placement(s)

Organisational remarks and main changes to the course

The course is organized during the second term (from February to mid-May), on Wednesday morning. All lectures are in English.

Contacts

Coordinators/Lecturers:

• B. Donnet (office 1.87b/B28)
• G. Leduc (office 1.73a/B28)

• Justin Iurman (office 1.75b/B28)

Association of one or more MOOCs

Items online