6.35 Ethernet

Ethernet uses as its communication medium a single length of coaxial cable ( [link] ). This cable serves as the "ether", through which all digital datatravel. Electrically, computers interface to the coaxial cable ( [link] ) through a device known as a transceiver . This device is capable of monitoring the voltage appearing between the core conductor andthe shield as well as applying a voltage to it. Conceptually it consists of two op-amps, one applying a voltage corresponding toa bit stream (transmitting data) and another serving as an amplifier of Ethernet voltage signals (receiving data). Thesignal set for Ethernet resembles that shown in BPSK Signal Sets , with one signal the negative of the other. Computers are attached in parallel, resulting in thecircuit model for Ethernet shown in [link] .

No one computer has more authority than any other to control when and how messages are sent. Without scheduling authority,you might well wonder how one computer sends to another without the (large) interference that the other computers would produceif they transmitted at the same time. The innovation of Ethernet is that computers schedule themselves by a random-access method. This method relies on the fact that all packets transmitted over the coaxial cable can be received by all transceivers, regardless of which computer might actually be the intended recipient. In communications terminology, Ethernetdirectly supports broadcast. Each computer goes through the following steps to send a packet.

1. The computer senses the voltage across the cable to determine if some other computer is transmitting.
2. If another computer is transmitting, wait until the transmissions finish and go back to the first step. If thecable has no transmissions, begin transmitting the packet.
3. If the receiver portion of the transceiver determines that noother computer is also sending a packet, continue transmitting the packet until completion.
4. On the other hand, if the receiver senses interference from another computer's transmissions, immediately ceasetransmission, waiting a random amount of time to attempt the transmission again (go to step 1) until only one computertransmits and the others defer. The condition wherein two (or more) computers' transmissions interfere with others is knownas a collision .

The reason two computers waiting to transmit may not sense the other's transmission immediately arises because of the finitepropagation speed of voltage signals through the coaxial cable. The longest time any computer must wait to determine ifits transmissions do not encounter interference is $\frac{2L}{c}$ , where $L$ is the coaxial cable's length. The maximum-length-specification for Ethernet is1 km. Assuming a propagation speed of 2/3 the speed of light, this time interval is more than 10 μs. As analyzed in Problem 22 , the number of these time intervals required to resolve the collision is, on the average, less than two!

Thus, despite not having separate communication paths among the computers to coordinate their transmissions, the Ethernet randomaccess protocol allows computers to communicate without only a slight degradation in efficiency, as measured by the time takento resolve collisions relative to the time the Ethernet is used to transmit information.

A subtle consideration in Ethernet is the minimum packet size $P_{\min }$ . The time required to transmit such packets equals $\frac{P_{\min }}{C}$ , where $C$ is the Ethernet's capacity in bps. Ethernet now comes in two differenttypes, each with individual specifications, the most distinguishing of which is capacity: 10 Mbps and 100 Mbps. Ifthe minimum transmission time is such that the beginning of the packet has not propagated the full length of the Ethernet beforethe end-of-transmission, it is possible that two computers will begin transmission at the same time and, by the time theirtransmissions cease, the other's packet will not have propagated to the other. In this case, computers in-between the two willsense a collision, which renders both computer's transmissions senseless to them, without the two transmitting computersknowing a collision has occurred at all! For Ethernet to succeed, we must have the minimum packet transmission timeexceed twice the voltage propagation time: $\frac{P_{\min }}{C}> \frac{2L}{c}$ or