What Is A Wide Area Network?
The wide area network, often referred to as a WAN, is a communications network that makes use of existing technology to connect local computer networks into a larger working network that may cover both national and international locations. This is in contrast to both the local area network and the metropolitan area network, which provides communication within a restricted geographic area. Here is how the wide area network functions, and why it is so important to communications today. The concept of linking one computer network with another is often desirable, especially for businesses that operate a number of facilities. Beginning with the local area network and going up to the wide area network, this is most easily accomplished by using existing telephony technology. Essentially, fiber optics are used to create the link between networks located in different facilities. Often, this means using standard phone lines, referred to as POTS, or employing PSTN (public switched telephone netwo
A Wide Area Network (WAN) is a network that spans a large geographical area, the most common example being the Internet the largest known WAN today. Typically, a WAN consists of two or more Local Area Networks (LANs) connected by a communication sub-system, which usually comprised of Autonomous System (AS) routers. Special software protocols have been created to support routing within communication sub-system of a WAN. These protocols operate with ‘smart’ algorithms that can adapt the flow of network traffic when problems occur. Protocols such as Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) are widely used across the Internet today and this is the primary protocol used on the Air-Stream Wireless network. The algorithms employed by this protocol provide great network stability ensuring that if one network connection is lost, the router can quickly adapt to send data through an alternate network path. Consequently, the greater the number of network connections that are available, the greater the reliab
