Technology Trends
Open systems with unrestricted connectivity, using Internet networking technologies as their technology platform, are the primary telecommunications technology drivers of the late 1990s. This trend is self-evident in the rapid and continually changing development of thousands of hardware, software, and networking products and services. Their primary goal is to promote easy and secure access by business end users and consumers to the resources of the Internet, especially the World Wide Web, and corporate intranets and extranets. Web browser suites, HTML Web page editors, Internet and intranet servers and network management software, TCP/IP Internet networking products, and network security fire walls are just a few examples. These technologies are being applied in many types of business networks and applications, especially those for electronic commerce and collaboration. This trend has reinforced previous industry and technical moves toward building client/server networks based on an open systems architecture.
Open systems are information systems that use common standards for hardware, software, applications, and networking. Open systems, like the Internet and corporate intranets and extranets, create a computing environment that is open to easy access by end users and their networked computer systems. Open systems provide great connectivity, that is, the ability of networked computers and other devices to easily access and communicate with each other and share information. Any open systems architecture also provides a high degree of network interoperability. That is, open systems enable the many different applications of end users to be accomplished using the different varieties of computer systems, software packages, and databases provided by a variety of interconnected networks. Frequently, software known as middleware may be used to help diverse systems work together. Network architectures like the Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) model of the International Standards Organization and the Internet’s TCP/IP protocol suite promote open, flexible, and efficient standards for the development of open telecommunications networks.
Telecommunications is also being revolutionized by a change from analog to digital network technologies. Telecommunications has always depended on voice-oriented analog transmission systems designed to transmit the variable electrical frequencies generated by the sound waves of the human voice. However, local and global telecommunications networks are rapidly converting to digital transmission technologies that transmit information in the form of discrete pulses, as computers do. This provides (1) significantly higher transmission speeds, (2) the movement of larger amount of information, (3) greater economy, and (4) much lower error rates than analog systems. In types of communications (data, voice, video) on the same circuits.
Another major trend in telecommunications technology is a change in communications media. Many telecommunications networks are switching from reliance on copper wire-based media (such as coaxial cable) and land-based microwave relay systems to fiber optic lines and communications satellite transmissions. Fiber optic transmission, which user pulses of laser-generated light, offers significant advantages in terms of reduced size and installation effort, vastly greater communication capacity, much faster transmission speeds, and freedom from electrical interference, Satellite transmission offers significant advantages for organizations that need to transmit massive quantities of data, audio, and video over global networks, especially to isolated areas. These trends in technology give organizations more alternatives in overcoming the limitations of their present telecommunications systems.
Open systems with unrestricted connectivity, using Internet networking technologies as their technology platform, are the primary telecommunications technology drivers of the late 1990s. This trend is self-evident in the rapid and continually changing development of thousands of hardware, software, and networking products and services. Their primary goal is to promote easy and secure access by business end users and consumers to the resources of the Internet, especially the World Wide Web, and corporate intranets and extranets. Web browser suites, HTML Web page editors, Internet and intranet servers and network management software, TCP/IP Internet networking products, and network security fire walls are just a few examples. These technologies are being applied in many types of business networks and applications, especially those for electronic commerce and collaboration. This trend has reinforced previous industry and technical moves toward building client/server networks based on an open systems architecture.
Open systems are information systems that use common standards for hardware, software, applications, and networking. Open systems, like the Internet and corporate intranets and extranets, create a computing environment that is open to easy access by end users and their networked computer systems. Open systems provide great connectivity, that is, the ability of networked computers and other devices to easily access and communicate with each other and share information. Any open systems architecture also provides a high degree of network interoperability. That is, open systems enable the many different applications of end users to be accomplished using the different varieties of computer systems, software packages, and databases provided by a variety of interconnected networks. Frequently, software known as middleware may be used to help diverse systems work together. Network architectures like the Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) model of the International Standards Organization and the Internet’s TCP/IP protocol suite promote open, flexible, and efficient standards for the development of open telecommunications networks.
Telecommunications is also being revolutionized by a change from analog to digital network technologies. Telecommunications has always depended on voice-oriented analog transmission systems designed to transmit the variable electrical frequencies generated by the sound waves of the human voice. However, local and global telecommunications networks are rapidly converting to digital transmission technologies that transmit information in the form of discrete pulses, as computers do. This provides (1) significantly higher transmission speeds, (2) the movement of larger amount of information, (3) greater economy, and (4) much lower error rates than analog systems. In types of communications (data, voice, video) on the same circuits.
Another major trend in telecommunications technology is a change in communications media. Many telecommunications networks are switching from reliance on copper wire-based media (such as coaxial cable) and land-based microwave relay systems to fiber optic lines and communications satellite transmissions. Fiber optic transmission, which user pulses of laser-generated light, offers significant advantages in terms of reduced size and installation effort, vastly greater communication capacity, much faster transmission speeds, and freedom from electrical interference, Satellite transmission offers significant advantages for organizations that need to transmit massive quantities of data, audio, and video over global networks, especially to isolated areas. These trends in technology give organizations more alternatives in overcoming the limitations of their present telecommunications systems.
