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g l o ssa r y
10BaseT –
Unshielded, t w ist ed pair cable w it h an RJ-45 connect or, used w it h
Et hernet LAN (Local Area Net w ork). “ 10” indicat es speed (10 M bps), “ Base”
ref ers t o baseband t echnology, and “ T” means t w ist ed pair cable.
DHCP (Dynam ic Host Conf igurat ion Prot ocol) –
A prot ocol w hich allow s a
server t o dynamically assign IP addresses t o w orkst at ions on t he f ly.
DOCSIS (Dat a Over Cable Service Int erf ace Specif icat ions) –
A project
w it h t he object ive of developing a set of necessary specif icat ions and
operat ions support int erf ace specif icat ions f or cable modems and associat ed
equipment .
Et hernet card –
A plug-in circuit board inst alled in an expansion slot of a
personal comput er. The Et hernet card (somet imes called a Net w ork Int erf ace
Card or NIC) t akes parallel dat a f rom t he comput er, convert s it t o serial dat a,
put s it int o a packet f ormat , and sends it over t he 10BaseT LAN cable.
F Connect or –
A t ype of coaxial connect or, labeled CABLE IN on t he rear of
t he Cable M odem, t hat connect s t he modem t o t he cable syst em.
Hub –
A device used t o connect mult iple comput ers t o t he cable modem.
IP Address –
A unique, 32-bit address assigned t o every device in a net w ork.
An IP (Int ernet Prot ocol) address has t w o part s: a net w ork address and a host
address. This modem receives a new IP address f rom your cable operat or via
DHCP each t ime it goes t hrough Init ializat ion M ode.
M AC Address –
The permanent “ ident it y” f or a device as it programmed int o
t he M edia Access Cont rol layer in t he net w ork archit ect ure during t he
modem’s manuf act ure.
Net w ork Driver –
A f ile t hat is loaded on t he comput er t o allow t he
comput er t o recognize t he Et hernet card.
TCP/IP (Transm ission Cont rol Prot ocol/Int ernet Prot ocol) –
A net w orking
prot ocol t hat provides communicat ion across int erconnect ed net w orks,
bet w een comput ers w it h diverse hardw are archit ect ures and various operat ing
syst ems.
