Design of a Local Computer Network for the Robins Air Force Base Electronic Warfare Division Engineering Branch Laboratory.

A local computer for the Electronic Warfare Division Engineering Branch Laboratory was designed around a commercially available and supportable network configuration. The requirements for this network were specified by interviewing the engineers associated with the Engineering Branch Laboratory and then translating the functional requirements into a detailed set of hardware and software system requirements. Structured Analysis was used to produce a structured specification for application, transport, network, and data link protocol level requirements. These computers will be connected to the nodes using duplex fiber optic links supporting transmission rates up to 1 Mbs. The Phase II DECnet protocol was selected to provide the file transfer and data transport protocols in conjunction with a basic routing algorithm at each host, while the Phase III DECnet protocol was selected to provide these functions at a higher level in the nodes. The selection of the above topology in conjunction with the described protocol structure keeps any one host from degrading the network if the host should fail.