Aims and Fit of Module

To enable students to better understand, develop, design and improve data communication systems, with an awareness of fundamental theories and all the main factors involved, and of existing and emerging technologies in data communications and networking.

Learning outcomes

A Identify and
explain the nature of
data, and the concept
of entropy, relative
entropy and mutual
information.
B Elaborate on
Shannon’s Theorems
and the significance.
C Design source
coding for data
compression.
D Explain how noise
arises in
communications
systems and its
connection to channel
capacity and mutual
information, and
apply some of the
methods to combat the
adverse effect of
noise.
E Design channel
coding for error
correction.
F Design basic
encryption/decryption
algorithms to provide
secrecy of
information adopting
a holistic and
proportionate
approach to the
mitigation of
security risks.
G Explain why
standard protocol
architecture is
needed in data
communication and
interpret the basic
components in a
communication
network.
H Identify different
topology and design
basic routing
algorithms applied in
a data communication
network.

Method of teaching and learning

This module will be delivered by a combination of formal lectures, tutorials and assignments.