Computer Networks

Data & Signals

Week 4
BCS 6th Spring 2022
Date: July 25, 27 & 28, 2022
Mahmood Khan (Assistant Professor)
Department of Computer Science SBBU
[email protected]

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Topics
 1. Analog & Digital Data.
 2. Analog & Digital Signals.
 3. Representation of Analog & Digital Signals.
 4. Periodic & Aperiodic Signals
 5. Characteristics of Analog Signal/ Sine Wave
 6. Composite Signals.
 7. Digital Signals.
 8. Characteristics of Digital Signals.

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1. Analog & Digital Data
 Data can be defined as a representation of facts, concepts, or
instructions in a formalized manner, which should be suitable for
communication, interpretation, or processing by human or
electronic machine.
 Data is information that has been translated into a form that is
efficient for movement or processing. Relative to today's computers
and transmission media, data is information converted into binary
digital form.
 Data is the information we want to transmit.
 Data can be analog or digital.
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1. Analog & Digital Data..
 Analog data refers to information that is continuous.
 An analog clock that has hour, minute, and second hands gives
information in a continuous form.
 Digital data refers to information that has discrete states.
 A digital clock that reports the hours and the minutes will
change suddenly from 12:00 to 12:01.
 Digital data take on discrete values.
 For example, data are stored in computer memory in the form
of 0s and 1s.
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2. Analog & Digital Signals
 Signal is the waveform format used to send data over channel.
 Signal: A signal is the variation of an electrical current or
another physical magnitude that is used to transmit information.
 Like the data they represent, signals can be either analog or
digital.
 An analog signal has infinitely many levels of intensity over a
period of time.
 Best example of Analog signal is sound or human speech, over
an electrified copper wire.
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2. Analog & Digital Signals..
 When someone speaks, an analog wave is created in the air.
 This can be captured by a microphone and converted to an
analog signal or sampled and converted to a digital signal.
 A digital signal, can have only a limited number of defined
values.
 Although each value can be any number, it is often as
simple as 1 and 0.

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3. Representation of Analog &
Digital Signals
 The simplest way to show signals is by plotting them on a
pair of perpendicular axes.
 The vertical axis represents the value or strength of a signal.
 The horizontal axis represents time.
 The below figure illustrates an analog signal and a digital
signal.
 The curve representing the analog signal passes through an
infinite number of points.
 The vertical lines of the digital signal, however, demonstrate
the sudden jump that the signal makes from value to value.

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3. Representation of Analog &
Digital Signals..
 Comparison of analog and digital signals.

Figure

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4. Periodic & Aperiodic Signals
 Both analog and digital signals can take one of two forms:
periodic or aperiodic; the prefix a in Greek means “non” i.e
Aperiodic is also known as non-periodic.
 A periodic signal completes a pattern within a measurable time
frame, called a period, and repeats that pattern over subsequent
identical periods.
 The completion of one full pattern is called a cycle.
 Aperiodic signal changes without exhibiting a pattern or cycle that
repeats over time.
 Both analog and digital signals can be periodic or aperiodic.
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Periodic Analog Signals
 Periodic analog signals can be classified as simple or
composite.
 A simple periodic analog signal, a sine wave, cannot
be decomposed into simpler signals.
 A composite periodic analog signal is composed of
multiple sine waves.

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Sine Wave
 The sine wave is the most fundamental form of a
periodic analog signal.
 When we visualize it as a simple oscillating (move back
& forward) curve, its change over the course of a cycle
is smooth and consistent, a continuous, rolling flow.
 The below figure shows a sine wave.
 Each cycle consists of a single arc above the time axis
followed by a single arc below it.

Figure: A sine wave

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5. Characteristics of Analog Signal/
Sine Wave
1. Amplitude
 (i) Amplitude of a signal refers to the height of the

signal.
 (ii) It is equal to the vertical distance from a given

point on the waveform to the horizontal axis.

 (iii) The maximum amplitude of a sine wave is equal

to the highest value it reaches on the vertical axis as

shown in figure.

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Characteristics of Analog Signal/
Sine Wave ..
1. Amplitude..

 (iv) Amplitude is measured in volts, amperes or watts

depending on the type of signal. A volt is used for
voltage, ampere for current and watts for power.
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Peak Amplitude
 The peak amplitude of a signal is the absolute value of its
highest intensity, proportional to the energy it carries.
 For electric signals, peak amplitude is normally measured in
volts.
 Figure shows two signals and their peak amplitudes.

Figure: Two signals

with the same
phase and
frequency, but
different amplitudes

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Characteristics of Analog Signal/
Sine Wave …
2. Period
 (i) Period refers to the amount of time in which a
signal completes one cycle.
 (ii) It is measured in seconds.
 (iii) Other units used to measure period are
millisecond (10-3 sec.) microsecond (10-6 sec),
nanosecond (10-9 sec) and picoseconds (10-12 sec).
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Characteristics of Analog Signal/
Sine Wave ….
3. Frequency
 (i) It refers to the number of wave patterns completed in a
given period of time.
 (ii) To be more precise, frequency refers to number of
periods in one second or number of cycles per second.
 (iii) Frequency is measured in Hertz (Hz)
 (iv) Other units used to express frequency are kilohertz
(103 Hz) Megahertz (106 Hz), Gigahertz (109 Hz) and
Terahertz (1012 Hz).
 (v) Frequency and period are the inverse of each other.
Period is the inverse of frequency and frequency is the
inverse of period.
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Period and Frequency
 Period refers to the amount of time, in seconds, a signal
needs to complete 1 cycle.
 Frequency refers to the number of periods in 1s.
 Note that period and frequency are just one
characteristic defined in two ways.
 Period is the inverse of frequency, and frequency is the
inverse of period, as f = 1/T, T=1/f.
Unit of period is second while unit of frequency is Hertz.
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Period and Frequency..
 Two signals with the same amplitude and phase, but different
frequencies.

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Characteristics of Analog Signal/
Sine Wave …..
4. Phase
 (i) Phase, phase shift describes the position of the waveform
relative to time zero.
 (ii) Phase describes the amount by which the waveform shifts
forward or backward along the time axis.
 (iii) It indicates the status of first cycle.
 (iv) Phase is measured in degrees or radians [360º is 2π rad; 1º is
2π/360 rad, and 1 rad is 360/(2π)].
 (v) A phase shift of 3600 indicates a shift of a complete period,
a phase shift of 180° indicates a shift of half period and a
phase shift of 90° indicates a shift of a quarter of a period as
shown in fig. below.
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 Phase..
Looking at Figure, we can say that
a. A sine wave with a phase of 0°
starts at time 0 with a zero
amplitude. The amplitude is
increasing.
b. A sine wave with a phase of 90°
starts at time 0 with a peak
amplitude. The amplitude is
decreasing.
c. A sine wave with a phase of
180° starts at time 0 with a zero
amplitude. The amplitude is
decreasing.

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Phase…
00 and 900 phase shifts

Fig: Zero Phase Shift Fig: 900 Phase Shift

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Phase….
1800 and 2700 phase shifts

Fig: 1800 Phase Shift Fig: 2700 Phase Shift

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Characteristics of Analog Signal/
Sine Wave ……
5. Wavelength
 Wavelength is another characteristic of a signal traveling
through a transmission medium.
 Wavelength binds the period or the frequency of a simple
sine wave to the propagation speed of the medium.
 While the frequency of a signal is independent of the
medium, the wavelength depends on both the frequency
and the medium.
 Wavelength is a property of any type of signal.
 In data communications, we often use wavelength to
describe the transmission of light in an optical fiber.
 The wavelength is the distance a simple signal can travel
in one period.
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Wavelength..
 Wavelength and period.

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6. Composite Signals
 If we had only one single sine wave to convey a
conversation over the phone, it would make no sense
and carry no information.
 We would just hear a buzz.
 We need to send a composite signal to communicate
data.
 A composite signal is made of many simple sine
waves.
 In the early 1900s, the French mathematician Jean-
Baptiste Fourier showed that any composite signal is
actually a combination of simple sine waves with
different frequencies, amplitudes, and phases.
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Periodic & Aperiodic Composite
Signals
A composite signal can be periodic or aperiodic.
A periodic composite signal can be decomposed into
a series of simple sine waves with discrete frequencies
– frequencies that have integer values (1, 2, 3, and so
on).
An aperiodic composite signal can be decomposed
into a combination of an infinite number of simple sine
waves with continuous frequencies, frequencies that
have real values.
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Periodic Composite Signals
 Details on next slide

A composite periodic signal

Decomposition of a composite periodic

signal in the time and frequency
domains
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Explanation of the above diagram
 The frequency of the sine wave with frequency f is
the same as the frequency of the composite signal;
it is called the fundamental frequency, or first
harmonic.
 The sine wave with frequency 3f has a frequency of
3 times the fundamental frequency; it is called the
third harmonic.
 The third sine wave with frequency 9f has a
frequency of 9 times the fundamental frequency; it
is called the ninth harmonic.

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 Aperiodic Composite Signal
 In a time-domain representation of the composite signal, there
are an infinite number of simple sine frequencies.
 Although the number of frequencies in a human voice is
infinite, the range is limited, and a normal human being can
create a continuous range of frequencies between 0 and 4
kHz.

The time and

frequency domains
of aperiodic signal

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 Aperiodic Composite Signal..
 There are an infinite number of frequencies between 0.0
and 4000.0 (real values).
 To find the amplitude related to frequency f, we draw a
vertical line at f to intersect the envelope curve.
 The height of the vertical line is the amplitude of the
corresponding frequency.

The time and frequency

domains of aperiodic
signal

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Bandwidth
 The range of frequencies contained in a composite signal
is its bandwidth.
 The bandwidth of a composite signal is the difference
between the highest and the lowest frequencies contained
in that signal.
 The bandwidth of the periodic signal contains all integer
frequencies between 1000 and 5000 (1000, 1001, 1002, . ).
 The bandwidth of the aperiodic signals has the same
range, but the frequencies are continuous.

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7. Digital Signals
 The digital signal is a type of signal generated by some kind of
electromagnetic phenomenon in which each signal encoding the
content thereof can be analyzed in terms of some magnitudes
representing discrete values, rather than values ​within a certain
range.
 For example, the light switch can only take two values ​or states:
open or closed, or the same lamp: on or off.
 Digital systems, such as the computer, use two-state logic
represented by two levels of electrical voltage, one high, one H
and one low, L.
 By abstraction, these states are replaced by zeros and ones, which
facilitates the application of logic and binary arithmetic. If the
high level is represented by 1, and the low level is 0, positive
logic is spoken and otherwise negative logic.
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Digital Signals..
Information can also be represented by a digital signal.
For example, a 1 can be encoded as a positive voltage and
a 0 as zero voltage.
A digital signal can have more than two levels.
In this case, we can send more than 1 bit for each level.

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Digital Signals…
 It should mention that, in addition to the levels, in a
digital signal are the transitions from high to low and
from low to high, called rising and falling edges,
respectively.
 There are two different approaches for the
transmission of digital signals: baseband transmission
and broadband transmission.

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Baseband transmission
 Baseband transmission means sending a digital
signal over a channel without changing the digital
signal to an analog signal.

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Low-Pass Channel
 Baseband transmission requires low pass channel for
transmission.
 A low pass channel is a channel whose bandwidth

starts from zero.

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Broadband Transmission
 Broadband transmission means sending a digital
signal over a channel after changing the digital signal
to analog signal i.e. it requires modulation.
 Broadband transmission can use band-pass channel.
 A band-pass channel is a channel whose bandwidth

does not start from zero.

 A band-pass channel is more available than a low-

pass channel.

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Band-pass channel..
 If the available channel is band-pass, we cannot send
the digital signal directly to the channel, it must be
converted to an analog form before transmission.

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Narrowband and Wideband
 Narrowband refers to radio communications whose signal
bandwidth is within the coherence (combined) band of a
frequency channel.
 This means that in narrowband communications, bandwidth of
the signal does not significantly exceed the coherent bandwidth
of the frequency channel.
 Narrowband antennas are typically used in many applications
that heavily depend on achieving reliable links in different
operating environments, such as in handheld and military
radios.
 They are also used for other shorter-range, fixed-location
civilian applications, such as radio-frequency identification
(RFID) and commercial vehicle remote keyless entry (RKE)
devices.
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Wideband
 A system is wideband when the message bandwidth significantly
exceeds the coherence bandwidth of the channel.
 Some communication links have such a high data rate that they are
forced to use a wide bandwidth; other links may have relatively
low data rates, but deliberately use a wider bandwidth than
"necessary" for that data rate in order to gain other advantages.
 The term Wideband Audio or (also termed HD Voice or Wideband
Voice) denotes a telephony using a wideband codec, which uses a
greater frequency range of the audio spectrum than conventional
voiceband telephone calls, resulting in a clearer sound.
 Wideband in this context is usually considered to cover frequencies
in the range of 50–7,000 Hz, therefore allowing audio with richer
tones and better quality.

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8. Characteristics of Digital Signals
1. Bit Interval
 It is the time required to send one single bit
2. Bit Rate
 Most digital signals are aperiodic, and thus period and
frequency are not appropriate characteristics.
 Another term – bit rate (instead of frequency) – is used to
describe digital signals.
 The bit rate is the number of bits sent in 1s, expressed in bits per
second (bps).
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Characteristics of Digital Signals..
2. Bit Rate..
(i) It refers to the number of bit intervals in one second.
(ii) Therefore bit rate is the number of bits sent in one
second.
(iii) Bit rate is expressed in bits per second (bps).
(iv) Other units used to express bit rate are Kbps, Mbps
and Gbps.
 1 kilobit per second (Kbps) = 1,000 bits per second
 1 Megabit per second (Mbps) = 1,000,000 bits per

second
 1 Gigabit per second (Gbps) = 1,000,000,000 bits per

second
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Characteristics of Digital Signals…
3. Baud Rate
 The Baud rate refers to the total number of signal units
transmitted in one second.
 It is the unit for symbol rate or modulation rate in symbols per
second or pulses per second.
 The Bit rate refers to the total Bits transmitted in one unit time.
 Baud rate indicates the total number of times the overall state of
a given signal changes/ alters.
 Bit rate indicates the total bits that travel per second.
 Baud rate = Bit rate / Number of bits in a baud.
 So, divide the bit rate, which means the number of bits per
second, by the total number of bits in a baud, and the result is
the baud rate in bauds per second.
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Characteristics of Digital Signals….
 3. Baud Rate..
 Let's consider a system with a bit rate of 4,500 bits/s, and
each unit carries 9 bits. What is the baud rate of the
system?
 Baud rate ​=Bit Rate/# of bits​
 =4,500 bits/s​/9 bits
 =500 bauds/s​

 If the bit rate is 1,200 bps and the number of bits is 8.

What is baud rate?
Baud rate = Bit rate / Number of bits in a baud
 Baud rate = 1200/8 = 150 bauds/s
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 Thanks
 FURTHER DISCUSSION

NEXT WEEK …………….

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