A network can compose of few devices around one person in a room, or millions of devices around the whole world. It also can be defined by size, location or purpose which tells user how big the coverage area it is, what geographic footprint it is. It includes PAN, HAN, VAN, LAN, CAN, MAN, WAN, etc.
BAN(Body Area Network)
A Body Area Network is formally defined by IEEE 802.15 as, “a communication standard optimized for low power devices and operation on, in or around the human body (but not limited to humans) to serve a variety of applications including medical, consumer electronics / personal entertainment and other”.
It also knowns as Wireless Body Sensor Network (WBSN), Biomedical Sensor Network, Wireless Body Area Sensor Network(WBASN or BAN), which is a network attached to the body that consists of sensor and actuators. They can collect important physiological signals of the body (such as temperature, blood sugar, blood pressure, etc.), human activity or movement signals and information about the environment in which the body is located, process these signals and transmit them to a local base station near the outside of the body. So humans can know the change inside of their body, that they can look after their body health better.
Those devices can be worn on the body or implanted in the body, such as a blood oxygen sensor worn on the fingertips, a wrist blood glucose sensor, cochlear implant，cardiac pacemaker， etc.
PAN (Personal Area Network)
It is the smallest and the most basic computer network that consist of wireless modem and computing devices (like computer, mobile phone, PDA, digital camera, etc.) in personal range (with or without few meters). In this area, PAN allows them to exchange data between these devices, it also can be used to connect to a high-level network or the internet. This is the network use in personal area, for example, mobile phone connects to computer.
Furthermore, PAN can be used with wire, such as USB, Fire-wire (IEEE1394) bus; it also can be used with wireless, like IrDA (Infrared Data Association), Bluetooth. A personal area network using wireless technology, called wireless personal area network (WPAN).
HAN (Home Area Network)
It is type of computer network that use to connect devices within and close to the user’s house (few meters away). It allows the devices (include computers, telephones, smart appliances and other digital device) within the limited range connect to internet by using wired or wireless and exchange data between them. This is the network use in home, like a PC connect to a printer.
VAN (Value Added Network)
VAN is a HAN with added functionality internet communication that allows different entities (like the retail industry, wholesale industry, manufacturing industry, etc) to share, receive, store and forward the information through the computer network in a secure way.
VAN is used by the business for data/information exchange among each other. The purpose of VAN is to facilitate the electronic data interchange (EDI) between businesses. As the VAN sits on top of an existing common carrier. And the carrier provides additional services on top of the infrastructure. So it is called Valued Added Network.
Moreover, VAN is a closed network, which means if you are not a member of that circle, you can access their data. It’s combined technology and commercial. It will make the user device become a node in a huge business relationship network. From the connection of the node, it will provide strong profitability to user and help to strengthen the relationship that formed by the business transaction. It establishes a new market for business to help people make more profit.
Generally, the VANs is used among Telecommunication companies, Industry Groups, Special Service Providers, Large Company. The different circle has its own VAN to allow its members to access the data.
VPN (Virtual Private Network)
It is a communication method that use to connect to medium or large enterprise or groups privately. VPN use for transferring intranet information through public network architecture (Like internet). VPN doesn’t have fixed physical connection, it only establishes when it be used. It is a private network make up of public network facilities. VPN also can make full use of existing network resource provide an economical and flexible networking method to save the investment fee of device, staff and manage, and reduce the telecommunications costs of users.
VPN use Tunnelling Protocol to gain the security effect of privacy, accurate, authentication during the data transmission; if not use, it still has data stolen risk.
There are quite a lot of websites are not allowed in China, so people or companies would like to use a free or paid VPN to climb over the wall to access the webpage which is a popular method.
LAN (Local Area Network)
It is a computer network which is within the scope of a local geography (such as a school, factory and so on), usually within three thousand meters. It is composed of various computers, peripheral equipment and link to server by using wire or wireless. LAN can be used in resource share, such as: application share, printer share, scanner share, workgroup scheduling, and others. LAN can consist of several or hundreds of computers in a big office.
There are many types of LAN: according to the network using the transmission medium of classification, it can be divided into wired and wireless network; if classified according to network topology, it can be divided into bus, ring, tree, mixed, etc. According to the access control methods used in transmission media, it can be divided into Ethernet, Token Ring, FDDI (Fibre Distributed Data Interface) network and wireless LAN. Among them, Ethernet is the most commonly used in LAN technology.
CAN (Campus Area Network)
CAN normally refers to campus network of the university and the intranet of Enterprise or Government. It is a computer network that composed of switches, routers and transmission media (optical fibre, copper plant, Cat5 cabling etc.) connect to LAN within a limited geographical area. It is a LAN with educational establishment.
The range is the same with LAN, three kilometres. If two building have the same domain name and both connected with a network in education area, then it will be treat as CAN.
This is the network used in campus, for example, all the school computer can connect to the same printer. It is Academic network.
MAN(Metropolitan Area Network)
MAN stands for Metropolitan Area Network, it is a computer communications network established within a city. It is a larger LAN, which requires a higher cost, but can provide faster transmission rates. The geographical distribution range is large which around 75km that can cover a city, a metropolitan area. Its transmission medium mainly using optical cable, transmission rate above 100 megabit/second.
An important role of MAN is as a backbone through which hosts, databases, and LANs located at different locations in the same city to make them connected to each other. Generally, it owned by specific Telecommunication organisations, such as JANET-Joint Academic Network.
WAN(Wide Area Network)
WAN stand for Wide Area Network which spanning large physical areas ranging from tens to thousands of kilometres, it can connect multiple cities, countries, even several continents and can provide long-distance communication, forming an international long-distance network.
It covers a wider area than LAN and MAN. The communication subnet of WAN can use public packet switched network, satellite communication network and wireless packet switched network to connect the local area network or computer system distributed in different areas to achieve the purpose of resource sharing. The Internet, for example, is the largest wide area network in the world.
Generally, it owned, operated and maintained by telecommunication companies, such as BT. It is a commercial network. In the whole world, there are only three WAN exist: AMER(America), EMEA (Europe, Middle East, Africa) and APAC (Asia Pacific). All three add up equal to The Internet.
Reference：
Sensors for Health Monitoring, Science Direct, 2019,available at https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/engineering/body-area-network 【Accessed on 26 Sep 2020】
李林霜，新浪博客，26 NOV 2014, available at http://blog.sina.com.cn/s/blog_6ee2b31e0102v5at.html 【Accessed on 26 Sep 2020】
ER R S BANGER, Digital Thinker Help, What is Personal Area Network (PAN) in Computer Networking? Examples, 1 July 2020, available at：http://digitalthinkerhelp.com/what-is-personal-area-network-pan-in-computer-networking-examples/ 【Acceessed on 26 Sep 2020】
JAKE FRANKENFIELD, investopedia, Value-Added Network (VAN), Oct 28, 2019, available at: https://www.investopedia.com/terms/v/value-added-network.asp【Acceessed on 26 Sep 2020】
Prezi, Types of Networks: LAN, WAN, WLAN, MAN, SAN, PAN, EPN & VPN, 16 September 2015, available from: https://prezi.com/_uhh8ktwgsfi/types-of-networks-lan-wan-wlan-man-san-pan-epn-vpn/ [25/02/2020]
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