Chapter 8 - Designing the Infrastructure

Abstract

Designing the network is probably one of the most difficult and most overlooked areas in networking; it is also essential to the success of business. This chapter presents some best practices on design and location of equipment. An internetwork requires many layers of thought and design that encompass everything from physical space to future network considerations. There are generally three components when designing a large internetwork: data center networks, wide area networks (WAN), and remote users. One of the most beneficial tasks that one can perform in the design of network is to create a hierarchical internetwork design that modularizes the elements of a large internetwork into layers of internetworking. The key layers that help to create these modules in the model are the access, distribution, and core routing layers. Hierarchical internetworks are more scalable because they allow growing internetwork in a gradual way with the implementation of modules. The cost-effective and strategic significance of the core network often forces network designers to implement a hybrid-meshed network for their WAN internetworks.