Ethernet
Ethernet is a family of frame-based com-
puter networking technologies for local area
networks (LANs). The name comes from the
physical concept of the ether. It defines a
number of wiring and signaling standards for
the Physical Layer of the OSI networking
model, through means of network access at
the Media Access Control (MAC) /Data Link
Layer, and a common addressing format.
Ethernet is standardized as IEEE 802.3.
The combination of the twisted pair versions
of Ethernet for connecting end systems to the
network, along with the fiber optic versions
for site backbones, is the most widespread
wired LAN technology. It has been in use
from around 1980[1] to the present, largely
replacing competing LAN standards such as
token ring, FDDI, and ARCNET.
A standard 8P8C (often called RJ45) connect-
or used most commonly on cat5 cable, a type
of cabling used primarily in Ethernet
networks.
The Internet Protocol Suite
Application Layer
BGP · DHCP · DNS · FTP · GTP · HTTP · IMAP ·
IRC · Megaco · MGCP · NNTP · NTP · POP ·
RIP · RPC · RTP · RTSP · SDP · SIP · SMTP ·
SNMP · SOAP · SSH · Telnet · TLS/SSL · XMPP ·
(more)
Transport Layer
TCP · UDP · DCCP · SCTP · RSVP · ECN · (more)
Internet Layer
IP (IPv4, IPv6) · ICMP · ICMPv6 · IGMP · IPsec ·
(more)
Link Layer
ARP · RARP · NDP · OSPF · Tunnels (L2TP) ·
PPP · Media Access Control (Ethernet, MPLS,
DSL, ISDN, FDDI) · Device Drivers · (more)
History
Ethernet was originally developed at Xerox
PARC in 1973–1975.[2] In 1975, Xerox filed a
patent application listing Robert Metcalfe,
David Boggs, Chuck Thacker and Butler
Lampson
as
inventors
(U.S.
Patent
4,063,220: Multipoint data communication
system (with collision detection)). In 1976,
after the system was deployed at PARC, Met-
calfe and Boggs published a seminal paper.[3]
The experimental Ethernet described in
that paper ran at 3 Mbit/s, and had 8-bit des-
tination and source address fields, so the ori-
ginal Ethernet addresses were not the MAC
addresses they are today. By software con-
vention, the 16 bits after the desti