Local area networks for the automated office - a survey

This paper looks at the characteristics of the three types of information that can be expected to exist in the Automated Office of the Future:. voice, data and video. Then, it presents the three technologies (or methods), known as Local Area Networks, to support these types of information. The Local Area Networks considered here are: Central Switches, Rings and Buses. Two classes of Central Switches are considered: Circuit and Packet. Furthermore, two classes of Bus structures are also considered: Baseband and Broadband. Finally, this paper discusses the implications of each technology upon supporting each of the three types of information.