Customer Needs Assessment

Types of Connections

Public wired zone—Supports guest users and provides wired connec- tions for them. Typical examples of this zone might be meeting rooms and training rooms that are frequently used by visitors. These visitors might use desktop computers that are permanently connected to the network, or they might bring their own laptops and connect them to the network via a wired connection. Libraries, schools, and other public-service-ori- ented organizations often have extensive public wired zones.

Public wireless zone—Supports guest users and provides wireless access for them. A corporate lobby might be an example of this zone. Users probably carry laptops, personal digital assistants (PDAs), or smart phones and connect to the network via a wireless network.

Private remote zone—Supports well-defined users who need to access the network from a remote location. Although such users access the network over the very public Internet, VPNs secure these remote connec- tions.

Figure 2-2shows these zones on a sample network.

Figure 2-2. Access Control Zones

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