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The Indian healthcare industry has been exposed to various flavours of “ telemedicine,” from the healthcare portal suggesting that healthcare info provided on the website uses telecommunications to provide healthcare information to patients, thus delivering ehealth - to video conferencing vendors who claim to be “telemedicine” providers. At the other end there are a few genuine healthcare providers who really use telemedicine effective to provide care, minus the hype, and organizations which are taking an innovative approach to facilitate healthcare delivery by way of launching an exclusive health satellite such as mobile van..
Connectivity is the unbiased communication of packets between two end points. It is a generic term for connecting devices to each other in order to transfer data back and forth. It often refers to network connections, which embraces bridges, routers, switches and gateways as well as backbone networks. It may also refer to connecting a home or office to the Internet or connecting a digital camera to a computer or printer. Connectivity can be done via ISDN, VPN and Broadband Lines.
Connectivity via Integrated Services Digital Network (ISDN) is comprised of digital telephony and data-transport services offered by regional telephone carriers. ISDN involves the digitization of the telephone network, which permits voice, data, text, graphics, music, video, and other source material to be transmitted over existing telephone wires. The emergence of ISDN represents an effort to standardize subscriber services, user/network interfaces, and network and inter network capabilities. ISDN applications include high-speed image applications, additional telephone lines in homes to serve the telecommuting industry, high-speed file transfer, and videoconferencing. Voice service is also an application for ISDN.
ISDN components include terminals, terminal adapters (TAs), network-termination devices, line-termination equipment, and exchange-termination equipment. ISDN terminals come in two types.
- Specialized ISDN terminals are referred to as terminal equipment type 1 (TE1).
- Non-ISDN terminals, such as DTE, that predate the ISDN standards are referred to as terminal equipment type 2 (TE2).
TE1s connect to the ISDN network through a four-wire, twisted-pair digital link. TE2s connect to the ISDN network through a TA. The ISDN TA can be either a standalone device or a board inside the TE2.
There are two basic types of ISDN service:
- Basic Rate Interface (BRI) - consists of two 64 kbps B channels and one 16 kbps D channel for a total of 144 kbps. This basic service is intended to meet the needs of most individual users.
- Primary Rate Interface (PRI) which is intended for users with greater capacity requirements. Typically the channel structure is 23 B channels plus one 64 kbps D channel for a total of 1536 kbps.
Advantages of ISDN
- Speed- ISDN allows multiple digital channels to be operated simultaneously through the same regular phone wiring used for analog lines.
- Multiple Devices- ISDN can handle multiple devices on a single line. Up to eight telephones, computers, workstations, faxes, credit card readers, cash registers or other devices can be directly attached to a single ISDN line, all in use simultaneously.
- Connection Time-An ISDN call usually takes less than 2 seconds i.e. Fast dial-up establishment.
Disadvantages
- More expensive than the Plain Old Telephone System (POTS).
- The telephone company and the remote computer both need specialized equipment.
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Virtual Private Network is a network that uses a public telecommunication infrastructure, such as the Internet, to provide remote offices or individual users with secure access to their organization's network. A virtual private network can be contrasted with an expensive system of owned or leased lines that can only be used by one organization. The goal of a VPN is to provide the organization with the same capabilities, but at a much lower cost.
A VPN works by using the shared public infrastructure while maintaining privacy through security procedures and tunneling protocols such as the Layer Two Tunneling Protocol (L2TP). In effect, the protocols, by encrypting data at the sending end and decrypting it at the receiving end, send the data through a "tunnel" that cannot be "entered" by data that is not properly encrypted. An additional level of security involves encrypting not only the data, but also the originating and receiving network addresses.
Basically, a VPN is a private network that uses a public network (usually the Internet) to connect remote sites or users together. Instead of using a dedicated, real-world connection such as leased line, a VPN uses "virtual" connections routed through the Internet from the company's private network to the remote site or employee. In this article, you will gain a fundamental understanding of VPNs, and learn about basic VPN components, technologies, tunneling and security.
Types of VPN:
- Remote Access VPN
- Intranet VPN
- Extranet VPN
Advantages of VPN
- Greater Scalability
- Easy to add/remove users
- Reduced long distance telecommunications costs
- Mobility
- Security
Disadvantages of VPN
- Lack of standards
- Understanding of security issues
- Unpredictable Internet traffic
- Difficult to accommodate products from different vendors
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Broadband Internet access is high speed Internet access—typically contrasted with dial-up access over modem. Dial-up modems are generally only capable of a maximum bit rate of 56 kbit/s (kilobits per second) and require the full use of a telephone line—whereas broadband technologies supply at least double this speed and generally without disrupting telephone use.
Types of Broadband:
- DSL(Digital Subscriber Line) Broadband
- ADSL(Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line) Broadband
- DSL(Symmetric Digital Subscriber Line)
- Cable Broadband
- Satellite Broadband
- Wireless Broadband
Advantages of Broadband Internet Access
- Speed- Connection speed is up to 100 times faster than dialup connection.
- Free up your telephone line-It does not affect the phone line. For DSL internet access, you can use the same phone line for both voice/fax and data transmission. For cable internet access, you are connected to the internet via the cable network.
- Unlimited Access-Broadband internet offers unlimited access and you won't be charged based on the connection duration.
Disadvantages of Broadband Internet Access
- Expensive- High monthly fee compared to dialup internet access.
- Security risk- Higher security risk than dialup connection. A personal firewall is needed to protect your computer.
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