Locality of networks
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An underlying concept, locality of networks, underlies a great many terms ranging from "personal area network" to "interplanetary network". Many physical, and some logical, networking technologies make an assumption of what area they serve, or, in other terms, what is local to them.
| Range | Generic type of network | Representative technologies |
|---|---|---|
| First meter | Personal area network, RFID | Bluetooth |
| First 10 meters | Line-of-sight wireless | Infrared wireless |
| First 100 meters | LAN star cabling, femtocell | 10BaseT, 100BaseT |
| First kilometer | Local loop | Digital subscriber loop, intracell cellular telephony, T1 carrier, E1 carrier |
| Second kilometer | Drop from metropolitan area network, interoffice trunk, pair gain | SONET, SDH, T3 carrier, short-haul optical, CWDM |
| Tens of kilometers | Metropolitan area network | SONET, SDH, DWDM |
| Planetary | Internet, Public Switched Telephone Network | Logical packet switching, HF radio, very long haul optical |
| Interplanetary | Interplanetary Internet project | http://www.ipnsig.org/aboutstudy.htm |