A computer network, often simply referred to as a network, is a collection of computers
and devices interconnected by communications channels that facilitate
communications and allows sharing of resources and information among
interconnected devices.[1] Computer networking or Data communications (Datacom) is the engineering discipline concerned with the computer networks. Computer networking is sometimes considered a sub-discipline of electrical engineering, telecommunications, computer science, information technology and/or computer engineering since it relies heavily upon the theoretical and practical application of these scientific and engineering disciplines.
Networks may be classified according to a wide variety of characteristics such as medium used to transport the data, communications protocol used, scale, topology, organizational scope, etc.
A communications protocol defines the formats and rules for exchanging information via a network. Well-known communications protocols are Ethernet, which is a family of protocols used in LANs, the Internet Protocol Suite, which is used not only in the eponymous Internet, but today nearly ubiquitously in any computer network.