| Advantages
|
- Expensive resources such as printers and
storage devices can be shared between many
computers.
- A user can use can load and edit files that they have created on any station,
providing the station has the software required to
use the files.
- You can use a network to send electronic mail or to
access huge databases such as the World Wide Web or
a database of all the products a company sells.
- If data is stored centrally on a file server then it can be easily and reliably backed up as is is all stored in one place.
| Disadvantages
|
- There are additional costs involved in setting up a network. These include cabling, interface cards,
file servers.
- If one computer, cable or interface breaks the whole
network may stop operating and you may not be able to use any of the computers
until the fault is repaired. In practice this rarely happens. The exact effect
of a failure will depend on the toplogy of the network.
- Viruses stored on a computer on a network can spread
to other computers over the network.
- The files stored on computer networks can be accessed, stolen and edited more
easily that files stored on a non-networked computer could be. Appropriate
security measures must be implemented to prevent
this.
- If the network is complicated then it may be necessary to employee a network manager to run it. This will be an ongoing cost.
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