CO2222: You Have been Commissioned by Your Government to Propose a System for Your Country: Data communications and enterprise networking Report, UOL, Singapore

Computing and Information Systems
Coursework assignment 2 2020–2021

This coursework assignment aims to develop your skills in researching a large network infrastructure application, assimilating the main requirements, and proposing a possible solution in the form of a feasibility report.

Introduction
Air pollution is a major concern around the world and governments are introducing a series of measures to reduce levels. Emissions from private motor vehicles are seen as one significant factor and a switch from petrol engines to electric power is underway with ambitious targets being set by governments. For example, the UK Government has recently committed to phasing out the sale of all new petrol vehicles by 2030.

This however presents a problem in respect of loss of tax revenue on the sale of petrol which has been estimated as £40bn by 2030 for the UK. Governments are hence looking at schemes whereby taxation is switched to distance traveled to make up for such shortfalls. Such schemes are not new, and many countries operate toll roads and a number of cities around the world have either introduced congestion charging systems.

The problem
You have been commissioned by your Government to propose a system for your country that is suitable for use in both cities and less densely populated urban areas. Produce the overall design that addresses, as a minimum, the following points:
a) whether a client- or server-based architecture should be adopted
b) the underlying interconnection network needed to support the application
c) details of any new infrastructure requirements and its communications needs
d) security, authentication, and privacy issues
e) an example of the processes and operations involved in a typical transaction
(e.g. how a moving vehicle is identified, how the distance traveled is calculated, and how payment is made).
Your design should as far as possible make use of existing technologies and infrastructures in order to produce a solution that is both cost-effective and user-friendly. Your report is intended for Government ministers and is, therefore, not expected to include ‘textbook’ type details of network operation and protocols. What it should include are reasoned justifications of why certain options have been selected and others rejected, and how they contribute to the overall design.