Instructor Note
The purpose of this target indicator is to underscore the importance of the "alphabet soup" of acronyms that govern networking media standards. It is important to convey that these standards bodies are living, breathing entities -- groups that meet regularly to ensure that the commercial diversity of networking product options doesn't descend into chaos.
By the mid-1980s, growing pains from expansion in the field of networking were felt, especially by those companies that had instituted many different network technologies. It became increasingly difficult for networks that used different specifications and implementations to communicate with each other. An organization, called the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), researched various networks and created a network model, called the OSI Reference Model. (Note: Do not confuse the name of the model [OSI] with the name of the organization [ISO].) It was designed to help vendors create networks that would work compatibly and interoperably. By creating the OSI model, the ISO provided vendors with a set of standards.
