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The elements of a telecommunication system are a transmitter, a medium ( line) and possibly a channel imposed upon the medium (see baseband and broadband as well as multiplexing), and a receiver. The transmitter is a device that transforms or encodes the message into a physical phenomenon; the signal. The transmission medium, by its physical nature, is likely to modify or degrade the signal on its path from the transmitter to the receiver. The receiver has a decoding mechanism capable of recovering the message within certain limits of signal degradation. In some cases, the final "receiver" is the human eye and/or ear (or in some extreme cases other sense organs) and the recovery of the message is done by the brain (see psychoacoustics.)
Telecommunication can be point-to-pointPoint-to-Point telecommunications is most recently ( 2003) referenced regarding wireless data communications for Internet or Voice over IP via radio frequencies in the multi-gigahertz range. It also includes technologies such as laser for telecommunicatio, point-to-multipointPoint-to-multipoint (PT2MP telecommunications is most typically ( 2003) used in wireless Internet and IP Telephony via gigahertz radio frequencies. PT2MP systems have been designed both as single and bi-directional systems. A central antenna or antenna ar or broadcastingNote: broadcasting is also the old term for hand sowing. Broadcasting is the distribution of audio and video signals (programs) to a number of recipients ("listeners" or "viewers") that belong to a large group. This group may be the public in general, or, which is a particular form of point-to-multipoint that goes only from the transmitter to the receivers.
One of the roles of the telecommunications engineer is to analyse the physical properties of the line or transmission mediumA transmission medium is any material substance, such as fiber-optic cable, twisted-wire pair, coaxial cable, dielectric-slab waveguide, water, and air, that can be used for the propagation of signals, usually in the form of modulated radio, light, or aco, and the statistical properties of the message in order to design the most effective encoding and decoding mechanisms.
When systems are designed to communicate through human sense organs (mainly visionVision can refer to: Visual perception is one of the senses. vision (religion) "Vision" can mean an imagined picturing originating with not-so-divine sources: politicians, business planners and change gurus play on this sense of the word. A company vision and hearingHearing is one, the auditory, of the traditional five senses, and refers to the ability to detect sound. In human beings, hearing is performed by the ears, which also perform the function of balance, a sense in itself but not one of the traditional list (), physiological and psychological characteristics of human perception will be taken into account. This has important economic implications and engineers will research what defects may be tolerated in the signal yet not affect the viewing or hearing experience too badly.