What term is defined as the amount of time a network is available over its operational period?

The term that represents the amount of time a network is available over its operational period is "availability." This concept is crucial in networking as it indicates how reliably a network can provide its services, typically expressed as a percentage. For instance, a network with 99.9% availability is down for only a small fraction of time in a given period, which is critical for businesses that rely on continuous connectivity.

In the context of operational performance, availability includes both uptime and any potential downtime due to maintenance or failures. Therefore, while uptime refers specifically to the time the network is operational, availability encompasses the broader context of service reliability.

Other terms like latency, which measures the delay before a transfer of data begins, and throughput, which refers to the amount of data successfully transmitted over a network in a given time, do not directly relate to the measure of overall network operational time.