TCP/IP II

Abstract

TCP and IP are extremely important protocols as they allow hosts to communicate over the Internet in a reliable way. TCP provides a connection between two hosts and supports error handling. This chapter discusses the following:

• TCP. The IP part allows data to be routed through a network, whereas TCP establishes and maintains a connection.

• Ports and sockets. An important concept of TCP/IP communications is the usage of ports and sockets. A port identifies the process type (such as FTP, TELNET, and so on) and the socket identifies a unique connection number. In this way TCP/IP can support multiple simultaneous connections of applications over a network.

• IP Ver6. The IP header contains the 32-bit IP address of the source and destination node. Unfortunately, the standard 32-bit IP address is not large enough to support the growth in nodes connecting to the Internet. Thus a new standard, IP Version 6 (IP Ver6), has been develop to support a 128-bit address, as well as additional enhancements.

• TCP/IP programs. These programs can be used to connect to other hosts and also to determine routing information.