Sri Lanka Institute of Information Technology

Faculty of Computing

Protocol Architecture
Shashika Lokuliyana
Year 01 and Semester 01

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Lesson outline
• What are Protocols?
• Need for protocols in networking
• Protocol layering and Encapsulation
• TCP/IP protocol stack
• ISO/OSI reference model
• Comparison of OSI and TCP/IP

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Key terms and concepts

• Protocol
• Protocol Data Unit
• Encapsulation
• De-encapsuation
• Protocol architecture
• Protocol layering
• Protocol stack
• Protocol suite
• Protocol family
• Reference model

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What’s a protocol?

Human protocols: Network protocols:

§ “What is the time?” § computers (devices) rather than humans
§ “Any questions?” § all communication activity in Internet
§ Introductions governed by protocols

Rules for:
Protocols define the format, order of
… specific messages sent
messages sent and received
… specific actions taken
when message received, among network entities, and
or other events actions taken on message
transmission, receipt

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Example: What is the time?

Example human protocol

A
Excuse me B

Are these steps essential?

Yes

What is the
time?
2 pm
Thank you
time Are these steps essential?
No problem.

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Example: What is the time?

Example human protocol

A
B
Με συγχωρείς
Are these steps essential?
Sorry. I don’t
understand • Not essential if both are
speaking the same language.
• In this case the • But safer to have them
communication task • to make sure that both can
is incomplete time understand each other
• cannot proceed • to make sure that A has got
to steps 3 and 4 B’s attention

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Example: What is the time?

Example human protocol

A
B
A did not have B’s attention to ask
What is the
time? the question.
Sorry. What did
you say?
What is the
time?
2 pm time

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Example: What is the time?

Example human protocol

A
Excuse me B

Yes

What is the
time?
2 pm These two steps are optional.
- No “Thank you”
Thank you
time - Just “Thank you”
No problem - “Thank you” followed by
“No problem”

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Example: DNS request

Client Server
What is the IP
address of
www.sliit.lk?

Use any of
108.156.133.34
108.156.133.43
108.156.113.114
108.156.113.114
time

9
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Example: Web page request

• A web browser(client) accessing a web page on a web server using

HTTP (Hyper Text Transfer Protocol)
Client Server

GET /index.html
200 OK
<html/>
GET /image.png

404 Not found

time

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Example: Four frame exchange in Wi-Fi

1. Source issues a Request

to Send (RTS) frame

2. Destination responds
with Clear to Send (CTS)

3. After receiving CTS,

source transmits data

4. Destination responds
with ACK

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Example: Four frame exchange in Wi-Fi (ctd)
• Sender (A) waits until no one else is “speaking”

• Continues to wait for a specified time period (DIFS = 34 μs)

• If no one is “speaking” even after that time period, it sends a Request to Send (RTS) to the intended recipient

• After receiving the RTS, the recipient (B) waits for a time period (SIFS = 16 μs)

• Recipient sends Clear to Send (CTS) to the sender

• After receiving CTS, the sender waits for a time period (SIFS) and sends the data

• Other stations “keep quiet” for a time period specified in RTS/CTS messages

• After receiving the data, the recipient waits for a time period (SIFS) and sends an Acknowledgment

• If no Acknowledgement is received within a timeout, sender starts all over again

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Example: Four frame exchange in Wi-Fi (ctd)
• Message format for Wi-Fi

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Revisit: What is a protocol?
• Protocols define the format, order of messages sent and received among
network entities, and actions taken on message transmission, receipt

• Also define what to do if an expected message is not received

• Some messages are essential, while others may be optional or required in

certain situations
• In “What is the time?”, don’t hit the other person for not saying “Thank you”

• Violating the protocol can make the communication difficult or impossible

• The messages exchanged are called protocol data units (PDUs)

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Exercises

• What are possible variations in the “What is the time?”

• Expected response / action not received
• Identify the messages and actions involved in another human
transaction, like

• Teacher asking “Do you have any questions?” in a lecture

• Buying a lunch packet from the canteen
• ….
• ….
• ….

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Need for a protocol architecture
• Communicating with another device is a complex task

• Better if this big task can be broken into a number of smaller subtasks An example 5-layer architecture

• Each subtask can be performed by hardware and/or software layer specialized to do that
subtask

• The layers and subtasks can be organized such that

• each layer provides some services to the layer above

• each layer uses the services provided by the layer below

• Each layer can be modified independently, as long as the services provided to the upper
layer and the services expected from the lower layer do not change

• i.e. the interfaces between the layers do not change

• Peer layers at the two ends communicate using a protocol specific to that layer
• Can be changed without affecting the upper or lower layers

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Protocol layering: an analogy
• Consider an office consisting of the following personnel
• Officer grade: Engineer and Finance officer

• Secretary grade: A confidential secretary to handle confidential matters and a secretary to

handle other matters

• Office assistant: Sends documents given by a secretary to the destination, and passes
received documents to the appropriate secretary

• Each layer provides services to the upper layer and uses the services provided by the
lower layer

• It is obvious that dividing the tasks in the office into subtasks and using specialized
persons to do each subtask is better than having a single person doing all the tasks
• Each person can be changed independently without affecting others in the office

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Protocol layering analogy – scenario 1

• Engineer in Office A
communicating with
engineer in office B
• Using the services of
the normal secretary
• Note that the
message is
”encapsulated” by
each layer

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Protocol layering analogy – scenario 2
• Finance officer in Office
A communicating with
finance officer in office B

• Message requires
confidentiality
§ Use the services of
confidential secretary
§ Message may be
encrypted

• Because the envelope is

marked as confidential,
Office Assistant in office
B passes it over to the
confidential secretary
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Layered Internet (TCP/IP) protocol stack
§ application: supporting network applications
• HTTP, IMAP, SMTP, DNS
§ transport: process-process data transfer application
application
• TCP, UDP
§ network: routing of datagrams from source to transport
transport
destination
• IP, routing protocols network
§ link: data transfer between neighboring link
network elements
• Ethernet, 802.11 (WiFi), PPP physical
§ physical: bits “on the wire”

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TCP/IP layers: Application layer
• The application layer is where network applications and their application-
layer protocols reside
• HTTP: for web document request and transfer
• SMTP: for the transfer of e-mail messages
• FTP: for the transfer of files
• DNS: for translation of human-friendly names like www.ietf.org to a numerical network
address
• An application in one end system exchanges packets of information with the
application in another end system
• following the rules of the specific application layer protocol

• We refer to this packet (PDU) of information at the application layer as a

message

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TCP/IP layers: Transport layer
• The Internet’s transport layer is responsible for transporting application-layer messages between
application endpoints
• In the TCP/IP Internet there are two transport protocols, TCP and UDP, either of which can
transport application layer messages
• TCP – Transport Control Protocol
• UDP – User Datagram Protocol
• TCP provides a connection- oriented service to its applications.
• Includes guaranteed delivery of application-layer messages to the destination
• Provides flow control (that is, sender/receiver speed matching)
• Breaks long messages into shorter segments
• Provides a congestion-control mechanism, so that a source throttles its transmission rate
when the network is congested.
• The UDP protocol provides a connectionless service to its applications
• provides no reliability, no flow control, and no congestion control
• A transport-layer packet (PDU) as a segment

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TCP/IP layers: Network layer
• The network layer is responsible for moving network-layer packets known as
datagrams from one host to another
• The Internet transport-layer protocol (TCP or UDP) in a source host passes a
transport-layer segment and a destination address to the network layer
• just like destination address of a letter that you post using the postal service
• The network layer then provides the service of delivering the segment to the
transport layer in the destination host
• The main protocol used in the network layer is the IP protocol (Internet Protocol)
• There is only one IP protocol, and all devices on the Internet must use IP
• Two versions: IPv4 and IPv6
• The Internet’s network layer also has a number of other protocols such as routing
protocols
• The network layer is also called IP layer, as IP is the main protocol used in this layer

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TCP/IP layers: Link layer
• The IP layer routes a datagram through a series of routers between the source and
destination
• To move a packet from one node (host or router) to the next node in the route, the network
layer relies on the services of the link layer
• At each node, the network layer passes the datagram down to the link layer, which delivers
the datagram to the next node along the route
• At this next node, the link layer passes the datagram up to the network layer.
• The services provided by the link layer depend on the specific link-layer protocol that is
employed over the link
• Examples of link-layer protocols include
• Ethernet: for wired local area networks (LANs)
• Wi-Fi: wireless LANs
• PPP: for point-to-point links
• HDLC: for point-to-point links
• We refer to the link-layer packets (PDUs) as frames

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TCP/IP layers: Physical layer
• The job of the physical layer is to move the individual bits (1s and 0s) in the
link layer frame from one node to the next

• The protocols in this layer depend on the actual transmission medium of the
link
• twisted-pair copper wire
• optical fiber

• For example, Ethernet has many physical-layer protocols:

• one for twisted-pair copper wire
• another for coaxial cable
• another for fiber
• … and so on

• In each case, a bit is moved across the link in a different way

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Services, Layering and Encapsulation

M
application Application exchanges messages to implement some application
application service using services of transport layer
Ht M
transport Transport-layer protocol transfers M (e.g., reliably) from transport
one process to another, using services of network layer

network § transport-layer protocol encapsulates network

application-layer message, M, with
link transport layer-layer header Ht to create a link
transport-layer segment
• Ht used by transport layer protocol to
physical implement its service physical

source destination

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Services, Layering and Encapsulation

M
application application
Ht M
transport Transport-layer protocol transfers M (e.g., reliably) from transport
one process to another, using services of network layer

network Hn Ht M network
Network-layer protocol transfers transport-layer
segment [Ht | M] from one host to another, using link
link layer services link
§ network-layer protocol encapsulates
transport-layer segment [Ht | M] with
physical physical
network layer-layer header Hn to create a
network-layer datagram
source • Hn used by network layer protocol to destination
implement its service
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Services, Layering and Encapsulation

M
application application
Ht M
transport transport

network Hn Ht M network
Network-layer protocol transfers transport-layer segment
[Ht | M] from one host to another, using link layer services
link Hl Hn Ht M link
Link-layer protocol transfers datagram [Hn| [Ht |M] from
host to neighboring host, using network-layer services
physical physical
§ link-layer protocol encapsulates network
datagram [Hn| [Ht |M], with link-layer
source header Hl to create a link-layer frame destination

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Encapsulation

• Encapsulation means putting in a cover

or a container
• Putting medicine in a capsule
• Putting a letter in an envelope
• In networking, encapsulation is done by
adding a header
• In some cases a trailer as well
• De-encapsulation means removing the
header (and trailer) to extract the original
data

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Encapsulation
Matryoshka dolls (stacking dolls)

message segment datagram frame

Credit: https://dribbble.com/shots/7182188-Babushka-Boi

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Services, Layering and Encapsulation

application message M M application

transport segment Ht M Ht M transport

network datagram Hn Ht M Hn Ht M network

link frame Hl Hn Ht M Hl Hn Ht M link

physical physical

source destination

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Encapsulation: an end-end view
source
message application
segment Ht M
M transport
datagram Hn Ht M network
frame Hl Hn Ht M link
physical
link
physical

switch

destination Hn Ht M network
M application Hl Hn Ht M link Hn Ht M
Ht M transport physical
Hn Ht M network
Hl Hn Ht M link router
physical
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ISO / OSI reference model

• Open Systems Interconnect (OSI) architecture

developed by
ISO (International Standards Organization)
• It is more of a “reference” architecture as
opposed to the TCP/IP stack which is based
on actual protocols in use
• Has a total of 7 layers, compared to the 5
layers of TCP/IP stack
• Additional layers are Session and Presentation
• In the TCP/IP stack the functions of these layers
are performed by Transport and Application layers

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Lesson summary
• Protocol Data Unit (PDU): The packet of information at
each layer.
• Encapsulation and De-encapsulation: Wrapping data
with protocol-specific headers/trailers and removing them
at the destination.
• Protocol Architecture: Organized structure of protocols
and layers facilitating network communication.
• Protocol Suite/Stack/Family: A set of protocols working
together in a layered architecture.
• Layered Services: Each layer provides services to the
layer above and utilizes services from the layer below.
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References

• Chapter 1 - Introduction
James F. Kurose and Keith W. Ross, Computer Networking – A Top-
Down Approach, (8th Edition), Pearson, 2020

• Chapter 2 - Protocol Architecture, TCP/IP, and Internet-Based

Applications
William Stallings, Data and Computer Communications (10th
Edition), Pearson, 2014

Credit to the content creator : Dr. Nimal Rajapaksha

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