The Presentation Layer- Layer 6

Computer Networks
EEE 448

Lecture #11
Dept of Electrical and Electronics Engineering
Çukurova University

Presentation Layer
Presentation Layer Network Functionality
 The name of this layer suggests its main function
 The presentation layer is the sixth layer of the OSI
as well:
Reference Model protocol stack, and second from
the top. it deals with the presentation of data.

 It is different from the other layers in two key  The presentation layer is charged with taking
respects. care of any issues that might arise where data
 First, it has a much more limited and specific function than the other sent from one system needs to be viewed in a
layers; it's actually somewhat easy to describe
different way by the other system.
 Second, it is used much less often than the other layers; in many
types of connections it is not required.  It also takes care of any special processing that
must be done to data from the time an application
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tries to send it until the time it is sent over the
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network.

Presentation layer The Presentation Layer

 The Presentation layer has three primary

functions:

 Coding and conversion of Application layer data to

ensure that data from the source device can be
interpreted by destination device.

 Compression of the data in a manner that can be

decompressed by the destination device.

 Encryption of the data for transmission and the

decryption of data upon receipt by the destination.

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 Coding and conversion -Translation
Presentation layer protocols

 Networks can connect very different types of

computers together: PCs, Macintoshes, UNIX
systems, AS/400 servers and mainframes can all  ASCII, American Standard Code for Information Interchange
exist on the same network.
 EBCDIC, Extended Binary Coded Decimal Interchange Code
 These systems have many distinct characteristics
and represent data in different ways;  X.25 PAD, Packet Assembler/Disassembler Protocol
 they may use different character sets for
example.
 The presentation layer handles the job of hiding
these differences between machines.

Compression Data Compression

 Compression (and decompression) may be done  The reasons compressed data should be done
at the presentation layer to improve the end-toend is that it requires:
throughput of data.  less memory for intermediate node buffers.
 less packets to be handled (FCS and routed).
 There are some who believe this is not, strictly  less time to send (if compression saves more
speaking, a function of the presentation layer. transmission time than the compression execution
time costs) - thus resulting in better response time
and throughput
 less cost (if charged per byte transmitted).

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Types of Compression
 There are two types
 Frequency-Dependent Coding
 Context-Dependent Coding

 The goal of data compression is to represent an information source (a

data file, an image) as accurately as possible using the fewest number
of bits
 For example, 25.888888888
 This string can be compressed as:
 25.[9]8
 Interpreted as, "twenty five point 9 eights", the original string is perfectly
recreated, just written in a smaller form

 Context-dependent: the probability that a “T” directly follows a “Q” is

about 4 times less than the probability of a “U” following a “Q”. Run-length encoding example

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 Huffman coding
assigns shorter codes to symbols that occur more frequently
and longer codes to those that occur less frequently. For
example, imagine we have a text file that uses only five
characters (A, B, C, D, E). Before we can assign bit patterns
to each character, we assign each character a weight based on
its frequency of use. In this example, assume that the
frequency of the characters is as shown in Table.

Run-length encoding for two symbols

Encoding
A character’s code is found by starting at the root and
following the branches that lead to that character. The code Let us see how to encode text using the code for our five
itself is the bit value of each branch on the path, taken in characters. The figure shows the original and the encoded
sequence. text.

Final tree and code Huffman encoding

Decoding Protocols
The recipient has a very easy job in decoding the data it
 Other protocols sometimes considered at this level (though perhaps not
receives. The figure shows how decoding takes place. strictly adhering to the OSI model) include:
 Apple Filing Protocol (AFP)
 Independent Computing Architecture (ICA), the Citrix system core
protocol
 Lightweight Presentation Protocol (LPP)
 NetWare Core Protocol (NCP)
 Network Data Representation (NDR)
 Telnet (a remote terminal access protocol)
 Tox, The Tox protocol is sometimes regarded as part of both the
presentation and application layer
 eXternal Data Representation (XDR)
 X.25 Packet Assembler/Disassembler Protocol (PAD)

Huffman decoding
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 Encryption Encryption

 Some types of encryption (and decryption) are  Microsoft ex-President Bill Gates that his two
performed at the presentation layer. This ensures major concerns about the future of computer are:
the security of the data as it travels down the
protocol stack.  That computing and information access did not
 For example, one of the most popular become a realm of only the rich. i.e.
encryption schemes that is usually associated
with the presentation layer is the Secure
Sockets Layer (SSL) protocol.  That computer security and privacy could be
competently managed.
 Not all encryption is done at layer 6, however;
some encryption is often done at lower layers in
the protocol stack, in technologies such as IPSec.
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Cryptography 4 types of attacks

 Ciphertext only attack
 The general idea is to modify the data so that it is  the only data available is a target ciphertext
meaningless to the casual observer,
 Known plaintext attack
 a target ciphertext
 but may be decoded by the intended receiver(s),  pairs of other ciphertext and plaintext (say, previously broken or
guessing)
and by nobody else.
 Chosen plaintext attacks
 a target ciphertext
 can feed encryption algorithm with plaintexts and obtain the
matching ciphertexts
 Chosen ciphertext attack
 a target ciphertext
 can feed decryption algorithm with ciphertexts and obtain the
matching plaintexts
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The Basic Problem Cryptography

 We consider the confidentiality goal: plaintext (data file or messages)
 Alice and Bob are Friends
encryption
 Marvin is a rival
 Alice wants to send secret messages (M 1,M2,…) to
Bob over the Internet ciphertext (stored or transmitted safely)

 Rival Marvin wants to read the messages (M1,M2,…) - decryption

Alice and Bob want to prevent this!
 Assumption: The network is OPEN: Marvin is able to plaintext (original data or messages)
eavesdrop and read all data sent from Alice to Bob.
 Consequence: Alice must not send messages
(M1,M2,…) directly – they must be “scrambled” or
encrypted using a ‘secret code’ unknown to Marvin
but known to Bob.
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 Private key cipher Basic terms

 Cryptology (to be very precise)

 Cryptography --- code designing
Encryption Encrypted message Decryption  Cryptanalysis --- code breaking
(ciphertext)
 Cryptologist:
 Cryptographer & cryptanalyst
Alice E  Encryption/encipherment
D Bob
 Scrambling data into unintelligible to unauthorised
key parties
Message Message  Decryption/decipherment
(cleartext,plaintext) (cleartext, plaintext)  Un-scrambling

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