for76042_ch02.
fm Page 34 Friday, February 13, 2009 12:40 PM
34 PART 1 INTRODUCTION AND UNDERLYING TECHNOLOGIES
them and make a segment out of them. Figure 2.13 shows the communication at the
transport layer.
Figure 2.13 Communication at the transport layer
A Legend Source Destination D Data H Header B
Transport Transport
R1 R3 R4
Network Network
Data link Data link
Physical Physical
Link 1
A Link 2
R1 R2
D4 H4 Link 3 Link 4 Link 6
Segment
Link 5 B
R3 R4
D4 H4
Segment
Again, we should know that the two transport layers only think that they are com-
municating with each other using a segment; the communication is done through the
physical layer and the exchange of bits.
Traditionally, the transport layer was represented in the TCP/IP suite by two proto-
cols: User Datagram Protocol (UDP) and Transmission Control Protocol (TCP). A
new protocol called Stream Control Transmission Protocol (SCTP) has been intro-
duced in the last few years.
The unit of communication at the transport layer is a segment, user datagram, or a
packet, depending on the specific protocol used in this layer.
Application Layer
The application layer in TCP/IP is equivalent to the combined session, presentation, and
application layers in the OSI model. The application layer allows a user to access the ser-
vices of our private internet or the global Internet. Many protocols are defined at this layer
to provide services such as electronic mail, file transfer, accessing the World Wide Web,
and so on. We cover most of the standard protocols in later chapters. Figure 2.14 shows
the communication at the application layer.
