Chapter Five

The Transport Layer

 Objectives
 The transport layer is responsible for process-to-
process delivery of the entire message.
 A process is an application program running on a
host.
 Whereas the network layer oversees source-to-
destination delivery of individual packets, it does not
recognize any relationship between those packets.
 It treats each one independently, as though each
piece belonged to a separate message, whether or
not it does.
 The transport layer ensures that the whole message
arrives intact and in order, overseeing both error
control and flow control at the source-to-destination
level.
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3.1 Introduction
 the core or the heart of the whole protocol hierarchy
 it provides reliable, cost-effective data transfer from
the source to the destination on top of an unreliable
network; process-to-process delivery
 the transport layer code runs on the users’ machines;
the network layer mostly runs on the routers (operated
by a carrier for a WAN) and the adequacy of the
service can not be guaranteed
 position of the transport layer

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 Cont’d…
 A transport layer protocol can be either
connectionless or connection-oriented
 A connectionless transport layer treats each
segment as an independent packet and delivers it
to the transport layer at the destination machine.
 A connection-oriented transport layer makes a
connection with the transport layer at the
destination machine first before delivering the
packets. After all the data is transferred, the
connection is terminated

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 data link layer: node-to-node delivery
 network layer: host-to-host delivery
 transport layer: process-to-process delivery

 several processes may be running on the source as well as the

destination; an addressing mechanism is required (see next
slide)

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 two processes communicate in a client-server relationship
(paradigm)
 a process on the local host, called a client, needs services
from a process usually on the remote host, called a server
 both processes (client and server) have the same name; e.g.,
to get the day and time from a remote machine, we need a
Daytime client process running on the local host and a
Daytime server process running on a remote machine
 for communication, we must define (identify them by an
addressing mechanism) the following four
 Local Host
 Local Process
 Remote Host
 Remote Process
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3.2 Packetizing
 the transport layer creates packets out of the message
received from the application layer
 it divides a long message into smaller ones; they are then
encapsulated into the data field of the transport-layer
packet and headers are added

3.3 Addressing
 at the data link layer, we need a MAC address
 at the network layer, we need an IP address
 at the transport layer, we need a transport-layer address,
called a port number, to choose among several processes

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 in all the above, a destination address is needed for
delivery and a source address for reply (next node,
destination host, and destination process,
respectively)
 IP addresses and port
numbers play different roles
 in the Internet model, the port
numbers are 16-bit integers
between 0 and 65,535

 ephemeral port number: the client program defines itself

with a port number, chosen randomly by the transport layer
software running on the client

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 well-known port numbers: universal port numbers for servers;
not random since a client process cannot know it

 IANA (Internet Assigned Numbers Authority) Ranges

 IANA divided the port numbers into three ranges

 Well-known ports: assigned and controlled by IANA for

standard services
 Registered ports: are not assigned and controlled by IANA;
can only be registered with IANA to prevent duplication
 Dynamic ports: neither controlled nor registered; these are
the ephemeral ports 10
 Socket Addresses
 process-to-process delivery needs two addresses: IP
address and port number at each end
 the combination of an IP address and a port number is
called a socket address

 a transport-layer protocol needs a pair of socket

addresses: the client socket address and the server
socket address
 the IP header contains the IP address; the UDP or TCP
header contains the port number

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 Multiplexing and Demultiplexing
 the addressing mechanism allows multiplexing and
demultiplexing by the transport layer since there may be
several processes that need to send packets, but there is
only one transport-layer protocol (UDP or TCP)

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3.4 Connection Control
 a transport-layer protocol can be either connectionless (UDP)
or connection-oriented (TCP)
 if connection-oriented, it first establishes a virtual connection,
then follows data transfer, then the connection is terminated
3.5 Reliability - UDP and TCP
 a transport-layer service can be either reliable or unreliable
 the choice depends on the needs of the application layer
program
 a reliable transport-layer protocol (TCP) implements flow and
error control; a slower and more complex service
 if the data link layer is reliable and has flow and error control,
do we need this at the transport layer?
 yes; reliability at the data link layer is between two nodes, but
we also need reliability between two ends
 flow control at the transport layer is end-to-end rather than
across a single link
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 reliability may not be needed (UDP)
 a process may use its own flow and error control
mechanisms
 a process may need fast service
 the nature of the service may not demand flow and error
control (real-time applications)

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 UDP - User Datagram Protocol
 connectionless and unreliable transport layer protocol in the
Internet (no flow or error control, no retransmission if data is
corrupted or lost)
 simple with a minimum of overhead
 convenient for
 multimedia and multicasting applications
 for client-server situations
 e.g., DNS can use UDP, give me the IP address of the
host name www.cs.aau.edu.et - see later

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 some of the well-known ports used by UDP (see
www.iana.org for a complete list - also for TCP ports)
Port Protocol Description
7 Echo Echoes a received datagram back to the sender
9 Discard Discards any datagram that is received
11 Users Active users
13 Daytime Returns the date and the time
17 Quote Returns a quote of the day
19 Chargen Returns a string of characters
53 DNS Domain Name Service
67 Bootps Server port to download bootstrap information
68 Bootpc Client port to download bootstrap information
69 TFTP Trivial File Transfer Protocol
111 RPC Remote Procedure Call
123 NTP Network Time Protocol
161 SNMP Simple Network Management Protocol
162 SNMP Simple Network Management Protocol (trap)
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  UDP packets, called datagrams, have a fixed size header of 8
bytes followed by the payload (data)

 Checksum: optional; if not included, the field is filled with 0s (a

true computed 0 is stored as all 1s)

 Some Applications of UDP

 for processes that require simple request-response
communication; not for applications that send bulk data such as
FTP
 for a process with internal flow and error control mechanisms,
e.g., TFTP (Trivial FTP)

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  for multicasting; multicasting capabilities are embedded in the
UDP software but not in the TCP software
 used for some route updating protocols such as RIP (Routing
Information Protocol)
 used in conjunction with RTP (Real Time Transport Protocol) to
provide a transport-layer mechanism for real-time data; see later
for RTP in the discussion of multimedia
 TCP - Transport Control Protocol
 reliable, but complex transport-layer protocol in the Internet
 it is called a stream connection-oriented and reliable
transport protocol
 like UDP, TCP uses port numbers as transport-layer
addresses
 note: if an application can use both UDP and TCP, the same
port number is assigned to this application; e.g., Daytime,
DNS
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 some of the well-known ports used by TCP
Port Protocol Description
7 Echo Echoes a received datagram back to the sender
9 Discard Discards any datagram that is received
11 Users Active users
13 Daytime Returns the date and the time
17 Quote Returns a quote of the day
19 Chargen Returns a string of characters
20 FTP, Data File Transfer Protocol (data connection)
21 FTP, Control File Transfer Protocol (control connection)
23 TELNET Terminal Network
25 SMTP Simple Mail Transfer Protocol
53 DNS Domain Name Server
67 BOOTP Bootstrap Protocol
79 Finger Lookup information about a user
80 HTTP Hypertext Transfer Protocol
111 RPC Remote Procedure Call
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 Important issues (topics) to be covered for TCP
 TCP Services
 Numbering Bytes
 Segments and the TCP header format
 Flow Control
 Error Control

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 TCP Services
1. Stream Delivery Service
 unlike UDP, TCP is a stream-oriented protocol; in UDP,
there are no relationships between different chunks of
data
 in TCP, the two processes seem to be connected by an
imaginary “tube” that carries their data across the
Internet

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2. Sending and Receiving Buffers
 the sender and the receiver may not produce and
consume data at the same speed

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3. Bytes and Segments
 the IP layer (as a service provider for TCP) needs to send
data in packets, not as a stream of bytes
 TCP groups a number of bytes together into a packet
called a segment; it adds a header to each segment (for
control purposes) and delivers it to IP

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4. Full-Duplex Service
 TCP offers a full-duplex service
 each TCP has a sending and receiving buffer, and
segments are sent in both directions
5. Connection-Oriented Service
 a virtual connection for all segments belonging to a
message is created
 a TCP segment is encapsulated in an IP datagram and can
be sent out of order, lost, or corrupted, and then resent
 however, TCP creates a stream-oriented environment in
which it accepts the responsibility of delivering the bytes
in order to the other site
 the connection is point-to-point (it has exactly two ends);
TCP does not support multicasting or broadcasting

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 6. Reliable Service
 it uses an acknowledgement mechanism to check the
safe arrival of data (see later in error control)
 Numbering Bytes
 there are two fields in the TCP header: sequence number
and acknowledgement number; they refer to the byte
number not the segment number
 Byte Numbers
 TCP numbers all data bytes transmitted; numbering is
independent in each direction; used for flow and error
control
 the numbering starts with a randomly generated number
(between 0 and 232-1)
 Sequence Number
 after the bytes have been numbered, TCP assigns a
sequence number to each segment
 the sequence number is the number of the first byte
carried in that segment 25
 e.g., Imagine a TCP connection is transferring a file of 6000
bytes. The first byte is numbered 10,010. What are the
sequence numbers for each segment if data are sent in five
segments with the first four segments carrying 1000 bytes
and the last segment carrying 2000 bytes?
The following shows the sequence number for each
segment:
Segment 1 ==> sequence number: 10,010 (range: 10,010
to 11,009)
Segment 2 ==> sequence number: 11,010 (range: 11,010
to 12,009)
Segment 3 ==> sequence number: 12,010 (range: 12,010
to 13,009)
Segment 4 ==> sequence number: 13,010 (range: 13,010
to 14,009)
Segment 5 ==> sequence number: 14,010 (range: 14,010
to 16,009) 26
 Acknowledgement Number
 to confirm the bytes the receiver has received
 it defines the number of the next byte that the receiver
expects to receive (both can be receivers since the
transmission is full-duplex)
 it is cumulative; the receiver adds 1 to the number of the
last byte it received correctly and announces this as the
acknowledgement number
 e.g., if a party uses 5643 as an acknowledgement
number, it means that it has received all bytes from the
beginning up to 5642 (does it mean it has received 5642
bytes?)

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 Segments
 the unit of data transfer using TCP is a segment
 a segment consists of a 20- to 60-byte header followed by
data
 Header length (HLEN): the number of 4-byte words in the TCP
header (because of the options)
 Control: 6 different control bits or flags; they enable flow
control, connection establishment and termination, and the
mode of data transfer in TCP

UDP Header

TCP Header
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 Flag Description
URG The value of the urgent pointer field is valid
ACK The value of the acknowledgment number field is valid
PSH Push the data; send it without waiting for the
window to be filled
RST Connection must be reset - as a result of host crash
or other reasons
SYN Synchronize sequence numbers during connection
establishment
FIN Terminate the connection
 Urgent pointer: the segment contains urgent data; it must be
delivered soon even if out of order, e.g., Control-C to abort
the application program on the other side; valid only if the
urgent flag is set
 Widow size: defines the size of the sliding window, in bytes,
that the other party must maintain 29
 Flow Control
 defines the amount of data a source can send before
receiving an acknowledgement from the destination; used to
prevent a fast transmitter from overwhelming a slow receiver
 two extreme cases
 send 1 byte: extremely slow
 send all the data: speeds up the process; but may
overwhelm the receiver; + if some part of data is lost,
duplicated, received out of order, or corrupted, the source
will not know until all data have been checked by the
destination
 TCP defines a window (somewhere in between the above two
extremes)
 it sends as many data as are defined by the sliding window
protocol
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 Sliding Window Protocol
 both hosts use a window for each connection
 used to make transmission more efficient as well as to control
the flow of data so that the destination does not become
overwhelmed
 TCP’s sliding windows are byte-oriented
 sender buffer (circular)

 receiver buffer (circular)

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 Receiver window
 how many more bytes can the receiver store?
 let N = the total size of the receiving buffer
M = the number of locations occupied
 then only N-M more bytes can be received; this is called the
receiver window; in the above example it is 13-6 = 7
 Sender Window
 we have flow control if the sender creates a window (the
sender window) with a size less than or equal to the size of
the receiver window
 sender buffer and sender window

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 Error Control
 error control in TCP includes mechanisms for detecting
corrupted segments (discarded by the destination), lost
segments (discarded by some intermediate node), out-of-
order segments, and duplicated segments
 most errors nowadays are caused by congestion rather than
error-prone transmission media
 it uses three simple tools: checksum, acknowledgement, and
time-out
 no negative acknowledgement is used in TCP; if a segment is
not acknowledged before the time-out, it is considered to be
either corrupted or lost

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3.6 Congestion Control
 they are related to three layers: data link, network, and
transport layers
 congestion: may occur if the load on the network is
greater than the capacity of the network
 it arises as a result of waiting (queues by routers)
 when a packet is delayed, the source, not receiving the
acknowledgement, retransmits the packet, which makes
the delay, and the congestion, worse
 congestion control: refers to the mechanisms and
techniques to control the congestion and keep the load
below the capacity; either prevent congestion before it
happens or remove congestion after it has happened
(you can read more on the available techniques)

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