MODULE 5

TRANSPORT LAYER
The transport layer is responsible for the delivery of a message
from one process to another
A process is an application program running on a host
The transport layer header must include a type of address called a
service-point address in the OSI model and port number or port
addresses in the Internet and TCP/IP protocol suite. 1

A transport layer protocol can be either connectionless or

connection-oriented.
In the transport layer, a message is normally divided into
transmittable segments.
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 TRANSPORT LAYER SERVICES
Process-to-Process Communication
The first duty of a transport-layer protocol is to provide process-to-
process communication.
A process is an application-layer entity (running program) that uses
the services of the transport layer.
A network-layer protocol can deliver the message only to the
destination computer. However, this is an incomplete delivery. The
message still needs to be handed to the correct process. This is
where a transport-layer protocol takes over. A transport-layer
protocol is responsible for delivery of the message to the
appropriate process.
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Network layer versus transport layer

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 Addressing: Port Numbers
For communication, we must define the local host, local process,
remote host, and remote process.
The local host and the remote host are defined using IP addresses
To define the processes, we need second identifiers, called port
numbers.
In the TCP/IP protocol suite, the port numbers are integers
between 0 and 65,535 (16 bits).
TCP/IP has decided to use universal port numbers for servers; these
are called well-known port numbers.
Every client process knows the well-known port number of the
corresponding server process
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Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN)

divided the port numbers into three ranges
Well-known ports - The ports ranging from 0 to 1,023 are assigned
and controlled by ICANN. These are the well-known ports.
Registered ports - The ports ranging from 1,024 to 49,151 are not
assigned or controlled by ICANN. They can only be registered with
ICANN to prevent duplication.
Dynamic ports - The ports ranging from 49,152 to 65,535 are
neither controlled nor registered. They can be used as temporary or
private port numbers.

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Socket Addresses
A transport-layer protocol in the TCP suite needs both the IP address
and the port number, at each end, to make a connection. The
combination of an IP address and a port number is called a socket
address. The client socket address defines the client process uniquely
just as the server socket address defines the server process uniquely.

Encapsulation and Decapsulation

Encapsulation happens at the sender site.
When a process has a message to send, it passes the message to the
transport layer along with a pair of socket addresses and some other
pieces of information, which depend on the transport-layer protocol.
The transport layer receives the data and adds the transport-layer
header.
The packets at the transport layers in the Internet are called user
datagrams, segments, or packets, depending on what transport-layer
protocol we use.

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Decapsulation happens at the receiver site.
When the message arrives at the destination transport layer, the
header is dropped and the transport layer delivers the message to
the process running at the application layer.
The sender socket address is passed to the process in case it needs to
respond to the message received.

Multiplexing and Demultiplexing

Whenever an entity accepts items from more than one source, this is
referred to as multiplexing (many to one).
whenever an entity delivers items to more than one source, this is
referred to as demultiplexing (one to many).
The transport layer at the source performs multiplexing; the
transport layer at the destination performs demultiplexing.
Flow Control
Delivery of items from a producer to a consumer can occur in one of
two ways: pushing or pulling

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If the sender delivers items whenever they are produced without a
prior request from the consumer, the delivery is referred to as
pushing.
If the producer delivers the items after the consumer has requested
them, the delivery is referred to as pulling.

When the producer pushes the items, the consumer may be

overwhelmed and there is a need for flow control, in the opposite
direction, to prevent discarding of the items.
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Although flow control can be implemented in several ways, one of

the solutions is normally to use two buffers: one at the sending
transport layer and the other at the receiving transport layer.
A buffer is a set of memory locations that can hold packets at the
sender and receiver.
When the buffer of the sending transport layer is full, it informs the
application layer to stop passing chunks of messages.
When the buffer of the receiving transport layer is full, it informs the
sending transport layer to stop sending packets. When there are
some vacancies, it informs the sending transport layer that it can
send packets again.

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 Error Control
Error control at the transport layer is responsible for
Detecting and discarding corrupted packets.
Keeping track of lost and discarded packets and resending them.
Recognizing duplicate packets and discarding them.
Buffering out-of-order packets until the missing packets arrive.

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Sequence Numbers
Error control requires that the sending transport layer knows which
packet is to be resent and the receiving transport layer knows which
packet is a duplicate, or which packet has arrived out of order.
This can be done if the packets are numbered. We can add a field to
the transport-layer packet to hold the sequence number of the
packet.
When a packet is corrupted or lost, the receiving transport layer can
somehow inform the sending transport layer to resend that packet
using the sequence number.
The receiving transport layer can also detect duplicate packets if two
received packets have the same sequence number.
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The out-of-order packets can be recognized by observing gaps in the
sequence numbers.
Acknowledgment
We can use both positive and negative signals as error control.
positive signals are more common at the transport layer.
The receiver side can send an acknowledgment (ACK) for each of a
collection of packets that have arrived safe and sound.
The receiver can simply discard the corrupted packets. The sender
can detect lost packets if it uses a timer. When a packet is sent, the
sender starts a timer. If an ACK does not arrive before the timer
expires, the sender resends the packet.

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Duplicate packets can be silently discarded by the receiver. Out-of-

order packets can be either discarded (to be treated as lost packets
by the sender), or stored until the missing ones arrives.
Connectionless and Connection-Oriented Services
In a connectionless service, the source process (application program)
needs to divide its message into chunks of data of the size acceptable
by the transport layer and deliver them to the transport layer one by
one.
The transport layer treats each chunk as a single unit without any
relation between the chunks.
When a chunk arrives from the application layer, the transport layer
encapsulates it in a packet and sends it.
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 However, since there is no dependency between the packets at the
transport layer, the packets may arrive out of order at the
destination and will be delivered out of order to the server
process.
The situation would be worse if one of the packets were lost. Since
there is no numbering on the packets, the receiving transport layer
has no idea that one of the messages has been lost.
We can say that no flow control, error control, or congestion
control can be effectively implemented in a connectionless service.

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Connection-Oriented Service
In a connection-oriented service, the client and the server first
need to establish a logical connection between themselves.
The data exchange can only happen after the connection
establishment.
After data exchange, the connection needs to be torn down.

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 Connectionless service

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Connection Oriented Service

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 USER DATAGRAM PROTOCOL (UDP)
The User Datagram Protocol (UDP) is a connectionless, unreliable
transport protocol.
UDP is a very simple protocol using a minimum of overhead.
If a process wants to send a small message and does not care much
about reliability, it can use UDP.
Sending a small message using UDP takes much less interaction
between the sender and receiver than using TCP.
UDP packets, called user datagrams, have a fixed-size header of 8
bytes made of four fields, each of 2 bytes (16 bits).

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The first two fields define the source and destination port
numbers. The third field defines the total length of the user
datagram, header plus data.

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 UDP Services
Process-to-Process Communication
UDP provides process-to-process communication using socket
addresses, a combination of IP addresses and port numbers
Connectionless Services
UDP provides a connectionless service. This means that each user
datagram sent by UDP is an independent datagram.
There is no relationship between the different user datagrams even
if they are coming from the same source process and going to the
same destination program.
The user datagrams are not numbered. There is no connection
establishment and no connection termination. This means that
each user datagram can travel on a different path.
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Flow Control
UDP is a very simple protocol. There is no flow control, and hence
no window mechanism. The receiver may overflow with incoming
messages.
Error Control
There is no error control mechanism in UDP except for the
checksum.
This means that the sender does not know if a message has been
lost or duplicated.
When the receiver detects an error through the checksum, the
user datagram is silently discarded

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 Congestion Control
Since UDP is a connectionless protocol, it does not provide
congestion control.
UDP assumes that the packets sent are small and sporadic and
cannot create congestion in the network. This assumption may or
may not be true today, when UDP is used for interactive real-time
transfer of audio and video.
Encapsulation and Decapsulation
To send a message from one process to another, the UDP protocol
encapsulates and decapsulates messages.

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Multiplexing and Demultiplexing

In a host running a TCP/IP protocol suite, there is only one UDP but
possibly several processes that may want to use the services of
UDP. To handle this situation, UDP multiplexes and demultiplexes.
Applications of UDP
UDP is suitable for a process that requires simple request-response
communication with little concern for flow and error control.
UDP is suitable for a process with internal flow- and error-control
mechanisms
UDP is a suitable transport protocol for multicasting
UDP is used for management processes such as SNMP
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UDP is used for some route updating protocols such as Routing
Information Protocol(RIP).
UDP is normally used for interactive real-time applications
Position of transport-layer protocols in the TCP/IP protocol suite

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TRANSMISSION CONTROL PROTOCOL (TCP)

TCP is a connection-oriented, reliable protocol.
TCP explicitly defines connection establishment, data transfer, and
connection teardown phases to provide a connection-oriented
service.
TCP uses a combination of GBN and SR protocols to provide
reliablity.
TCP uses checksum (for error detection), retransmission of lost or
corrupted packets, cumulative and selective acknowledgments,
and timers.
TCP is the most common transport-layer protocol in the Internet.
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 TCP Services
Process-to-Process Communication
As with UDP, TCP provides process-to-process communication
using port numbers
Stream Delivery Service
TCP is a stream-oriented protocol. It allows the sending process to
deliver data as a stream of bytes and allows the receiving process
to obtain data as a stream of bytes.
TCP creates an environment in which the two processes seem to be
connected by an imaginary “tube” that carries their bytes across
the Internet. The sending process produces (writes to) the stream
and the receiving process consumes (reads from) it.
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Stream delivery

Sending and Receiving Buffers

Because the sending and the receiving processes may not
necessarily write or read data at the same rate, TCP needs buffers
for storage. There are two buffers, the sending buffer and the
receiving buffer, one for each direction. One way to implement a
buffer is to use a circular array.
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 Segments - At the transport layer, TCP groups a number of bytes
together into a packet called a segment.
Full-Duplex Communication
TCP offers full-duplex service, where data can flow in both
directions at the same time. Each TCP endpoint then has its own
sending and receiving buffer, and segments move in both
directions.
Multiplexing and Demultiplexing
Like UDP, TCP performs multiplexing at the sender and
demultiplexing at the receiver. However, since TCP is a connection-
oriented protocol, a connection needs to be established for each
pair of processes
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Connection-Oriented Service
TCP, unlike UDP, is a connection-oriented protocol. When a process
at site A wants to send to and receive data from another process at
site B, the following three phases occur:
The two TCP’s establish a logical connection between them.
Data are exchanged in both directions.
The connection is terminated
Note that this is a logical connection, not a physical connection
Reliable Service
TCP is a reliable transport protocol. It uses an acknowledgment
mechanism to check the safe and sound arrival of data.
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 TCP SEGMENT
A packet in TCP is called a segment

TCP segment format

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Source port address- This is a 16-bit field that defines the port
number of the application program in the host that is sending the
segment.
Destination port address - This is a 16-bit field that defines the
port number of the application program in the host that is
receiving the segment.
Sequence number - This 32-bit field defines the number assigned
to the first byte of data contained in this segment. During
connection establishment each party uses a random number
generator to create an initial sequence number (ISN).

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Acknowledgment number - This 32-bit field defines the byte
number that the receiver of the segment is expecting to receive
from the other party. If the receiver of the segment has
successfully received byte number x from the other party, it returns
x + 1 as the acknowledgment number. Acknowledgment and data
can be piggybacked together.
Header length - This 4-bit field indicates the number of 4-byte
words in the TCP header. The length of the header can be between
20 and 60 bytes
Control - This field defines 6 different control bits or flags

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Window size - This field defines the window size of the sending
TCP in bytes. Note that the length of this field is 16 bits
Checksum - This 16-bit field contains the checksum. The calculation
of the checksum for TCP follows the same procedure as the one
described for UDP.
Urgent pointer - This 16-bit field, which is valid only if the urgent
flag is set, is used when the segment contains urgent data.

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 TCP CONNECTION
In TCP, connection-oriented transmission requires three phases:
connection establishment, data transfer, and connection
termination
Connection Establishment
TCP transmits data in full-duplex mode. When two TCPs in two
machines are connected, they are able to send segments to each
other simultaneously
Three-Way Handshaking
The connection establishment in TCP is called three-way
handshaking
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The process starts with the server. The server program tells its TCP
that it is ready to accept a connection. This request is called a
passive open. Now the server TCP is ready to accept a connection
from any machine in the world.
The client program issues a request for an active open. A client
that wishes to connect to an open server tells its TCP to connect to
a particular server. TCP can now start the three-way handshaking
process.
STEP 1
The client sends the first segment (SYN segment) in which only the
SYN flag is set. This segment is for synchronization of sequence
numbers.

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The client chooses a random number as the first sequence number
and sends this number to the server. This sequence number is
called the initial sequence number (ISN).
Note that the SYN segment is a control segment and carries no
data. However, it consumes one sequence number because it
needs to be acknowledged.
A SYN segment cannot carry data, but it consumes one sequence
number.
STEP 2
The server sends the second segment, a SYN + ACK segment with
two flag bits set as: SYN and ACK. This segment has a dual
purpose.
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First, it is a SYN segment for communication in the other direction.

The server uses this segment to initialize a sequence number for
numbering the bytes sent from the server to the client.
The server also acknowledges the receipt of the SYN segment from
the client by setting the ACK flag and displaying the next sequence
number it expects to receive from the client.
A SYN + ACK segment cannot carry data, but it does consume one
sequence number.
STEP 3
The client sends the third segment. This is just an ACK segment. It
acknowledges the receipt of the second segment with the ACK flag
and acknowledgment number field.
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 Data Transfer
After connection is established, bidirectional data transfer can take
place. The client and server can send data and acknowledgments in
both directions.
Pushing Data
The sending TCP uses a buffer to store the stream of data coming
from the sending application program. The sending TCP can select
the segment size.
The receiving TCP also buffers the data when they arrive and
delivers them to the application program when the application
program is ready or when it is convenient for the receiving TCP.
This type of flexibility increases the efficiency of TCP.
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Urgent Data
There are occasions in which an application program needs to send
urgent bytes, some bytes that need to be treated in a special way
by the application at the other end.
The solution is to send a segment with the URG bit set.
The sending application program tells the sending TCP that the
piece of data is urgent.
The sending TCP creates a segment and inserts the urgent data at
the beginning of the segment. The rest of the segment can contain
normal data from the buffer.

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 Connection Termination
Either of the two parties involved in exchanging data (client or
server) can close the connection, although it is usually initiated by
the client.
Most implementations today allow two options for connection
termination: three-way handshaking and four-way handshaking
with a half-close option.

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Connection establishment using three-way handshaking

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APPLICATION LAYER

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