Application Layer Protocols 251

2. What is a domain name system?

Ans: The TCP/IP protocol identifies entities that are connected on the Internet using their unique IP
addresses. These addresses being numeric are difficult to remember for the users as compared to their
names, therefore, a system was needed that can change a name to an address and vice versa. Domain
name system (DNS) is such a system that is used to map the user friendly host names to their IP ­addresses
and vice versa. This system is used extensively over the Internet and other private businesses.
3. What is a resolver? What is its role in DNS?
Ans: A resolver is a library procedure used by the DNS during mapping of a host name to its corre-
sponding IP address. Whenever an application program requires mapping of a host name to IP ­address, or
IP address to host name it invokes the resolver, passing the host name or IP address to it as a parameter. The
resolver passes this parameter to a local DNS server, which searches the name or address in its database.
After the name or address has been found, the DNS server returns the result back to the resolver. Then, the
resolver passes on the result to the calling application program so that a connection could be established
with the destination.
4. Explain the DNS in terms of name space, resource record and name server.
Ans: The DNS is used to map host names to their corresponding IP addresses or vice versa. Various
components of DNS include name space, resource record and name server.

Name Space
It is a representation of the domains of the Internet as a tree structure. Each domain can be subdivided
into many other domains, which are further partitioned thereby creating a hierarchy. The leaf nodes of
the tree cannot be subdivided and each leaf node may contain only a single host or several hosts. The
top-level domains are classified into two groups, namely, generic and country. The generic group con-
tains domain names such as com (commercial), edu (educational institutions), gov (governments), int
(international organizations), mil (armed forces), net (network providers) and org (organizations). The
country domains contain one entry for every country, as per ISO 3166 specification. The tree structure
of the name space is shown in Figure 13.1.

Generic Countries

com edu net mil ... ip nl ...

Sun Yale ac co oce vu

CS Iinda keio nec

Figure 13.1 A Portion of Internet Domain Name Space

A label is included in each node of the tree (Figure 13.2). The label is a string, which has a maximum
size of 63 characters. The label at the root node is just an empty string. The child nodes, which have the
same parent, are not allowed to have the same label name as it may cause ambiguity. Each node in the

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 252 Data Communications and Computer Networks

root(.)

edu.
edu

[Link]. Domain
flag names

Labels
[Link].
tc

[Link].
terminator
Figure 13.2 Labels and Domain Names

tree has a domain name, which is formed by a sequence of labels separated by dots (.). The domain
names are again divided into two types, namely, fully qualifie domain name (FQDN ) and partially
qualified domain name (PQDN ).
‰‰ FQDN: If the domain name ends with a dot (.), that is, null string, it is said to be an FQDN. It is
the full name of a host, which includes all labels, starting from the host label toward the root label,
which is a dot (.). For example, in Figure 13.2, the FQDN of a host named terminator installed at
the technology centre tc is [Link] .
‰‰ PQDN: If a domain name does not end with a null string, then it is said to be a PQDN. This means
a PQDN starts with the host label but does not end with the root node. A partial domain name ad-
dress is used when the domain name and the client reside in the same site. The PQDN can take
help of the resolver to convert it to an FQDN. For example, if a person at the [Link] site wants
to get the IP address of the terminator computer, he/she defines only the partial name terminator.
The rest of the part (called suffi ), that is, [Link] , is added by the resolver and then the address
is passed to the DNS server.

Resource Records
Every domain is associated with a set of information known as resource records (RRs). The most com-
mon RR is the IP address for a single host, although many other kinds of resource records are also found.
A RR is a five-tuple set, which is mostly represented as ASCII text, but for better efficienc , it can also
be encoded in binary form. The different fields of the five-tuple set are described as follow
‰‰ Domain_Name: This field identifies the domain with which this record is associated. Usually, many
records related to a single domain exist in the databases and the database contains RRs for multiple
domains. Thus, this field is used for search operations so that queries an be executed efficientl .
‰‰ Time_to_Live: This field indicates the stability of the record. It specifies the time interval with-
in which a RR may be cached by the receiver so that the server need not be consulted for RR
­repeatedly. A zero value in this field indicates that the RR is to be used for a single transaction and
therefore, should not be cached. The highly stable records are given large values while less stable
records are given small values.

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 Application Layer Protocols 253

‰‰ Class: This field identifies the protocol family. It is set to IN for Internet information; otherwise,
some other codes are used.
‰‰ Type: This field specifies the type of the recor
‰‰ Value: This field depends on the Type field and can be a domain name, a number or an ASCII
character.

Name Servers
As DNS database is very vast, it is impossible for a single server to hold information about the complete
database and respond to all queries. Even if it is done, then a failure in the single name server would
bring the whole network down. To avoid such a situation, the DNS name space is divided into many
non-overlapping zones (represented by dotted areas in Figure 13.3) with each zone containing name
servers holding information about that zone. Each zone covers some nodes of the tree and contains a
group of one or more subdomains and their associated RRs that exist within that domain. The name
server creates a zone file, which holds all the information of the nodes under it. Each zone has a primary
name server and one or more secondary name servers. The primary name server of a zone obtains the
information from a file on the disk, whereas the secondary name servers obtain information from the
primary name server. Some servers can also be located outside the zone to improve the reliability.

Generic Country

com edu net mil ... ip nl ...

S

Sun Yale ac co oce vu

CS cs
Iinda keio nec

john
texas

Figure 13.3 Division of DNS Name Space into Zones

Whenever a query from a resolver for a domain name arrives at a local name server, it checks ­whether
that information falls under its zone. If so, then the domain name is provided; otherwise, the query is for-
warded to the upper-level name servers. For example, consider a resolver [Link] wants to query
about the IP address of the host [Link] (Figure 13.3). To handle this query, firstly the resolver
sends a query to the local name server [Link] to check whether it already has the IP address. If the
local name server has the IP address in its cache, it returns the address to the resolver; else, it forwards
the query to the root server. The root server then forwards the UDP packet to [Link], which is further
forwarded to [Link] because this name server has the IP address of the host [Link]. The
whole process is repeated in the reverse order in order to reach to the client who had sent the original
request. Once the client has been reached, the local name server stores this IP address in its cache so that
it may be used later when required.

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 254 Data Communications and Computer Networks

5. Why was there a need of dynamic domain name system (DDNS)?

Ans: The DNS database contains large number of addresses that need to be changed very often
due to addition of a new host, removal of some existing host or change in the IP address of some
host. All these changes must be updated in the DNS master file, which leads to lot of manual work
consuming a lot of time. To overcome this problem, DDNS was devised that updates the master fil
automatically. In DDNS, whenever a binding of name and address is found, the information is passed
to a primary DNS server by dynamic host control protocol (DHCP). After receiving the information,
the primary server updates its zone and the secondary servers are informed about the change using
one of the two modes: active and passive. In the active mode, the primary name server itself informs
about the change to the secondary servers by sending the message while in the passive mode, the
secondary name server checks for any change at regular intervals of time. However, in both modes,
the secondary server requests information about the entire zone after being notified about the change.
Further, DDNS also secures DNS database from unauthorized changes by using an authentication
mechanism.
6. What is e-mail? State its advantages and disadvantages.
Ans: E-mail (or electronic mail) is the process of exchanging messages electronically via a commu­
nications network using the computer. E-mail allows users to communicate with each other in less time
and at nominal cost as compared to traditional phone or mail services. Apart from the textual ­message,
e-mails can also consist of other data formats such as pictures, sound and video. E-mails can be sent
anywhere in the world using the computer and a modem. Its delivery is almost instant and is very eco-
nomical to use. One may send many messages at a time or just one to a designated location.
In order to use e-mail, one must have access to the Internet and an e-mail account. An e-mail account is
a service that allows the user to send and receive e-mails through the Internet. The e-mail account pro-
vides a unique e-mail address and a mailbox where the user can save all his/her mails. The e-mail address
is made up of two parts, namely, the logon identity and the identity of the e-mail server. Both these parts
are separated by the symbol @ (­pronounced as at
the rate). A typical e-mail address is username@ Name:
[Link]. The first part of the address indicates Street:
Pin:
name of the user. The symbol @ in the address is Envelope
Priority:
used to separate the user name from the rest of the Encryption:
address. Next comes the host name ([Link]),
also called the domain name. From:
E-mail consists of two fields: envelope and mes- To:
sage (Figure 13.4). The envelope field defines the Address:
Header Location:
address of the sender and the receiver. The mes-
Date:
sage field is again subdivided into parts, namely, Subject:
header and the body. The header of the message Message
specifies the sender and the receiver while the Dear X,
body contains the information that needs to be
transmitted. Body
Though e-mail is quite popular and efficient Yours friend
XYZ.
but it has some disadvantages along with its ad-
vantages. The advantages and disadvantages are
discussed in Table 13.1. Figure 13.4 Format of an E-mail

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 Application Layer Protocols 255

Table 13.1 Advantages and Disadvantages of E-mail

Advantages Disadvantages
• The delivery of messages is very fast, sometimes • Although e-mail is delivered instantly, the recipient may
almost instantaneous, even though the message is or may not read his/her mail on time. That defeats the
meant for overseas or just to a friend next door. quickness of electronic mailing.
• The cost of e-mailing is almost free as it involves • The user must stay online to read and write more than
negligible amount of telephone and ISP charges. one mail. In addition, most webmail either display
advertisements during use or append them to mails
sent. It results in increased size of the original mail,
which brings a significant decrease in speed of use.
• M
 ultiple copies of the same message can be sent • Since e-mail passes through a network, therefore, it
to a group of people at the same time and can be may be intercepted in between. Moreover, viruses can
sent as easily to a single person. enter the system while downloading the e-mails.
• Pictures, documents and other files can also be • The slightest error in the address or a failure in one
attached to messages. of the links between sender and receiver is enough to
prevent a delivery.

7. Describe the architecture of e-mail.

Ans: The architecture of e-mail includes three components, namely, the user agent (UA), message
transfer agent (MTA) and message access agent (MAA). The UA is a program that helps the user in
reading, writing, replying and forwarding message. It also handles the user’s mailboxes. The MTA is a
client/server program where the MTA client can push messages to the MTA server. The MAA is a client/
server program where the MAA client pulls (retrieves) messages from the MAA server.
To understand how e-mail system works, consider two users A and B on two different systems.
Further, assume that both A and B are connected to their respective mail servers by local area network
(LAN) or wide area network (WAN). When A wishes to send a message to B, it executes the UA pro-
gram to prepare the message. Now, as the message is to be sent to A’s mail server through LAN/WAN, a
pair of MTAs (MTA client and MTA server) is used. The UA after preparing the message sends it to an
MTA client, which then sets up a connection with MTA server on the mail server. At A’s mail server, the
message waiting to be sent is kept in a queue maintained by the mail server. Then, the mail server calls
its MTA client to send the message to MTA server at B’s mail server connected via Internet. At B’s mail
server, the received message for B is kept in his/her mailbox. To retrieve the message from mailbox at
mail server, B calls the MAA client, which then establishes a connection with MAA server at the mail
server. This way B can receive the message sent by A. Figure 13.5 depicts the whole mechanism.
8. What are the services offered by user agent? Also, discuss its types.
Ans: The UA offers various services to the user to make the process of sending and receiving mes-
sages easier. These services are discussed as follows:
‰‰ Composing Messages: This service helps the user in composing the messages that are to be sent.
A template is provided by UA, which can be filled by the user to create the messages. Some UAs
provide users with built-in editor to perform functions like spelling and grammar checking, empha-
sizing text by making it bold, italic, etc.

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 256 Data Communications and Computer Networks

MTA MAA
UA A B UA
client client

LAN/WAN LAN/WAN

MTA MAA
server server

Queue B's mail

box

Message Message
MTA MTA
Internet
client server

A's mail B's mail

server server
Figure 13.5 Mechanism of E-mail Transfer

‰‰Reading Messages: This service helps the user to read the messages, which are in its inbox. Most
user agents show a one-line description of each received mail.
‰‰ Replying to Messages: This service is used to reply to the messages that have been received by
the user. While replying, a user can send a new reply or may include the original message sent by
the sender along with the new one. Moreover, the user can reply either to the original sender or to
all the recipients of message.
‰‰ Forwarding of Messages: This service helps the user to forward the message to the third party
instead of sending it to the original sender. The user can also add some more content in the message
to be forwarded.
‰‰ Handling Mailboxes: The user agent is responsible for maintaining all the mailboxes in e-mail
system. Basically, it creates two types of mailboxes, namely, inbox and outbox. The inbox contains
all the messages received by a user and the outbox contains all the messages sent by the user. The
messages are kept in both mailboxes until the user deletes them.
There are two types of UAs namely, command-driven and graphical-user-interface (GUI )-based
UAs. These types are described as follows:
‰‰ Command-driven UA: This UA was used in the early days in e-mail. In this type, the user can
type one character at a time at the command prompt while replying to the sender. A few command-
driven UAs include pine, elm and mail.
‰‰ GUI-based UA: This UA being used nowadays allows the user to use both mouse and keyboard
to interact with the software. As the name of this UA suggests, it provides GUI components such
as menus and icons that help the users to access the services more easily. Thus, GUI-based UAs
are more user friendly.

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 Application Layer Protocols 257

9. Write a short note on MIME.

Ans: Multipurpose Internet mail extensions (MIME) is a protocol that enables the transfer of
non-ASCII data through e-mails and thus, overcome the limitation of simple e-mail format. It converts
non-ASCII messages to a 7-bit NVT ASCII format at the sender’s side. The converted message is then
forwarded to the MTA client so that it can be sent over the Internet to the receiver. At receiver’s side, the
message is converted to its original format. Further, MIME can also be used to send messages in differ-
ent languages such as French, German, Chinese, etc. The structure of MIME defines five new headers
that were included in the original e-mail header section. These headers are described as follows:
‰‰ MIME Version: This header specifies the MIME version and tells the receiver that the sender is
using MIME message format. The version number 1.1 is being used nowadays.
‰‰ Content Type: This header defines the type and subtype of the data used in the message body. The
type of the data is followed by its subtype, separated by a slash, that is, type/subtype. Some of the
types and their subtypes used by MIME are listed in Table 13.2.
Table 13.2 Data Types and Subtypes in MIME

Type Subtype Description

Text Plain Unformatted
HTML HTML format
Image JPEG Image is in JPEG format
GIF Image is in GIF format
Video MPEG Video is in MPEG format
Audio Basic Single-channel encoding of voice at 8 kHz

‰‰ Content Transfer Encoding: This header defines the different methods used for encoding the
messages into various formats, so that it can be transmitted over the network. Some schemes used
for encoding the message body are listed in Table 13.3.

Table 13.3 Content Transfer Encoding

Type Description
7 bit NVT ASCII characters and short lines
8 bit Non-ASCII characters and short lines
Binary Non-ASCII characters with unlimited length

‰‰ Content Id: This header uniquely identifies the message content

‰‰ Content Description: This header tells what the body of message contains, that is, whether it
contains picture, audio or video. It is an ASCII string that helps the receiver decide whether the
­message needs to be decoded.
10. Explain SMTP.
Ans: Simple mail transfer protocol (SMTP) is a TCP/IP application protocol that supports e-mail
service. It handles the transfer of messages between the sender and receiver. It is based on the client-
server model and defines the MTA client and server in the Internet. During the exchange of message

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 258 Data Communications and Computer Networks

between the sender and the receiver, SMTP is used twice. Once, it is used to transfer the mail from
sender’s end to sender’s mail server, and then to transfer the mail from sender’s mail server to receiver’s
mail server. To retrieve the mail from receiver’s mail server at the receiver’s end, a different mail pro-
tocol such as POP3 and IMAP (discussed in the next question) is used. While transferring mails, SMTP
uses commands and responses between MTA client and MTA server.
‰‰ Commands: They are sent from the client machine to the server machine. The syntax of a com-
mand consists of a keyword followed by zero or more arguments. There are total 14 commands
defined by SMT some of which are listed in Table 13.4.
Table 13.4 SMTP Commands

Keyword Arguments Description

HELO<domain> Sender’s host name It is used for sending sender’s identification.
MAIL FROM: <...> Sender of the message It specifies the sender’s name.
RCPT TO: <...> Intended recipient of the message It specifies the receiver’s name.
DATA Body of the mail It indicates the beginning of mail transmission.
RSET No arguments It ends the current mail transaction.
SEND FROM: <...> Intended recipient of the message It specifies that this mail should be sent directly
to the user’s terminal.
SOML FROM: <...> Intended recipient of the message It is used to specify that the mail should be
sent to user’s terminal if possible; otherwise to
mailbox.
VRFY Name of the recipient to be verified It is used to confirm the user name.

‰‰ Responses: They are just the opposite of commands, that is, they are sent from a server machine
to a client machine. A response consists of a three-digit code, which may be followed by additional
textual information. Some of the SMTP responses are shown in Table 13.5.

Table 13.5 SMTP Responses

Code Information
221 Service closing transmission channel
354 Start mail input
500 Syntax error, unrecognized command
503 Bad sequence or commands

11. Explain in brief the following:

(a) POP3
(b) IMAP4
Ans:
(a) POP3: It stands for post office protocol and the number 3 is its version number. It is a simple
MAA protocol that has the limited functionality. To use POP3, the client POP3 software and server

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 Application Layer Protocols 259

POP3 software must be installed on the recipient’s machine and on its mail server, respectively. Further,
POP3 works in two modes: delete mode and keep mode. In the delete mode, as a message has been
pulled from the mail server, it is deleted from the mailbox on the mail server. On the other hand, in the
keep mode the message remains in the mailbox even after it has been pulled from the mail server. This
mail can be read later from any other computer or location.
Whenever a recipient (client) needs to retrieve mails from the mail server, it establishes a TCP con-
nection to the server on the port 110. Then, it passes its username as well as the password to the mail
server to get access to the mailbox on the mail server. After the server has verified the client, the client
can list and download the messages one at a time.
POP3 has some disadvantages, which are as follows:
‰‰ POP3 does not support mail organization on the server, that is, a user cannot have different folders
on the mail server.
‰‰ POP3 does not allow the contents of the mail to be checked in parts while the mail is being down-
loaded. The mail can be checked after it has been completely downloaded.
(b) IMAP4: It stands for Internet mail access protocol and the number 4 denotes its version number.
Like POP3, it is also an MAA protocol but it provides more functionality and is more complex than
POP3. Some of the additional features provided by IMAP4 are as follows:
‰‰ A user can create folders on the mail server and can delete or rename the mailboxes.
‰‰ IMAP enables the user to partially download the mails. This is especially useful in cases where a
message contains large audio and video files, which may take a lot of time to download because
of slow Internet connection. In such cases, the user can download only the text part of message if
required using IMAP4.
‰‰ A user can search through the contents of the messages while the messages are still on the mail
server.
‰‰ IMAP allows the user to check the contents of the e-mail before it has been downloaded.
‰‰ A user can selectively retrieve the attributes of messages such as body, header, etc.

12. What is FTP? How the files a e transferred using FTP?

Ans: File transfer protocol (FTP) is a mechanism provided by TCP/IP to transfer the files between
hosts connected via Internet. Further, FTP allows access to the files stored in the directory of a remote
computer that is connected to the Internet. In order to access a remote system by FTP, you need to know
either the uniform resource locator (URL) or the IP address of the FTP site such as ftp: ftp.­[Link].
Unlike other client-server applications, FTP establishes two TCP connections between the hosts,
namely, control connection and data connection. The control connection is established over well-
known TCP port 21 and it remains active throughout the session. This connection is used for transfer-
ring control information such as commands and responses. Only one line of command or response can
be transferred at one time through the control connection. On the other hand, the data connection is
­established over the well-known TCP port 20 and it is established only after the control connection has
established. In addition, it needs to be established and released for each file to be transferred while the
control ­connection is open.
Figure 13.6 shows the FTP file transfer procedure. At the client side, there are three components,
namely, user interface, control process and the data transfer process while the server side uses only
two components, namely, control process and the data transfer process. The control processes of client

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 260 Data Communications and Computer Networks

User

User
interface

Control
connection
Control Control
process process

TCP/IP

Data Data
Disk transfer transfer Disk
process Data connection process

Client Server
Figure 13.6 Mechanism of File Transfer in FTP

and server are connected via control connection, whereas the data transfer process of client and server
are connected via data connection. The control processes of client and server communicate using NVT
format. They are responsible for converting from their local syntax such as DOS or UNIX to NVT
­format and vice versa. The data transfer processes of client and server communicate under the control
of commands transferred through the control connection.
13. Explain the following with respect to FTP:
‰‰ File Type
‰‰ Data Structure
‰‰ Transmission Mode
Ans: To transfer a file through the data connection in FTP, the user (client) has to specify certain
attributes to the server including type of file to be transferred, the data structure and the transmission
mode so that the control connection could be prepared accordingly. These attributes are described as
follows:
‰‰ File Type: FTP supports three types of files for transmission over the data connection, namely, an
ASCII fil , EBCDIC fil or image file. The ASCII fil is the default format used for text files. It
uses the 7-bit ASCII format to encode each character of text file. The sender converts the file from
its original form to ASCII characters, while the receiver converts the ASCII characters back to the
original form. If EBCDIC encoding (file format used by IBM) is supported at the sender or receiver
side, then files can be transmitted using the EBCDIC encoding. The image fil is the default format
used in the transmission of binary files. Binary files are sent as continuous stream of bits without
using any encoding method. Usually, the compiled programs are transferred using the image file
‰‰ Data Structure: FTP uses three data structures to transfer a file, namely, file structure, record struc-
ture and page structure. When file structure format is used, the file is sent as a continuous stream of
bytes. The record structure can be used only with text files and the file is divided into many records.

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 Application Layer Protocols 261

In page structure, each file is divided into a number of pages where each page contains a page
­number and a page header. These pages can be accessed sequentially as well as randomly.
‰‰ Transmission Mode: FTP uses three types of transmission modes, namely, stream mode, block
mode and compressed mode. The default mode of transmission is the stream mode, which sends
the data as a continuous pattern of bytes. In case the data contains only a stream of bytes, then no
end-of-file (closing of data connection) is required; the end of file is simply indicated by closing
of connection by the sender. In the block mode, data is sent in blocks, where each block is pre-
ceded by a 3-byte header. The first byte is just a description about the block and the next two bytes
­define the size of the block in bytes. The compressed mode is used in case of large files to reduce
their size so that they can be transmitted conveniently. The size of file is reduced by replacing
multiple consecutive occurrences of characters with a single character or reducing the number of
­repetitions. For example, in text files blank spaces can be compressed

14. What is anonymous FTP access?

Ans: Generally, in FTP a user needs an account (username) and password to login to a particular site
for accessing the file. However, some sites provide public access to a set of files; the user can access
these files without having any account or password. The users can type “anonymous” in the username
part and “guest” in the password part. Using FTP in this way is known as anonymous FTP access. With
an anonymous FTP, users have restricted access rights and usually, can only list, view or copy files to
and from a public directory on the remote system.
15. Define WWW. Explain its architecture.
Ans: The World Wide Web (abbreviated as the Web or WWW) is a collection of linked documents
or pages, stored on millions of computers and distributed across the world. The concept of the Web
began at CERN (the European Center for Nuclear Research) Geneva, Switzerland in the year 1989.
Since then, WWW is the most popularly used Internet subnetwork. One of the main reasons that led to
its popularity is that it provides information in multimedia form, that is, in more than one medium such
as, text, graphics, video and audio. Further, it provides a simple and consistent way of accessing the in-
formation available on the Internet by using hypertext system. In the hypertext system, the documents
are connected to other related documents on the Internet through links. The Web uses a specific Internet
protocol called hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) to support hypertext documents.
Further, WWW is based on a distributed client/server architecture in which the services provided by
the server are distributed over various locations termed as sites and the client can access these services.
Each site contains one or more documents, which are known as web pages. A web page contains hy-
perlinks that enable the user to jump on other web pages on the same site or on the different sites. The
client can access the web pages through the browser—the software that enables a user to read/view web
pages. Whenever a user needs to access some web page stored on some site, it sends a request includ-
ing the address of the site and the web page (known as the URL) through its browser to the server. On
receiving the request, the server searches the required document and returns it to the client.
The WWW includes many components, which are discussed as follows:

Client (Browser)
Browser is a program which accesses and displays the web pages. It consists of three components, namely,
controller, interpreter and client protocol. The user provides inputs (request for a web ­document)
to the controller through a keyboard or a mouse. After receiving the input, the controller uses client

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 262 Data Communications and Computer Networks

p­ rotocols such as FTP or HTTP to access the web document. Once the controller has accessed the
­desired web document, it selects an appropriate interpreter such as hypertext markup language (HTML)
or JavaScript depending on the type of the web document accessed. The interpreters help the ­controller
to display the web document. A few of the web browsers used today include Microsoft Internet ­Explorer,
Opera and Google chrome.
To understand how a browser works, consider a user who wants to access the link [Link]
[Link]/home/[Link]. When the user provides this link (URL) to the browser, the browser goes
through the following steps:
1. The browser determines the given URL and sends a query to the DNS server asking for the IP
address of [Link].
2. The DNS sends a reply to the browser, providing the desired IP address.
3. A TCP connection to port 80 on the received IP address is made by the browser.
4. The browser then sends a request for the file home/[Link].
5. The file home/[Link] is sent by the [Link] server.
6. The TCP connection is ended.
7. The browser displays the text in the file /home/[Link]. It also fetches and displays the images
in the file

Server
Server is the place where web pages are stored. On a request from the client, the server searches the
desired document from the disk and returns the document to the browser through a TCP connection. The
steps performed by a server are as follows:
1. The server accepts the TCP connection request arriving from the client.
2. It then acquires the name of the file requested by the client
3. The server retrieves the file from the disk
4. The file is sent back to the client
5. The TCP connection is released.
The efficiency of a server can be improved by caching the recently accessed pages so that those pages
could be directly accessed from memory and need not be accessed from the disk. Moreover, server can
support multithreading, that is, serving multiple clients at the same time to increase the efficienc .

Uniform Resource Locator

Each web page has a unique address, called the URL that identifies its location on the Internet. This ad-
dress can be used to locate that page all over the world by millions of people. Usually, the format of an
URL consists of four parts: protocol, name of the web server (or domain name), path and filenam . Here
is an example: [Link] The structure of this URL is:
‰‰ Protocol: http
‰‰ Web server name/domain name: [Link]
‰‰ Path: tutor/start/
‰‰ File name: [Link]
The first part of the address, the part before the colon, is the protocol. Most of the time http is used for
accessing a web page. After the protocol, comes the domain name. Colons and slashes respectively separate

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 Application Layer Protocols 263

the protocol and the domain name. Then comes the last part of a URL, namely, the path and the file name.
The path name specifies the hierarchical location of the said file on the computer. For instance, in http://
[Link]/tutor/start/[Link], the file [Link] is located in start, which is a subdirectory of tutor.

Cookies
Cookies are the small files or strings, which are used to store information about the users. This stored
information may be later used by the server while responding to the requests of the client(s). For some
particular sites, only registered users are permitted to access the information. In such a case, the server
stores the user’s registration information in the form of cookies on the client’s machine. The size of a
cookie file cannot exceed 4 KB. A user can disable the cookies in the browser or can even delete them.
16. What is HTTP? Describe the format of HTTP request and response message.
Ans: Hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) is the most common protocol that is used to access infor-
mation from the Web. It manages the transfer of data between the client and the server. The older version
of HTTP was 1.0, in which TCP connection was released after serving a single request. This was not ad-
equate as every time a new connection had to be established. This led to the development of HTTP ­version
1.1 that supports persistent connection, that is, it is meant for multiple request–response operations.
Further, HTTP is a stateless protocol and all the transactions between the server and client are carried
out in the form of messages. The client sends a request message to the server and the server replies with
a response message. The HTTP request and response messages have a similar format (Figure 13.7) ex-
cept that in request message, the first line is the request line while in response message, and the first line
is the status line. The remaining part of both the messages consists of a header and sometimes, a body.

Request line Status line

Headers Headers

Blank line Blank line

Body Body

Request message Response message

Figure 13.7 Format of HTTP Request and Response Message

The HTTP request messages are of different types, which are categorized into various methods as
shown in Table 13.6.
For each HTTP request message, the server sends an HTTP response that consists of status line and
some additional information. The status line comprises a three digit status code, similar to the response
message of FTP and SMTP. The status code indicates whether the client request is satisfied or if there is
some error. The first digit of the status code can be 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5 and it indicates one of the five groups

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 264 Data Communications and Computer Networks

Table 13.6 The Built-in HTTP Request Methods

Method Description
GET Request to access a web page from the server.
HEAD Request to get the header of a web page
PUT Request to store a web page
POST Append to a named resource
DELETE Remove the web page
TRACE Echo the incoming request
CONNECT Reserved for future use
OPTIONS Enquire about certain options

into which response messages have been divided. Codes falling in the 100 range are only informational
and thus, rarely used. The codes falling in the 200 range indicate a successful request, codes in the 300
range redirect the client to some other site, the codes in the 400 range indicate an error in the client side
and the codes in the 500 range indicate an error at the server site.
Further, HTTP also contains various headers, which are
used to transfer additional information other than the normal
Header name Header value
message between the client and the server. For example, the
request header can ask for a message to be delivered in some
particular format while a response header can contain a de-
scription of the message. The additional information can be Space
included in one or more header lines within the header. Each Figure 13.8 HTTP Header Format
header line has a format as shown in Figure 13.8.
Each header line may belong to one of the four types of HTTP
headers, which are discussed as f­ ollows:
‰‰ General Header: This header can be included in both request and response message. It contains
general information about the sent or received messages. An example of a general header is Date
that is used to display the current date.
‰‰ Request Header: This header can be used only in the request messages from the client. The details
about the client setup and the preference of the client for any particular format are included in this
header. An example of a request header is the From header, which shows the e-mail address of
the user.
‰‰ Response Header: This header is part of the response messages only. It contains the server’s setup infor­
mation. An example of a response header is the Age header, which shows the age of the d­ ocument.
‰‰ Entity Header: This header includes information about the body of a document. It is mostly pres-
ent in the request or response messages. An example of entity header is the Allow header, which
lists the valid methods that can be used with a URL.

17. Compare HTTP with FTP and SMTP.

Ans: Functionally, HTTP works as a combination of FTP and SMTP. It is similar to FTP as it is also
used to transfer files over the TCP connection. However, it differs from FTP in the respect that it can
transfer only data and thus, no separate control connection is needed. It uses only one TCP connection
over port number 80.

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