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In computing and telecommunications, the transport layer is the second highest layer in the four and five layer TCP/IP reference models, where it responds to service requests from the application layer and issues service requests to the network layer. It is also the name of layer four of the seven layer OSI model, where it responds to service requests from the session layer and issues service requests to the network layer. The definitions of the transport layer are slightly different in these two models. This article primarily refers to the TCP/IP model. See also the OSI model definition of the transport layer.

A transport protocol is a protocol on the transport layer. The two most widely used transport protocols on the Internet are the connection oriented TCP (Transmission Control Protocol), and connectionless UDP (User Datagram Protocol). TCP is the more complicated and most common. Other options are the Datagram Congestion Control Protocol (DCCP) and Stream Control Transmission Protocol (SCTP).

The transport layer is typically handled by processes in the host computer operational system, and not by routers and switches. The transport layer usually turns the unreliable and very basic service provided by the Network layer into a more powerful one.

In the TCP/IP model, the transport layer is responsible for delivering data to the appropriate application process on the host computers. This involves statistical multiplexing of data from different application processes, i.e. forming data packets, and adding source and destination port numbers in the header of each transport layer data packet. Together with the source and destination IP address, the port numbers constitutes a network socket, i.e. an identification address of the process-to-process communication. In the OSI model, this function is supported by the session layer.

Some transport layer protocols, for example TCP but not UDP, support virtual circuits, i.e. provide connection oriented communication over an underlying packet oriented datagram network. A byte-stream is delivered while hiding the packet mode communication for the application processes. This involves connection establishment, dividing of the data stream into packets called segments, segment numbering and reordering of out-of order data.

Finally, some transport layer protocols, for example TCP but not UDP, provides end-to-end reliable communication, i.e. error recovery by means of error detecting code and automatic repeat request (ARQ) protocol. The ARQ protocol also provides flow control, which may be combined with congestion avoidance.

UDP is a very simple service, and does not provide virtual circuits, nor reliable communication, leaving these to the application. The UDP packets are called datagrams rather than segments.

TCP is used for many protocols, including HTTP web browsing and email transfer. UDP may be used for multicasting and broadcasting, since retransmissions are not possible to a large amount of hosts. UDP typically gives higher throughput and shorter latency, and is therefore often used for realtime multimedia communication where packet loss occasionally can be accepted, for example IP-TV and IP-telephony, and for online computer games.

In many non-IP-based networks, for example X.25, Frame Relay and ATM, the connection oriented communication is implemented at network layer or data link layer rather than the transport layer. In X.25, in telephone network modems and in wireless communication systems, reliable node-to-node communication is implemented at lower protocol layers.

In the OSI/X.25 protocol suite, there are five classes of the OSI transport protocol, ranging from class 0 (which is also known as TP0 and provides the least error recovery) to class 4 (which is also known as TP4 and is designed for less reliable networks, similar to the Internet).

List of transport layer services
There is a long list of services that can be optionally provided by the transport layer. None of them are compulsory, because not all applications want all the services available. Some can be wasted overhead, or even counterproductive in some cases.

Connection-oriented
This is normally easier to deal with than connection-less models, so where the Network layer only provides a connection-less service, often a connection-oriented service is built on top of that in the Transport layer.

Same Order Delivery
The Network layer doesn't generally guarantee that packets of data will arrive in the same order that they were sent, but often this is a desirable feature, so the Transport layer provides it. The simplest way of doing this is to give each packet a number, and allow the receiver to reorder the packets.

Reliable Data
Packets may be lost in routers, switches, bridges and hosts due to network congestion, when the packet queues are filled and the network nodes have to delete packets. Packets may be lost or corrupted in Ethernet due to interference and noise, since Ethernet does not retransmit corrupted packets. Packets may be delivered in the wrong order by an underlying network. Some transport layer protocols, for example TCP, can fix this. By means of an error detection code, for example a checksum, the transport protocol may check that the data is not corrupted, and verify that by sending an ACK message to the sender. Automatic repeat request schemes may be used to retransmit lost or corrupted data. By introducing segment numbering in the transport layer packet headers, the packets can be sorted in order. Of course, error free is impossible, but it is possible to substantially reduce the numbers of undetected errors.

Flow Control
The amount of memory on a computer is limited, and without flow control a larger computer might flood a computer with so much information that it can't hold it all before dealing with it. Nowadays, this is not a big issue, as memory is cheap while bandwidth is comparatively expensive, but in earlier times it was more important. Flow control allows the receiver to say "Whoa!" before it is overwhelmed. Sometimes this is already provided by the network, but where it is not, the Transport layer may add it on.

Congestion avoidance
Network congestion occurs when a queue buffer of a network node is full and starts to drop packets. Automatic repeat request may keep the network in a congested state. This situation can be avoided by adding congestion avoidance to the flow control, including slow-start. This keeps the bandwidth consumption at a low level in the beginning of the transmission, or after packet retransmission.

Byte orientation
Rather than dealing with things on a packet-by-packet basis, the Transport layer may add the ability to view communication just as a stream of bytes. This is nicer to deal with than random packet sizes, however, it rarely matches the communication model which will normally be a sequence of messages of user defined sizes.

Ports
(Part of the transport layer in the TCP/IP model, but of the session layer in the OSI model) Ports are essentially ways to address multiple entities in the same location. For example, the first line of a postal address is a kind of port, and distinguishes between different occupants of the same house. Computer applications will each listen for information on their own ports, which is why you can use more than one network-based application at the same time.

Transport protocol comparison table
 UDP TCP DCCP SCTP
Packet header size 8 Bytes 20 Bytes Varies 12 Bytes + Variable Chunk Header
Transport layer packet entity Datagram Segment Datagram Datagram
Port numbering Yes Yes Yes Yes
Error detection Optional Yes Yes Yes
Reliability: Error recovery by automatic repeat request (ARQ) No Yes No Yes
Virtual circuits: Sequence numbering and reordering No Yes Yes Optional
Flow control No Yes Yes Yes
Congestion avoidance: Variable congestion window, slow start, time outs No Yes Yes Yes
Multiple streams No No No Yes
ECN support No Yes Yes Yes

Reference:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transport_layer

The network layer is the third layer out of seven in the OSI model and the third layer out of five in the TCP/IP model. In the TCP/IP reference model it is called the Internet layer. In all of the models, the network layer responds to service requests from the transport layer and issues service requests to the data link layer.

In essence, the network layer is responsible for end to end (source to destination) packet delivery, whereas the data link layer is responsible for node to node (hop to hop) frame delivery.

The network layer provides the functional and procedural means of transferring variable length data sequences from a source to a destination via one or more networks while maintaining the quality of service, and error control functions.

The network layer deals with transmitting information all the way from its source to its destination - transmitting from anywhere, to anywhere. Here are some things that the network layer needs to address:
- Is the network connection-oriented or connectionless?
For example, snail mail is connectionless, in that a letter can travel from a sender to a recipient without the recipient having to do anything. On the other hand, the telephone system is connection-oriented, because the other party is required to pick up the phone before communication can be established. The OSI Network Layer protocol can be either connection-oriented, or connectionless. The IP Internet Layer (equivalent to OSI's Network Layer) supports only the connectionless Internet Protocol (IP); however, connection-oriented protocols, such as TCP, exist higher in the stack by enforcing reliability constraints through timeouts and resending packets.

- What are the Global Addresses?
Everybody in the network needs to have a unique address which determines who he is. This address will normally be hierarchical, so you can be "Fred Murphy" to Dubliners, or "Fred Murphy, Dublin" to people in Ireland, or "Fred Murphy, Dublin, Ireland" to people anywhere in the world. On the internet, these addresses are known as IP Addresses.

- How do you forward a message?
This is of particular interest to mobile applications, where a user may rapidly move from place to place, and it must be arranged that his messages follow him. Version 4 of the Internet Protocol (IPv4) doesn't really allow for this, though it has been hacked somewhat since its inception. Fortunately, the forthcoming IPv6 has a much better designed solution, which should make this type of application much smoother.

List of Network layer services
- Forwarding
- Routing

Examples
- IPv4/IPv6, Internet Protocol
  - DVMRP, Distance Vector Multicast Routing Protocol
  - ICMP, Internet Control Message Protocol
  - IGMP, Internet Group Multicast Protocol
  - PIM-SM, Protocol Independent Multicast Sparse Mode
  - PIM-DM, Protocol Independent Multicast Dense Mode
- IPSec, Internet Protocol Security
- IPX, Internetwork Packet Exchange
  - RIP, Routing Information Protocol
- DDP, Datagram Delivery Protocol

Reference:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_layer

The data link layer is layer two of the seven-layer OSI model as well as of the five-layer TCP/IP reference model. It responds to service requests from the network layer and issues service requests to the physical layer.

This is the layer which transfers data between adjacent network nodes in a wide area network or between nodes on the same local area network segment. The data link layer provides the functional and procedural means to transfer data between network entities and might provide the means to detect and possibly correct errors that may occur in the Physical layer. Examples of data link protocols are Ethernet for local area networks and PPP, HDLC and ADCCP for point-to-point connections.

The data link is all about getting information from one place to a selection of other places. At this layer one does not need to be able to go everywhere, just able to go somewhere else. It is analogous to social interaction in that one needs to be able to talk to Bob to get a message to Fred or James.

The data link provides data transfer across the physical link. That transfer might or might not be reliable; many data link protocols do not have acknowledgments of successful frame reception and acceptance, and some data link protocols might not even have any form of checksum to check for transmission errors. In those cases, higher-level protocols must provide flow control, error checking, and acknowledgments and retransmission.

In some networks, such as IEEE 802 local area networks, the data link layer is split into MAC and LLC sublayers; this means that the IEEE 802.2 LLC protocol can be used with all of the IEEE 802 MAC layers, such as Ethernet, token ring, IEEE 802.11, etc., as well as with some non-802 MAC layers such as FDDI. Other data link layer protocols, such as HDLC, are specified to include both sublayers, although some other protocols, such as Cisco HDLC, use HDLC's low-level framing as a MAC layer in combination with a different LLC layer.

Logical Link Control Sublayer
The uppermost sublayer is Logical Link Control (LLC). This sublayer multiplexes protocols running atop the data link layer, and optionally provides flow control, acknowledgment, and error recovery. The LLC provides addressing and control of the data link. It specifies which mechanisms are to be used for addressing stations over the transmission medium and for controlling the data exchanged between the originator and recipient machines.

Media Access Control Sublayer
The sublayer below it is Media Access Control (MAC). Sometimes this refers to the sublayer that determines who is allowed to access the media at any one time (usually CSMA/CD). Other times it refers to a frame structure with MAC addresses inside. There are generally two forms of media access control: distributed and centralized. Both of these may be compared to communication between people:
- In a network made up of people speaking, i.e. a conversation, we look for clues from our fellow talkers to see if any of them appear to be about to speak. If two people speak at the same time, they will back off and begin a long and elaborate game of saying "no, you first".

The Media Access Control sublayer also determines where one frame of data ends and the next one starts. In a snail-mail network, each letter is one frame of data, and one can tell where it begins and ends because it is inside an envelope. One might also specify that a letter will begin with a phrase like "Dear Sir", and ends with a phrase like "Yours faithfully".

List of Data link layer services
- Error detection, in addition to one provided on physical layer
- Flow control, in addition to one provided on physical layer

Reference:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_link_layer

According to the IEEE 802 family of standards, Logical Link Control (LLC) is the upper sublayer of the OSI data link layer. The LLC is the same for the various physical media (such as Ethernet, token ring, and WLAN).

The LLC sublayer is primarily concerned with:
- Multiplexing protocols transmitted over the MAC layer (when transmitting) and demultiplexing them (when receiving).
- Providing flow and error control

The protocol used for LLC in IEEE 802 networks and in some non-IEEE 802 networks such as FDDI is specified by the IEEE 802.2 standard.

Some non-IEEE 802 protocols can be thought of as being split into MAC and LLC layers. For example, while HDLC specifies both MAC functions (framing of packets) and LLC functions (protocol multiplexing, flow control, detection, and error control through a retransmission of dropped packets when indicated), some protocols such as Cisco HDLC can use HDLC-like packet framing and their own LLC protocol.

An LLC header tells the Data Link layer what to do with a packet once a frame is received. It works like this: A host will receive a frame and look in the LLC header to find out where the packet is destined for - for example, the IP protocol at the Network layer or IPX.

LLC also does ciphering and deciphering of SN-PDU (SNDCP)packets.

Reference:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logical_Link_Control

The physical layer is the first level in the seven-layer OSI model of computer networking as well as in the five-layer TCP/IP reference model. It performs services requested by the data link layer.

The physical layer is the most basic network layer, providing only the means of transmitting raw bits rather than packets over a physical data link connecting network nodes. No packet headers nor trailers are consequently added to the data by the physical layer. The bit stream may be grouped into code words or symbols, and converted to a physical signal, which is transmitted over a physical transmission medium. The physical layer provides an electrical, mechanical, and procedural interface to the transmission medium. The shapes of the electrical connectors, which frequencies to broadcast on, what modulation scheme to use and similar low-level parameters are specified here. An analogy of this layer in a physical mail network would be the roads along which the vans carrying the mail drive.

Reference:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physical_layer

The Media Access Control (MAC) data communication protocol sub-layer, also known as the Medium Access Control, is a sublayer of the data link layer specified in the seven-layer OSI model (layer 2). It provides addressing and channel access control mechanisms that make it possible for several terminals or network nodes to communicate within a multipoint network, typically a local area network (LAN) or metropolitan area network (MAN).

The MAC sub-layer acts as an interface between the Logical Link Control (LLC) sublayer and the network's physical layer. The MAC layer emulates a full-duplex logical communication channel in a multipoint network. This channel may provide unicast, multicast or broadcast communication service.

Addressing mechanism
The MAC layer addressing mechanism is called physical address or MAC address. This is a unique serial number assigned to each network adapter, making it possible to deliver data packets to a destination within a subnetwork, i.e. a physical network consisting of one or several network segments interconnected by repeaters, hubs, bridges and switches, but not by IP routers. An IP router may interconnect several subnets.

An example of a physical network is an Ethernet network, perhaps extended by Wireless Local Area Networks (WLAN) accesspoints and WLAN network adapters, since these share the same 48 bit MAC address hierarchy as Ethernet.

A MAC layer is not required in full-duplex point-to-point communication, but address fields are included in some point-to-point protocols for compatibility reasons.

Channel access control mechanism
The channel access control mechanisms provided by the MAC layer are also known as a multiple access protocol. This makes it possible for several stations connected to the same physical medium to share it. Examples of shared physical media are bus networks, ring networks, hub networks, wireless networks and half-duplex point-to-point links. The multiple access protocol may detect or avoid data packet collisions if a packet mode contention based channel access method is used, or reserve resources to establish a logical channel if a circuit switched or channelization based channel access method is used. The channel access control mechanism relies on a physical layer multiplex scheme.

The most widespread multiple access protocol is the contention based CSMA/CD protocol used in Ethernet networks. This mechanism is only utilized within a network collision domain, for example an Ethernet bus network or a hub network. An Ethernet network may be divided into several collision domains, interconnected by bridges and switches.

A multiple access protocol is not required in a switched full-duplex network, such as today's switched Ethernet networks, but is often available in the equipment for compatibility reasons.

Common multiple access protocols
Examples of common packet mode multiple access protocols for wired multi-drop networks are:
- CSMA/CD (used in Ethernet and IEEE 802.3)
- Token bus (IEEE 802.4)
- Token ring (IEEE 802.5)
- Token passing (used in FDDI)

Examples of common multiple access protocols that may be used in packet radio wireless networks are:
- CSMA/CA (used in IEEE 802.11/WiFi WLANs)
- Slotted ALOHA
- Dynamic TDMA
- Reservation ALOHA (R-ALOHA)
- CDMA
- OFDMA

For a more extensive list, see List of channel access methods.

Reference:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Media_Access_Control

Packet switching is a communications paradigm in which packets (discrete blocks of data) are routed between nodes over data links shared with other traffic. In each network node, packets are queued or buffered, resulting in variable delay. This contrasts with the other principal paradigm, circuit switching, which sets up a limited number of constant bit rate and constant delay connections between nodes for their exclusive use for the duration of the communication.

Packet mode or packet-oriented communication may be utilized with or without a packet switch, in the latter case directly between two hosts. Examples of that are point-to-point data links, digital video and audio broadcasting or a shared physical medium, such as a bus network, ring network, or hub network.

Packet mode communication is a statistical multiplexing technique, also known as a dynamic bandwidth allocation method, where a physical communication channel is effectively divided into an arbitrary number of logical variable bit-rate channels or data streams. Each logical stream consists of a sequence of packets, which normally are forwarded by a network node asynchronously in a first-come first-serve fashion. Alternatively, the packets may be forwarded according to some scheduling discipline for fair queuing or differentiated and/or guaranteed Quality of service. In case of a shared physical media, the packets may be delivered according to some packet-mode multiple access scheme.

The service actually provided to the user by networks using packet switching internally to the network can be datagrams (connectionless messages), and/or virtual circuit switching (also known as connection oriented). Some connectionless protocols are Ethernet, IP, and UDP; connection oriented protocols include X.25, Frame relay, Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM), Multiprotocol Label Switching (MPLS), and TCP.

It's also entirely possible to have to weigh the various metrics against each other. For example, reducing the hop count could increase the latency to an unacceptable limit and some kind of balance would need to be found. For multi-parameter optimization, some form of optimization may be needed.

Once a route is determined for a packet, it is entirely possible that the route may change for the next packet, thus leading to a case where packets from the same source headed to the same destination could be routed differently.

Packet switching influenced the development of the Actor model of concurrent computation in which messages sent to the same address may be delivered in an order different from the order in which they were sent.

Reference:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Packet_switching

In telecommunication, an error ratio is the ratio of the number of bits, elements, characters, or blocks incorrectly received to the total number of bits, elements, characters, or blocks sent during a specified time interval.

The most commonly encountered ratio is the bit error ratio (BER) - also sometimes referred to as bit error rate.

Examples of bit error ratio are (a) transmission BER, i.e., the number of erroneous bits received divided by the total number of bits transmitted; and (b) information BER, i.e., the number of erroneous decoded (corrected) bits divided by the total number of decoded (corrected) bits.

The test time for a 95% confidence interval at several speed links is shown here:

40 Gbit/s (STM-256 or OC-768): 1 s
10 Gbit/s (STM-64 or OC-192): 3 s
2.5 Gbit/s (STM-16 or OC-48): 12 s
622 Mbit/s (STM-4c or OC-12): 48 s
155 Mbit/s (STM-1 or OC-3): 3.2 min
64 Mbit/s (STM-1 or stnd)  : 6.4 min
Source: from Federal Standard 1037C and from MIL-STD-188

The test time t can be calculated using Gaussian error distribution to:

t = - ln(1-c) / b*r

where c is the degree of confidence level, b = upper bound of BER and r = bit rate.

See the following technical article for measuring BER for High-speed serial communication. http://www.analogzone.com/nett1003.pdf

People usually plot the BER curves to describe the functionality of a digital communication system. In optical communication, BER(dB) vs. Received Power(dBm) is usually used; while in wireless communication, BER(dB) vs. SNR(dB) is used.

Curve fitting for such BER curve is a topic, attracting many research efforts.

Reference:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bit_error_ratio

In telecommunications, a circuit switching network is one that establishes a fixed bandwidth circuit (or channel) between nodes and terminals before the users may communicate, as if the nodes were physically connected with an electrical circuit. The bit delay is constant during the connection, as opposed to packet switching, where packet queues may cause varying delay.

There is a common misunderstanding that circuit switching is used only for connecting voice circuits(Analog or digital).The concept of circuit switching can be extended to other forms of digital data. Dedicated path still remains between two communicating parties and rest of the procedure remains same as voice circuits. But this time around the data is transferred non-stop NOT in the form of packets and without any overhead bits. Although possible, circuit switching is rarely used for transferring digital data (Except voice circuit) and this scheme is not employed in networks where digital data needs to be transferred.

Each circuit cannot be used by other callers until the circuit is released and a new connection is set up. Even if no actual communication is taking place in a dedicated circuit that channel remains unavailable to other users. Channels that are available for new calls to be set up are said to be idle.

Virtual circuit switching is a packet switching technology that may emulate circuit switching, in the sense that the connection is established before any packets are transferred, and that packets are delivered in order.

Reference:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circuit_switching