Application Layer

Computer Networks

CS4054 - 2025I
PROF.: [email protected]
SRC: KUROSE – COMPUTER NETWORKS BOOK
PETERSON AND DAVIE – COMPUTER NETWORKS BOOK
 Executive Summary
2

• Motivation: Network conceptual and implementation aspects can lead

to complex applications.
• Problem: We need details of the layered network abstraction and its
relationship with applications.
• Overview:
- Layered network review.
- Application layer and transport relationship
- Review of two important applications: HTTP and STMP
• Conclusion: We introduced fundamental aspects of well-known
applications such as web HTTP and mail.

CS4054-COMPUTER NETWORKS
 Outline
3

Introduction

Processes and sockets

Application layer and protocols

HTTP

SMTP

Conclusions

CS4054-COMPUTER NETWORKS
 Recall: OSI Architecture
4

OSI 7-layer Model

OSI – Open Systems Interconnection

• As a layer standard for

network architecture.

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 Recall: Layered Internet protocol stack
5

▪ application: supporting network applications

• HTTP, IMAP, SMTP, DNS application
application
▪ transport: process-process data transfer
• TCP, UDP transport
transport
▪ network: routing of datagrams from source to
destination network
• IP, routing protocols
link
▪ link: data transfer between neighboring
network elements physical
• Ethernet, 802.11 (WiFi), PPP
▪ physical: bits “on the wire”
CS4054-COMPUTER NETWORKS
 Some network apps
6

• e-mail possible structure of applications:

• web •client-server: usual architecture
• text messaging •peer-to-peer (P2P): we will cover
• remote login this in detail next week
• P2P file sharing
• multi-user network games
• streaming stored video
(YouTube, Hulu, Netflix)
 Client-server architecture
7

server:
• always-on host
• permanent IP address
• data centers for scaling

clients:
• communicate with server client/server
• may be intermittently connected
• may have dynamic IP addresses
• do not communicate directly with each other
 Outline
8

Introduction

Processes and sockets

Application layer and protocols

HTTP

SMTP

Conclusions

CS4054-COMPUTER NETWORKS
 Processes communicating
9

process: program running within a clients, servers

host client process: process that initiates
communication
• within same host, two processes server process: process that waits to
communicate using inter-process be contacted
communication (defined by OS)
• processes in different hosts communicate
by exchanging messages
 Sockets
10
• process sends/receives messages to/from its socket
• socket analogous to door
•sending process shoves message out door
•sending process relies on transport infrastructure on other side of
door to deliver message to socket at receiving process
 Outline
11

Introduction

Processes and sockets

Application layer and protocols

HTTP

SMTP

Conclusions

CS4054-COMPUTER NETWORKS
 App-layer protocol defines
12

• types of messages exchanged,

• e.g., request, response open protocols:
defined in RFCs
• message syntax:
allows for interoperability
• what fields in messages & how fields are e.g., HTTP, SMTP
delineated proprietary protocols:
• message semantics e.g., Skype
• meaning of information in fields
• rules for when and how processes send &
respond to messages
 Recall: Internet Architecture Protocol Graph
13

We are
here

“Hourglass shape”

Alternative view of the

Internet architecture. The
Internet Protocol Graph “Network” layer shown here is
sometimes referred to as the
“sub-network” or “link” layer.

CS4054-COMPUTER NETWORKS
 Recall: Protocols and Interfaces
14

• Defines the interfaces between the layers (more later) in the same system
and with the layers of peer system
• Building blocks of a network architecture

• Each protocol object has

two different interfaces
1. service interface: operations
on this protocol
2. peer-to-peer interface:
messages exchanged with
peer
CS4054-COMPUTER NETWORKS Service and Peer Interfaces
 Transport layer provides to the App layer
15

1. data integrity
some apps (e.g., file transfer, web transactions) require 100% reliable data transfer
other apps (e.g., audio) can tolerate some loss
2. security
encryption, data integrity, …
3. throughput
some apps (e.g., multimedia) require minimum amount of throughput to be “effective”
other apps (“elastic apps”) make use of whatever throughput they get
 Transport service requirements: common apps
16

application data loss throughput time sensitive

file transfer no loss elastic no

e-mail no loss elastic no
Web documents no loss elastic no
real-time audio/video loss-tolerant audio: 5kbps-1Mbps yes, 100’s msec
video:10kbps-5Mbps
stored audio/video loss-tolerant same as above yes, few secs
interactive games loss-tolerant few kbps up yes, 100’s msec
text messaging no loss elastic yes and no
 Internet apps: application, transport protocols
17

application underlying
application layer protocol transport protocol

e-mail SMTP [RFC 2821] TCP

remote terminal access Telnet [RFC 854] TCP
Web HTTP [RFC 2616] TCP
file transfer FTP [RFC 959] TCP
streaming multimedia HTTP (e.g., YouTube), TCP or UDP
RTP [RFC 1889]
Internet telephony SIP, RTP, proprietary
(e.g., Skype) TCP or UDP
 Outline
18

Introduction

Processes and sockets

Application layer and protocols

HTTP

SMTP

Conclusions

CS4054-COMPUTER NETWORKS
 Web and HTTP
19

First, a review…
• web page consists of objects
• object can be HTML file, JPEG image, Java applet, audio file,…
• web page consists of base HTML-file which includes several referenced
objects
• each object is addressable by a URL, e.g.,
www.someschool.edu/someDept/pic.gif

host name path name

 HTTP overview
20

HTTP: hypertext transfer protocol

• Web’s application layer protocol
• client/server model
PC running
• client: browser that requests, Firefox browser
receives, (using HTTP
protocol) and “displays” Web
objects server
• server: Web server sends (using running
HTTP protocol) objects in Apache Web
server
response to requests
iPhone running
Safari browser
 HTTP overview (continued)
21

uses TCP:
HTTP is “stateless”
▪ client initiates TCP connection server maintains no information about past client
(creates socket) to server, port requests
80
▪ server accepts TCP connection aside
from client
protocols that maintain
▪ HTTP messages (application-layer “state” are complex!
protocol messages) exchanged ▪ past history (state) must be
between browser (HTTP client) maintained
and Web server (HTTP server) ▪ if server/client crashes, their
views of “state” may be
▪ TCP connection closed inconsistent, must be reconciled
 HTTP request message
22

• two types of HTTP messages: request, response

• HTTP request message:
• ASCII (human-readable format) carriage return character
line-feed character
request line
(GET, POST, GET /index.html HTTP/1.1\r\n
HEAD commands) Host: www-net.cs.umass.edu\r\n
User-Agent: Firefox/3.6.10\r\n
Accept: text/html,application/xhtml+xml\r\n
header Accept-Language: en-us,en;q=0.5\r\n
lines Accept-Encoding: gzip,deflate\r\n
carriage return, Accept-Charset: ISO-8859-1,utf-8;q=0.7\r\n
line feed at start Keep-Alive: 115\r\n
Connection: keep-alive\r\n
of line indicates \r\n
end of header lines
 HTTP response message
23

status line
(protocol
status code HTTP/1.1 200 OK\r\n
status phrase) Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2010 20:09:20 GMT\r\n
Server: Apache/2.0.52 (CentOS)\r\n
Last-Modified: Tue, 30 Oct 2007 17:00:02
GMT\r\n
header ETag: "17dc6-a5c-bf716880"\r\n
Accept-Ranges: bytes\r\n
lines Content-Length: 2652\r\n
Keep-Alive: timeout=10, max=100\r\n
Connection: Keep-Alive\r\n
Content-Type: text/html; charset=ISO-8859-
1\r\n
data, e.g., \r\n
requested data data data data data ...
HTML file

* Check out the online interactive exercises for more

examples: http://gaia.cs.umass.edu/kurose_ross/interactive/
 User-server state: cookies Why?
24 HTTP is “stateless”
server maintains no information about past client
many Web sites use cookies requests
four components:
1) cookieheader line of HTTP response message
2) cookie header line in next HTTP request message
3) cookie file kept on user’s host, managed by user’s browser
4) back-end database at Web site

example:
▪ Susan always access Internet from PC
▪ visits specific e-commerce site for first time
▪ when initial HTTP requests arrives at site, site creates

• unique ID
• entry in backend database for ID
 Cookies: keeping “state” (cont.)
25
 Outline
26

Introduction

Processes and sockets

Application layer and protocols

HTTP

SMTP

Conclusions

CS4054-COMPUTER NETWORKS
 Electronic mail
27

Three major components:

• user agents
• mail servers
• simple mail transfer protocol: SMTP

User Agent
• a.k.a. “mail reader”
• composing, editing, reading mail messages
• e.g., Outlook, Thunderbird, iPhone mail client
• outgoing, incoming messages stored on server
 Electronic Mail: SMTP [RFC 2821]
28

• uses TCP to reliably transfer email message from client to server, port 25
• direct transfer: sending server to receiving server
• three phases of transfer
• handshaking (greeting)
• transfer of messages
• closure
• command/response interaction (like HTTP)
• commands: ASCII text
• response: status code and phrase
• messages must be in 7-bit ASCI
 SMTP: final words
29

• SMTP uses persistent connections

• SMTP requires message (header & body) to be in 7-bit ASCII
• SMTP server uses CRLF.CRLF to determine end of message

comparison with HTTP:

• HTTP: pull
• SMTP: push
• both have ASCII command/response interaction, status codes
• HTTP: each object encapsulated in its own response message
• SMTP: multiple objects sent in multipart message
 Mail message format
30

SMTP: protocol for exchanging

email messages
header
RFC 822: standard for text blank
message format: line
•header lines, e.g.,
• To:
body
• From:
• Subject:
different from SMTP MAIL FROM,
RCPT TO: commands!
• Body: the “message”
• ASCII characters only
 Mail access protocols
31

user
mail access user
SMTP SMTP protocol agent
agent
(e.g., POP,
IMAP)

sender’s mail receiver’s mail

server server

• SMTP: delivery/storage to receiver’s server

• mail access protocol: retrieval from server
• POP: Post Office Protocol [RFC 1939]: authorization, download
• IMAP: Internet Mail Access Protocol [RFC 1730]: more features, including manipulation of
stored messages on server
• HTTP: gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo! Mail, etc.
 Outline
32

Course Logistics

Introduction

Internet Structure

Internet as a Service

Internet Architecture

Conclusions

CS4054-COMPUTER NETWORKS
 Summary
33

We review the Internet, from the:

Structure perspective
•

Application perspective
•

•Both perspectives are important, each one relies on the other for
standarization.
•Internet is a network of computer network, that follow protocols and it is
organized (by astraction) as layers.

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