Subject Name: Computer Networks

Module 2 : Application Layer

Module 3 : Transport Layer

Faculty Name : Dr. Savita R. Bhosale

Index

Lecture 10- HTTP 03

Lecture 11- DNS 39

Lecture 12- Transport Layer Services & Principles 69

Module 2: Application Layer

Lecture No: 9
HTTP
Hyper Text Transfer Protocol (HTTP)

• HTTP is the protocol that supports communication between web browsers and
web servers.

• A “Web Server” is a HTTP server

• Most clients/servers today speak version 1.1, but 1.0 is also in use.
• RFC 1945 (HTTP 1.0)
• RFC 2616 (HTTP 1.1)

Lecture 10: HTTP

Hyper Text Transfer Protocol (HTTP)

 “HTTP is an application-level protocol with the lightness and speed necessary

for distributed, hypermedia information systems.”

 Transport Independence
 The HTTP protocol generally takes place over a TCP connection,
 but the protocol itself is not dependent on a specific transport layer.

Lecture 10: HTTP

Request - Response

• HTTP has a simple structure:

• client sends a request
• server returns a reply.

• HTTP can support multiple request-reply exchanges over a single TCP connection.

• The “well known” TCP port for HTTP servers is port 80.
• Other ports can be used as well...

Lecture 10: HTTP

 HTTP 1.0+ Request

• Lines of text (ASCII). Request-Line

• Lines end with CRLF “\r\n” Headers
.
.
.
• First line is called “Request-Line”
blank line

Content...

CRFL: Carriage Return Line Feed, this sequence is always used to terminate a line.
The HTTP protocol uses the CRLF character sequence to signify where one header ends
and another begins. It also used to signify where header end and the website content
begins

Lecture 10: HTTP

Request Line

Method URI HTTP-Version\r\n

• The request line contains 3 tokens (words).

• space characters “ “ separate the tokens.

• Newline (\n) seems to work by itself but the protocol requires CRLF

The target of an HTTP request is called a ‘resource’. Whose nature isn’t

defined further; it can be a document, a photo or anything else. Each resource
is identified by Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) used throughout HTTP for
identifying resources.

Lecture 10: HTTP

Request Method

The Request Method can be:

GET HEAD DELETE
PUT POST TRACE
OPTIONS
future expansion is supported

GET, HEAD and POST are supported everywhere.

HTTP 1.1 servers often support PUT, DELETE, OPTIONS & TRACE.

Lecture 10: HTTP

Methods

• GET: Retrieve information identified by the URI. Typically used to retrieve an

HTML document

• HEAD: Retrieve meta-information about the URI. Used to find out if a document
has changed

• POST: Send information to a URI and retrieve result. Used to submit a form

Lecture 10: HTTP

Methods

• PUT: Store information in location named by URI.

• DELETE: Remove entity identified by URI.

• TRACE: Used to trace HTTP forwarding through proxies, tunnels, etc.

• OPTIONS: Used to determine the capabilities of the server or characteristics of a

named resource.

Lecture 10: HTTP

URI: Universal Resource Identifier

• URIs defined in RFC 2396.

• Absolute URI:
scheme://hostname[:port]/path
http://www.cse.unr.edu:80/~mgunes/cpe401

• Relative URI:
/path
/blah/foo

No server mentioned

Lecture 10: HTTP

URI Usage

• When dealing with a HTTP 1.1 server, only a path is used (no scheme or
hostname).
HTTP 1.1 servers are required to be capable of handling an absolute URI, but
there are still some out there that won’t…

• When dealing with a proxy HTTP server, an absolute URI is used.

client has to tell the proxy where to get the document!
more on proxy servers in a bit….

Lecture 10: HTTP

HTTP Version Number

“HTTP/1.0” or “HTTP/1.1”

• Starting with HTTP 1.0 the version number is part of every request.
Client tells the server what version it can talk (what options are supported, etc).

• HTTP 0.9 did not include a version number in a request line.

If a server gets a request line with no HTTP version number, it assumes 0.9
HTTP 0.9 was used for many years.

Lecture 10: HTTP

The Header Lines

• Request Headers provide information to the server about the client

what kind of client
what kind of content will be accepted
who is making the request
• Each header line contains
an attribute name followed by a “:” followed by a space and the attribute value.

• There can be 0 headers (HTTP 1.0)

HTTP 1.1 requires a Host: header

Lecture 10: HTTP

Example HTTP Headers

Accept: text/html

Host: www.cse.unr.edu

From: [email protected]

User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0

Referer: http://www.unr.edu/

Lecture 10: HTTP

End of the Headers

• Each header ends with a CRLF ( \r\n )

• The end of the header section is marked with a blank line.

just CRLF

• For GET and HEAD requests, the end of the headers is the end of the request!

Lecture 10: HTTP

POST

• A POST request includes some content (some data) after the headers (after the
blank line).

• There is no format for the data (just raw bytes).

• A POST request must include a Content-Length line in the headers:

Content-length: 267

Lecture 10: HTTP

Example POST Request

POST /~mgunes/cpe401/grades.cgi HTTP/1.1

Accept: */*
Host: www.cse.unr.edu
User-Agent: SecretAgent V2.3
Content-Length: 35
Referer: http://www.unr.edu/

stuid=6660182722&item=test1&grade=99

Lecture 10: HTTP

Example GET Request

GET /~mgunes/cpe401/lab1.htm HTTP/1.1

Accept: */*
Host: www.cse.unr.edu
User-Agent: Internet Explorer
From: [email protected]
Referer: http://www.unr.edu/

Lecture 10: HTTP

HTTP Response

• ASCII Status Line

Status-Line
• Headers Section
Headers
.
• Content can be anything (not just text)
.
.
typically an HTML document or some blank line
kind of image.

Content...

Lecture 10: HTTP

Response Status Line

HTTP-Version Status-Code Message

• Status Code is 3 digit number (for computers)

1xx Informational
2xx Success
3xx Redirection
4xx Client Error
5xx Server Error

• Message is text (for humans)

Lecture 10: HTTP

Example Status Lines

HTTP/1.0 200 OK

HTTP/1.0 301 Moved Permanently

HTTP/1.0 400 Bad Request

HTTP/1.0 500 Internal Server Error

Lecture 10: HTTP

Response Headers

• Provide the client with information about the returned entity (document).
what kind of document
how big the document is
how the document is encoded
when the document was last modified

• Response headers end with blank line

Lecture 10: HTTP

Response Header Examples

Date: Wed, 30 Jan 2002 12:48:17 EST

Server: Apache/1.17

Content-Type: text/html

Content-Length: 1756

Content-Encoding: gzip

Lecture 10: HTTP

Content

• Content can be anything (sequence of raw bytes).

• Content-Length header is required for any response that includes content.

• Content-Type header also required.

Lecture 10: HTTP

Single Request/Reply

• The client sends a complete request.

• The server sends back the entire reply.
• The server closes it’s socket.
• If the client needs another document it must open a new connection.

This was the default for HTTP 1.0

Lecture 10: HTTP

Persistent Connections

• HTTP 1.1 supports persistent connections (this is the default).

• Multiple requests can be handled over a single TCP connection.
• The Connection: header is used to exchange information about persistence
(HTTP/1.1)
• 1.0 Clients used a Keep-alive: header

Lecture 10: HTTP

HTTP Proxy Server

HTTP
Browser Proxy
Server

Lecture 10: HTTP

Network Lab # HTTP Proxy

• You need to write a proxy server.

• Must be able to handle GET, HEAD and POST requests.

• Filtering: Your proxy will be given a list of domain names on the command line,
you should refuse to forward requests to any server whose name is within a
specified domain.

send back status line: 403 Forbidden.

Lecture 10: HTTP

The code you need

• Proxy is both a client and a server

• Parsing the HTTP request is needed.

You need to understand HTTP

• You will need to parse headers.

need to look at Content-length, Connection, etc.

Lecture 10: HTTP

Testing

• Tell your browser to use a proxy

Edit preferences/options.

• Interrupt a long transfer (press stop).

• Fill out a form (probably uses POST).

Test it with a browser.

Test it with telnet
Write an abusive client and a rude server!

Lecture 10: HTTP

What is expected

• We should be able to surf through your proxy!

• Proxy should print some info about each request (print the request line).
• No memory leaks!
• Check every system call for errors!
• No crashes, no matter what kind of nonsense we send your proxy.
• We should not be able to kill your proxy by-
sending a bad request.
using a server that sends bad replies.

Lecture 10: HTTP

HTTP V1.1 Details

• The RFC is 114 pages!

• we don’t expect you to read it all or to support every nitty-gritty detail.
• work on creating a working proxy (one you can use through a browser).
• performance is not a big deal (but it shouldn’t be horribly worse than without
your proxy).
• Don’t worry about persistence, pipelining, chunking, etc, you need to turn off
persistence if you don't want to handle it.

Lecture 10: HTTP

HTTP Headers

• You will need to look at the Content-Length header in a POST.

• You need to know how many bytes to read after the end of the headers.
• You will need to either look at Connection (Proxy-Connection) headers or
(at a minimum) to force Connection: close as a request header.

Lecture 10: HTTP

Thank You
Unit No: 2 Application Layer

Lecture No: 10
DNS
DNS (Domain Name System) OBJECTIVES

 To describe the purpose of DNS.

 To define the concept of domains and domain name space.
 To describe the distribution of name spaces and define zones.
 To discuss the use of DNS in the Internet and describe three categories of
domains: generic, country, and reverse.
 To discuss name-address resolution and show the two resolution methods:
recursive and iterative.
 To show the format of DNS message and how they can be compressed.
 To discuss DDNS and DNSSEC..

Lecture 11: DNS

NEED FOR DNS

• To identify an entity, TCP/IP protocols use the IP address, which uniquely

identifies the connection of a host to the Internet.

• However, people prefer to use names instead of numeric addresses.

• Therefore, we need a system that can map a name to an address or an address to

a name.

Lecture 11: DNS

Purpose of DNS

User

1
Host
name
Host
name
2

5
IP address
6 3 Query
IP address
Response 4
Transport layer

Lecture 11: DNS

Example of using the DNS service

Lecture 11: DNS

NAME SPACE

• To be unambiguous, the names assigned to machines must be carefully selected

from a name space with complete control over the binding between the names
and IP addresses.

• In other words, the names must be unique because the addresses are unique.

• A name space that maps each address to a unique name can be organized in two
ways:
Flat Name Space
Hierarchical Name Space

Lecture 11: DNS

Domain name space

• To have a hierarchical name space, a domain name space was designed.

• In this design the names are defined in an inverted-tree structure with the root at
the top.
• The tree can have only 128 levels: level 0 (root) to level 127.

Lecture 11: DNS

Domain name space

arpa: address and routing parameter area

ad: active directory
Lecture 11: DNS
Domain names and labels

Lecture 11: DNS

Domains

Lecture 11: DNS

Hierarchy of name servers

Lecture 11: DNS

Hierarchy of name servers

Lecture 11: DNS

Zones and domains

Lecture 11: DNS

Servers

A primary server loads all information from

the disk file; the secondary server loads all
information from the primary server.

When the secondary server downloads

information from the primary, it is
called zone transfer.

Lecture 11: DNS

DNS in Internet

DNS is a protocol that can be used in different platforms.

In the Internet, the domain name space (tree) is divided into three different sections:
generic domains,
country domains, and
the inverse domain.

Lecture 11: DNS

DNS in Internet

Lecture 11: DNS

Generic Domain

Lecture 11: DNS

Generic Domain Labels

Lecture 11: DNS

Country Domains

Lecture 11: DNS

Inverse Domains

Lecture 11: DNS

Resolution

Mapping a name to an address or an address to a name is called name-address

resolution.

Resolver
 Mapping Names to Addresses
 Mapping Addresses to Names
 Recursive Resolution
 Iterative Resolution
 Caching

Lecture 11: DNS

Recursive Resolution

3
4
8 7

2 5
9
6

10

Lecture 11: DNS

Iterrative Resolution
5
6

3
4

1
2

7
8

9
10

Lecture 11: DNS

DNS MESSAGES

• DNS has two types of messages: query and response.

• Both types have the same format.

• The query message consists of a header and question records

• The response message consists of a header, question records, answer records,

authoritative records, and additional records.

Lecture 11: DNS

Query and response messages

Lecture 11: DNS

Header Format

Lecture 11: DNS

ENCAPSULATION

• DNS can use either UDP or TCP.

• In both cases the well-known port used by the server is port 53.

• UDP is used when the size of the response message is less than 512 bytes because
most UDP packages have a 512-byte packet size limit.

• If the size of the response message is more than 512 bytes, a TCP connection is
used.

Lecture 11: DNS

REGISTRARS

• How are new domains added to DNS?

• This is done through a registrar, a commercial entity accredited by ICANN

(Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers).

• A registrar first verifies that the requested domain name is unique and then enters
it into the DNS database.

• A fee is charged.

Lecture 11: DNS

DDNS

• When the DNS was designed, no one predicted that there would be so many
address changes.

• In DNS, when there is a change, such as adding a new host, removing a host, or
changing an IP address, the change must be made to the DNS master file.

• The DNS master file must be updated dynamically.

• The Dynamic Domain Name System (DDNS) therefore was devised to respond to
this need.

Lecture 11: DNS

SECURITY OF DNS

• DNS is one of the most important systems in the Internet infrastructure; it

provides crucial services to the Internet users.

• Applications such as Web access or e-mail are heavily dependent on the proper
operation of DNS.

• DNS can be attacked in several Ways.

• To protect DNS, IETF has devised a technology named DNS Security (DNSSEC) that
provides the message origin authentication and message integrity using a security
service called digital signature.

Lecture 11: DNS

Thank You
Module 2: Application Layer

Lecture No: 12
Transport Layer Services
and Principles
TCP/IP Protocols

Lecture 12: Transport Layer Services and Principles

Services Provided to the Upper Layers

Lecture 12: Transport Layer Services and Principles

The Transport Services & Principles

• Residing between the application and network layers, the transport

layer is a central piece of the layered network architecture.

• It has the critical role of providing communication services directly to

the application processes running on different hosts.

• Transport layer protocols are TCP (Transmission Control Protocol)

and UDP (User Datagram Protocol).

Lecture 12: Transport Layer Services and Principles

TCP/IP Functions

• To create a process-to-process communication (using port numbers)

• To create a flow control mechanism at the transport level (using sliding

window)

• To create a error control mechanism at the transport level (using Ack packet,
time-out, retransmission)

• Sequence control mechanism

• A connection oriented, reliable transport protocol

Lecture 12: Transport Layer Services and Principles

TCP Services

• Services offered by TCP to the processes at the application layer

• TCP services include:
– Process-to-Process Communication
– Stream Delivery Service
– Full-Duplex Communication
– Connection-Oriented Service
– Reliable Service

Lecture 12: Transport Layer Services and Principles

Process-to-Process Communication

 For client/server communication we must define the

 Local host
 Local client program
 Remote host
 Remote server program

Lecture 12: Transport Layer Services and Principles

Process-to-Process Communication

Lecture 12: Transport Layer Services and Principles

Well-known port in TCP

Port Protocol Description

7 Echo Echoes a received datagram back to the sender

9 Discard Discards any datagram that is received

11 Users Active users

13 Daytime Returns the date and the time

17 Quote Returns a quote of the day

19 Chargen Returns a string of characters

20 FTP,data File transfer Protocol for data

21 FTP,control File transfer Protocol for control

23 TELNET Terminal Network

25 SMTP Simple Mail Transfer Protocol

53 DNS Domain Name Server

67 BOOTP Bootstrap protocol

79 Finger finger

80 HTTP Hypertext Transfer Protocol

111 RPC Remote Procedure Call

Lecture 12: Transport Layer Services and Principles

Finding port number in Linux

• In UNIX, the well-known ports are stored in a file called /etc/services

• Each line in this file gives the name of the server and the well-known port
number.

• We can use the grep utility to extract the line corresponding to the desired
application.

• The following shows the ports for FTP.

$ grep ftp /etc/services

ftp-data 20/tcp
ftp-control 21/tcp

Lecture 12: Transport Layer Services and Principles

Socket Address

• A socket is the interface between the application process and the transport-layer protocol.
The application at the sending side pushes messages through the socket.

• At the other side of the socket, the transport-layer protocol has the responsibility of getting
the messages to the socket of the receiving process.

• Socket addresses:
~ a combination of IP address and port number
~ to make a connection for each end
~ to need a pair of socket addresses: client and server socket address

Lecture 12: Transport Layer Services and Principles

Socket Address

Lecture 12: Transport Layer Services and Principles

TCP SERVICES

• Stream delivery service

- Sending and receiving buffers
- Segments

• Full-Duplex service
piggybacking

• Connection-Oriented service
A virtual connection (not physical connection)

• Reliable service
Reply acknowledge packet

Lecture 12: Transport Layer Services and Principles

Stream delivery

• Sending TCP
~ receives data as a stream of bytes from application process using sending
buffer
~ make data to appropriate segments and transfer to network
• Receiving TCP
~ receives segments using receiving buffer
~ reassemble segments to data and send data as a stream of bytes to
application process

Lecture 12: Transport Layer Services and Principles

Sending and Receiving Buffers

• The sending process and the receiving process may not produce and consume
data at the same speed, TCP needs buffers for storage

Lecture 12: Transport Layer Services and Principles

TCP Segments

• IP layer, as a service provider for TCP, needs to send data in packets, not as a
stream of bytes.
• TCP groups a number of bytes together into a packet called segment

Lecture 12: Transport Layer Services and Principles

The Transport Protocol: TCP and UDP

Type of transport services provided by the Internet-

• The Internet makes two transport protocols available to applications,

UDP and TCP.
• When you create a new network application for the Internet, one of the
first decisions you have to make is whether to use UDP or TCP.
• Each of these protocols offers a different set of services to the invoking
applications.

Lecture 12: Transport Layer Services and Principles

The Transport Protocol: TCP and UDP

TCP service: UDP service:

 reliable transport between  unreliable data transfer between
sending and receiving process sending and receiving process
 flow control: sender won’t  does not provide: reliability, flow
overwhelm receiver control, congestion control, timing,
 congestion control: throttle throughput guarantee, security, or
sender when network overloaded connection setup.
 connection-oriented: setup
required between client and
server processes
• does not provide: timing,
minimum throughput guarantee,
security

Lecture 12: Transport Layer Services and Principles

The Transport Protocol: TCP and UDP

Lecture 12: Transport Layer Services and Principles

The Transport Principles

Reliable data transfer throughput

 some apps (e.g., file transfer,  some apps (e.g., multimedia)
web transactions) require require minimum amount of
100% reliable data transfer throughput to be “effective”
 other apps (e.g., audio) can  other apps (“elastic apps”)
tolerate some loss make use of whatever
throughput they get
security
timing
 some apps (e.g., Internet  encryption, data integrity,
telephony, interactive
games) require low delay to
be “effective”

Lecture 12: Transport Layer Services and Principles

The Transport Principles

Lecture 12: Transport Layer Services and Principles

Thank You