TCP/IP Tutorial

TCP/IP is the communication protocol for the Internet.

In this tutorial you will learn what TCP/IP is, and how it works.

TCP/IP is the Internet Communication Protocol

A communication protocol is a description of the rules computers must follow to communicate with
each other. The Internet communication protocol defines the rules for computer communication over
the Internet.

Your Browser and Your Server Use TCP/IP

Internet browsers and Internet servers use TCP/IP to connect to the Internet. Your browser uses
TCP/IP to access Internet servers, and servers use TCP/IP to send HTML back to your browser.

Your E-Mail Uses TCP/IP

Your e-mail program uses TCP/IP to connect to the Internet for sending and receiving e-mails.

Your Internet Address is TCP/IP

Your Internet address "59.95.49.159" is a part of the standard TCP/IP protocol. (And so is your
domain name "www.someonesplace.com")
TCP/IP is the communication protocol for the Internet.

Computer Communication Protocol

A computer communication protocol is a description of the rules computers must follow to

communicate with each other.

What is TCP/IP?

TCP/IP is the communication protocol for communication between computers connected to the
Internet.

TCP/IP stands for Transmission Control Protocol / Internet Protocol.

The standard defines how electronic devices (like computers) should be connected to the Internet,
and how data should be transmitted between them.

Inside TCP/IP

Hiding inside the TCP/IP standard there are a number of protocols for handling data communication:

• TCP (Transmission Control Protocol) communication between applications

• UDP (User Datagram Protocol) simple communication between applications
• IP (Internet Protocol) communication between computers
• ICMP (Internet Control Message Protocol) for errors and statistics
• DHCP (Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol) for dynamic addressing

You will learn more about these standards later in this tutorial.

TCP Uses a Fixed Connection

TCP is for communication between applications.

When an application wants to communicate with another application via TCP, it sends a
communication request. This request must be sent to an exact address. After a "handshake"
between the two applications, TCP will setup a "full-duplex" communication between the two
applications.

The "full-duplex" communication will occupy the communication line between the two computers
until it is closed by one of the two applications.

UDP is very similar to TCP, but is simpler and less reliable.

IP is Connection-Less

IP is for communication between computers.

IP is a "connection-less" communication protocol. It does not occupy the communication line
between two communicating computers. This way IP reduces the need for network lines. Each line
can be used for communication between many different computers at the same time.

With IP, messages (or other data) are broken up into small independent "packets" and sent between
computers via the Internet.

IP is responsible for "routing" each packet to its destination.

IP Routers

When an IP packet is sent from a computer, it arrives at an IP router.

The IP router is responsible for "routing" the packet to its destination, directly or via another router.

The path the packet will follow might be different from other packets of the same communication.
The router is responsible for the right addressing depending on traffic volume, errors in the
network, or other parameters.

Connection-Less Analogy

Communicating via IP is like sending a long letter as a large number of small postcards, each finding
its own (often different) way to the receiver.

TCP/IP

TCP/IP is TCP and IP working together.

TCP takes care of the communication between your application software (i.e. your browser) and
your network software.

IP takes care of the communication with other computers.

TCP is responsible for breaking data down into IP packets before they are sent, and for assembling
the packets when they arrive.

IP is responsible for sending the packets to the receiver.

TCP/IP uses 32 bits, or 4 numbers between 0 and 255 to address a computer.

IP Addresses
Each computer must have an IP address before it can connect to the Internet.

Each IP packet must have an address before it can be sent to another computer.

This is an IP address: 192.68.20.50.

This might be the same IP address: www.w3schools.com

You will learn more about IP addresses and IP names in the next chapter of this tutorial.

An IP Address Contains 4 Numbers.

This is your IP address: 59.95.49.159

TCP/IP uses 4 numbers to address a computer. Each computer must have a unique 4 number
address.

The numbers are always between 0 and 255. Addresses are normally written as four numbers
separated by a period like this: 192.168.1.50.

32 Bits = 4 Bytes

TCP/IP uses 32 bits addressing. One computer byte is 8 bits. So TCP/IP uses 4 computer bytes.

A computer byte can contain 256 different values:

00000000, 00000001, 00000010, 00000011, 00000100, 00000101, 00000110, 00000111,

00001000 .......and all the way up to 11111111.

Now you know why a TCP/IP address is 4 numbers between 0 and 255

Domain Names

12 digit numbers are hard to remember. Using a name is easier.

Names used for TCP/IP addresses are called domain names. w3schools.com is a domain name.
When you address a web site like http://www.w3schools.com, the name is translated to a number
by a DNS process (Domain Name Server).All over the world, a large number of DNS servers are
connected to the Internet. DNS servers are responsible for translating domain names into TCP/IP
addresses and update each other with new domain names.When a new domain name is registered
together with a TCP/IP address, DNS servers all over the world are updated with this information.

TCP/IP is a large collection of different communication protocols.

A Family of Protocols

TCP/IP is a large collection of different communication protocols based upon the two original
protocols TCP and IP.
TCP - Transmission Control Protocol

TCP is used for transmission of data from an application to the network.

TCP is responsible for breaking data down into IP packets before they are sent, and for assembling
the packets when they arrive.

IP - Internet Protocol

IP takes care of the communication with other computers.

IP is responsible for the sending and receiving data packets over the Internet.

HTTP - Hyper Text Transfer Protocol

HTTP takes care of the communication between a web server and a web browser.

HTTP is used for sending requests from a web client (a browser) to a web server, returning web
content (web pages) from the server back to the client.

HTTPS - Secure HTTP

HTTPS takes care of secure communication between a web server and a web browser.

HTTPS typically handles credit card transactions and other sensitive data.

SSL - Secure Sockets Layer

The SSL protocol is used for encryption of data for secure data transmission.

SMTP - Simple Mail Transfer Protocol

SMTP is used for transmission of e-mails.

MIME - Multi-purpose Internet Mail Extensions

The MIME protocol lets SMTP transmit multimedia files including voice, audio, and binary data
across TCP/IP networks.

IMAP - Internet Message Access Protocol

IMAP is used for storing and retrieving e-mails.

POP - Post Office Protocol

POP is used for downloading e-mails from an e-mail server to a personal computer.

FTP - File Transfer Protocol

FTP takes care of transmission of files between computers.

NTP - Network Time Protocol

NTP is used to synchronize the time (the clock) between computers.

DHCP - Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol

DHCP is used for allocation of dynamic IP addresses to computers in a network.

SNMP - Simple Network Management Protocol

SNMP is used for administration of computer networks.

LDAP - Lightweight Directory Access Protocol

LDAP is used for collecting information about users and e-mail addresses from the internet.

ICMP - Internet Control Message Protocol

ICMP takes care of error handling in the network.

ARP - Address Resolution Protocol

ARP is used by IP to find the hardware address of a computer network card based on the IP
address.

RARP - Reverse Address Resolution Protocol

RARP is used by IP to find the IP address based on the hardware address of a computer network
card.

BOOTP - Boot Protocol

BOOTP is used for booting (starting) computers from the network.

PPTP - Point to Point Tunneling Protocol

PPTP is used for setting up a connection (tunnel) between private networks.

Email is one of the most important uses of TCP/IP.

You Don't

When you write an email, you don't use TCP/IP.

When you write an email, you use an email program like Lotus Notes, Microsoft Outlook or Netscape
Communicator.

Your Email Program Does

Your email program uses different TCP/IP protocols:

• It sends your emails using SMTP

• It can download your emails from an email server using POP
• It can connect to an email server using IMAP

SMTP - Simple Mail Transfer Protocol

The SMTP protocol is used for the transmission of e-mails. SMTP takes care of sending your email to
another computer.
Normally your email is sent to an email server (SMTP server), and then to another server or
servers, and finally to its destination.

SMTP can only transmit pure text. It cannot transmit binary data like pictures, sounds or movies.

SMTP uses the MIME protocol to send binary data across TCP/IP networks. The MIME protocol
converts binary data to pure text.

POP - Post Office Protocol

The POP protocol is used by email programs (like Microsoft Outlook) to retrieve emails from an
email server.

If your email program uses POP, all your emails are downloaded to your email program (also called
email client), each time it connects to your email server.

IMAP - Internet Message Access Protocol

The IMAP protocol is used by email programs (like Microsoft Outlook) just like the POP protocol.

The main difference between the IMAP protocol and the POP protocol is that the IMAP protocol will
not automatically download all your emails each time your email program connects to your email
server.

The IMAP protocol allows you to see through your email messages at the email server before you
download them. With IMAP you can choose to download your messages or just delete them. This
way IMAP is perfect if you need to connect to your email server from different locations, but only
want to download your messages when you are back in your office.