2.1. LAYERED PROTOCOLS
Due to the absence of shared memory, all communication in distributed systems is based on message passing. When process A wants to communicate with process B, it first builds a message in its own address space. Then it executes a system call that causes the operating system to fetch the message and send it over the network to B. Although this basic idea sounds simple enough, in order to prevent chaos, A and В have to agree on the meaning of the bits being sent. If A sends a brilliant new novel written in French and encoded in IBM's EBCDIC character code, and В expects the inventory of a supermarket written in English and encoded in ASCII, communication will be less than optimal.
Many different agreements are needed. How many volts should be used to signal a 0-bit, and how many volts for a 1-bit? How does the receiver know which is the last bit of the message? How can it detect if a message has been damaged or lost, and what should it do if it finds out? How long are numbers, strings, and other data items, and how are they represented? In short, agreements are needed at a variety of levels, varying from the low-level details of bit transmission to the high-level details of how information is to be expressed.
To make it easier to deal with the numerous levels and issues involved in communication, the International Standards Organization (ISO) has developed a reference model that clearly identifies the various levels involved, gives them standard names, and points out which level should do which job. This model is called the Open Systems Interconnection Reference Model (Day and Zimmerman, 1983), usually abbreviated as ISO OSI or sometimes just the OSI model. Although we do not intend to give a full description of this model and all of its implications here, a short introduction will be helpful. For more details, see (Tanenbaum, 1988).
To start with, the OSI model is designed to allow open systems to communicate. An open system is one that is prepared to communicate with any other open system by using standard rules that govern the format, contents, and meaning of the messages sent and received. These rules are formalized in what are called protocols. Basically, a protocol is an agreement between the communicating parties on how communication is to proceed. When a woman is introduced to a man, she may choose to stick out her hand. He, in turn, may decide either to shake it or kiss it, depending, for example, whether she is an American lawyer at a business meeting or a European princess at a formal ball. Violating the protocol will make communication more difficult, if not impossible.
At a more technological level, many companies make memory boards for the IBM PC. When the CPU wants to read a word from memory, it puts the address and certain control signals on the bus. The memory board is expected to see these signals and respond by putting the word requested on the bus within a certain time interval. If the memory board observes the required bus protocol, it will work correctly, otherwise it will not.
Similarly, to allow a group of computers to communicate over a network, they must all agree on the protocols to be used. The OSI model distinguishes between two general types of protocols. With connection-oriented protocols, before exchanging data, the sender and receiver first explicitly establish a connection, and possibly negotiate the protocol they will use. When they are done, they must release (terminate) the connection. The telephone is a connection-oriented communication system. With connectionless protocols, no setup in advance is needed. The sender just transmits the first message when it is ready. Dropping a letter in a mailbox is an example of connectionless communication. With computers, both connection-oriented and connectionless communication are common.
In the OSI model, communication is divided up into seven levels or layers, as shown in Fig. 2-1. Each layer deals with one specific aspect of the communication. In this way, the problem can be divided up into manageable pieces, each of which can be solved independent of the others. Each layer provides an interface to the one above it. The interface consists of a set of operations that together define the service the layer is prepared to offer its users.
In the OSI model, when process A on machine 1 wants to communicate with process B on machine 2, it builds a message and passes the message to the application layer on its machine. This layer might be a library procedure, for example, but it could also be implemented in some other way (e.g., inside the operating system, on an external coprocessor chip, etc.). The application layer software then adds a header to the front of the message and passes the resulting message across the layer 6/7 interface to the presentation layer. The presentation layer in turn adds its own header and passes the result down to the session layer, and so on. Some layers add not only a header to the front, but also a trailer to the end. When it hits bottom, the physical layer actually transmits the message, which by now might look as shown in Fig. 2-2.
When the message arrives at machine 2, it is passed upward, with each layer stripping off and examining its own header. Finally, the message arrives at the receiver, process B, which may reply to it using the reverse path. The information in the layer n header is used for the layer n protocol.
Fig. 2-1. Layers, interfaces, and protocols in the OSI model.
As an example of why layered protocols are important, consider communication between two companies, Zippy Airlines and its caterer, Mushy Meals, Inc. Every month, the head of passenger service at Zippy asks her secretary to contact the sales manager's secretary at Mushy to order 100,000 boxes of rubber chicken. Traditionally, the orders have gone via the post office. However, as the postal service deteriorates, at some point the two secretaries decide to abandon it and communicate by FAX. They can do this without bothering their bosses, since their protocol deals with the physical transmission of the orders, not their contents.
Similarly, the head of passenger service can decide to drop the rubber chicken and go for Mushy's new special, prime rib of goat, without that decision affecting the secretaries. The thing to notice is that we have two layers here, the bosses and the secretaries. Each layer has its own protocol (subjects of discussion and technology) that can be changed independently of the other one. It is precisely this independence that makes layered protocols attractive. Each one can be changed as technology improves, without the other ones being affected.
Fig. 2-2. A typical message as it appears on the network.
In the OSI model, there are not two layers, but seven, as we saw in Fig. 2-1. The collection of protocols used in a particular system is called a protocol suite or protocol stack. In the following sections, we will briefly examine each of the layers in turn, starting at the bottom. Where appropriate, we will also point out some of the protocols used in each layer.
2.1.1.The Physical Layer
The physical layer is concerned with transmitting the 0s and 1s. How many volts to use for 0 and 1, how many bits per second can be sent, and whether transmission can take place in both directions simultaneously are key issues in the physical layer. In addition, the size and shape of the network connector (plug), as well as the number of pins and meaning of each are of concern here.