UNIT – II : TRANSPORT LAYER

INTRODUCTION
 The transport layer is the fourth layer of the OSI model and is the
core of the Internetmodel.
 It responds to service requests from the session layer and issues
service requests tothe network Layer.
 The transport layer provides transparent transfer of data between hosts.
 It provides end-to-end control and information transfer with the
quality of serviceneeded by the application program.
 It is the first true end-to-end layer, implemented in all End Systems (ES).

TRANSPORT LAYER FUNCTIONS / SERVICES

 The transport layer is located between the network layer and the
application layer.
 The transport layer is responsible for providing services to the
application layer; itreceives services from the network layer.
 The services that can be provided by the transport layer are
1. Process-to-Process Communication
2. Addressing : Port Numbers
3. Encapsulation and Decapsulation
4. Multiplexing and Demultiplexing
5. Flow Control
6. Error Control
7. Congestion Control
1
Process-to-Process Communication
 The Transport Layer is responsible for delivering data to the
appropriate application process on the host computers.
 This involves 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.

Addressing: Port Numbers

 Ports are the essential ways to address multiple entities in the same
location.
 Using port addressing it is possible to use more than one network-
based applicationat the same time.
 Three types of Port numbers are used :
 Well-known ports - These are permanent port numbers. They
range between0 to 1023.These port numbers are used by
Server Process.
 Registered ports - The ports ranging from 1024 to 49,151 are
not assigned orcontrolled.
 Ephemeral ports (Dynamic Ports) – These are temporary
port numbers. Theyrange between 49152–65535.These port
numbers are used by Client Process.

Encapsulation and Decapsulation

 To send a message from one process to another, the transport-layer
protocol encapsulates and decapsulates messages.
 Encapsulation happens at the sender site. The transport layer receives
the data and adds the transport-layer header.
 Decapsulation happens at the receiver site. When the message arrives
at the destination transport layer, the header is dropped and the
transport layer delivers the message to the process running at the
application layer.

Multiplexing and Demultiplexing

 Whenever an entity accepts items from more than one source, this is
referred to as
multiplexing (many to one).
 Whenever an entity delivers items to more than one source, this is
referred to as
demultiplexing (one to many).
 The transport layer at the source performs multiplexing
 The transport layer at the destination performs demultiplexing
Flow Control
 Flow Control is the process of managing the rate of data
transmission between twonodes to prevent a fast sender from
overwhelming a slow receiver.
 It provides a mechanism for the receiver to control the transmission
speed, so that thereceiving node is not overwhelmed with data from
transmitting node.

Error Control
 Error control at the transport layer is responsible for
1. Detecting and discarding corrupted packets.
2. Keeping track of lost and discarded packets and resending them.
3. Recognizing duplicate packets and discarding them.
4. Buffering out-of-order packets until the missing packets arrive.
 Error Control involves Error Detection and Error Correction

Congestion Control
 Congestion in a network may occur if the load on the network (the
number of packets sent to the network) is greater than the capacity
of the network (the numberof packets a network can handle).
 Congestion control refers to the mechanisms and
techniques that control thecongestion and keep the load
below the capacity.
 Congestion Control refers to techniques and mechanisms that
can either preventcongestion, before it happens, or remove
congestion, after it has happened
 Congestion control mechanisms are divided into two categories,
1. Open loop - prevent the congestion before it happens.
 2. Closed loop - remove the congestion after it happens.

2. PORT NUMBERS
 A transport-layer protocol usually has several responsibilities.
 One is to create a process-to-process communication.
 Processes are programs that run on hosts. It could be either server or
client.
 A process on the local host, called a client, needs services from
a process usuallyon the remote host, called a server.
 Processes are assigned a unique 16-bit port number on that host.
 Port numbers provide end-to-end addresses at the transport layer
 They also provide multiplexing and demultiplexing at this layer.
 The port numbers are integers between 0 and 65,535 .

ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) has

divided the portnumbers into three ranges:
 Well-known ports
 Registered
 Ephemeral ports (Dynamic Ports)




WELL-KNOWN PORTS
 These are permanent port numbers used by the servers.
 They range between 0 to 1023.
 This port number cannot be chosen randomly.
 These port numbers are universal port numbers for servers.
  Every client process knows the well-known port number of the
corresponding serverprocess.
 For example, while the daytime client process, a well-known
client program, canuse an ephemeral (temporary) port number,
52,000, to identify itself, the daytimeserver process must use the
well-known (permanent) port number 13.

EPHEMERAL PORTS (DYNAMIC PORTS)

 The client program defines itself with a port number, called the
ephemeral portnumber.
 The word ephemeral means “short-lived” and is used because the
life of a client isnormally short.
 An ephemeral port number is recommended to be greater than 1023.
 These port number ranges from 49,152 to 65,535 .
 They are neither controlled nor registered. They can be used as
temporary or privateport numbers.

REGISTERED PORTS
 The ports ranging from 1024 to 49,151 are not assigned or controlled.
 3. TRANSPORT LAYER PROTOCOLS

 Three protocols are associated with the Transport layer.

 They are
(1) UDP –User Datagram Protocol
(2) TCP – Transmission Control Protocol
(3) SCTP - Stream Control Transmission Protocol

 Each protocol provides a different type of service and should be used

appropriately.

UDP - UDP is an unreliable connectionless transport-layer protocol used for

its simplicity and efficiency in applications where error control can be
provided by the application-layer process.

TCP - TCP is a reliable connection-oriented protocol that can be used in any

application where reliability is important.

SCTP - SCTP is a new transport-layer protocol designed to combine some

features of UDP and TCP in an effort to create a better protocol for
multimedia communication.

4. USER DATAGRAM PROTOCOL (UDP)

 User Datagram Protocol (UDP) is a connectionless, unreliable transport

protocol.
 UDP adds process-to-process communication to best-effort service
provided by IP.
 UDP is a very simple protocol using a minimum of overhead.
 UDP is a simple demultiplexer, which allows multiple processes
on each host tocommunicate.
 UDP does not provide flow control , reliable or ordered delivery.
 UDP can be used to send small message where reliability is not expected.
 Sending a small message using UDP takes much less interaction
between the senderand receiver.
  UDP allow processes to indirectly identify each other using an
abstract locator calledport or mailbox

UDP PORTS
 Processes (server/client) are identified by an abstract locator known as
port.
 Server accepts message at well known port.
 Some well-known UDP ports are 7–Echo, 53–DNS, 111–RPC, 161–
SNMP, etc.
 < port, host > pair is used as key for demultiplexing.
 Ports are implemented as a message queue.
 When a message arrives, UDP appends it to end of the queue.
 When queue is full, the message is discarded.
 When a message is read, it is removed from the queue.
 When an application process wants to receive a message, one is
removed from thefront of the queue.
 If the queue is empty, the process blocks until a message becomes
available.

UDP DATAGRAM (PACKET) FORMAT

 UDP packets are known as user datagrams .
 These user datagrams, have a fixed-size header of 8 bytes made of
four fields, eachof 2 bytes (16 bits).
Source Port Number
 Port number used by process on source host with 16 bits long.
 If the source host is client (sending request) then the port number
is an temporaryone requested by the process and chosen by UDP.
 If the source is server (sending response) then it is well known port
number.

Destination Port Number

 Port number used by process on Destination host with 16 bits long.
 If the destination host is the server (a client sending
request) then theport number is a well known port
number.
 If the destination host is client (a server sending response)
then port numberis an temporary one copied by server
from the request packet.

Length
 This field denotes the total length of the UDP Packet (Header plus
data)
 The total length of any UDP datagram can be from 0 to 65,535 bytes.

Checksum
 UDP computes its checksum over the UDP header, the contents
of the messagebody, and something called the pseudoheader.
 The pseudoheader consists of three fields from the IP header—
protocol number,source IP address, destination IP address plus
the UDP length field.

Data
 Data field defines tha actual payload to be transmitted.
 Its size is variable.

UDP SERVICES
Process-to-Process Communication
 UDP provides process-to-process communication using
socket addresses, acombination of IP addresses and port numbers.

Connectionless Services
 UDP provides a connectionless service.
 There is no connection establishment and no connection termination .
 Each user datagram sent by UDP is an independent datagram.
 There is no relationship between the different user datagrams even if they
are
 coming from the same source process and going to the same destination
program.
 The user datagrams are not numbered.
 Each user datagram can travel on a different path.

Flow Control
 UDP is a very simple protocol.
 There is no flow control, and hence no window mechanism.
 The receiver may overflow with incoming messages.
 The lack of flow control means that the process using UDP
should provide for thisservice, if needed.

Error Control
 There is no error control mechanism in UDP except for the checksum.
 This means that the sender does not know if a message has been lost or
duplicated.
When the receiver detects an error through the checksum, the user datagram is
  The lack of error control means that the process using UDP should
provide for thisservice, if needed.

Checksum
 UDP checksum calculation includes three sections: a pseudoheader,
the UDP header,and the data coming from the application layer.
 The pseudoheader is the part of the header in which the user
datagram is to beencapsulated with some fields filled with 0s.
Optional Inclusion of Checksum
 The sender of a UDP packet can choose not to calculate the
checksum.
 In this case, the checksum field is filled with all 0s before being sent.
 In the situation where the sender decides to calculate
the checksum, but it happens that the result is all 0s,
the checksum is changed to all 1sbefore the packet is
sent.
 In other words, the sender complements the sum two times.

Congestion Control
 Since UDP is a connectionless protocol, it does not provide congestion
control.
 UDP assumes that the packets sent are small and
sporadic(occasionally or at irregularintervals) and cannot create
congestion in the network.
 This assumption may or may not be true, when UDP is used for
interactive real-timetransfer of audio and video.

Encapsulation and Decapsulation

 To send a message from one process to another, the UDP protocol
encapsulates anddecapsulates messages.

Queuing
 In UDP, queues are associated with ports.
 At the client site, when a process starts, it requests a port number
from the operatingsystem.
 Some implementations create both an incoming and an outgoing
queue associatedwith each process.
 Other implementations create only an incoming queue associated with
each process.
Multiplexing and Demultiplexing
 In a host running a transport protocol suite, there is only one
UDP but possiblyseveral processes that may want to use the
services of UDP.
 To handle this situation, UDP multiplexes and demultiplexes.

APPLICATIONS OF UDP
 UDP is used for management processes such as SNMP.
 UDP is used for route updating protocols such as RIP.
 UDP is a suitable transport protocol for multicasting.
Multicasting capability isembedded in the UDP software
 UDP is suitable for a process with internal flow and error control
mechanisms suchas Trivial File Transfer Protocol (TFTP).
 UDP is suitable for a process that requires simple request-response
communicationwith little concern for flow and error control.
 UDP is normally used for interactive real-time applications
that cannot tolerateuneven delay between sections of a
received message.

5. TRANSMISSION CONTROL PROTOCOL (TCP)

 TCP is a reliable, connection-oriented, byte-stream protocol.

 TCP guarantees the reliable, in-order delivery of a stream of bytes. It
is a full-duplex protocol, meaning that each TCP connection supports
a pair of byte streams, one flowing in each direction.
 TCP includes a flow-control mechanism for each of these byte
streams that allow thereceiver to limit how much data the sender can
transmit at a given time.
 TCP supports a demultiplexing mechanism that allows multiple
application programson any given host to simultaneously carry on a
conversation with their peers.
 TCP also implements congestion-control mechanism. The idea of
this mechanism isto prevent sender from overloading the network.
 Flow control is an end to end issue, whereas congestion control is
concerned withhow host and network interact.

TCP SERVICES
Process-to-Process Communication
 TCP provides process-to-process communication using port numbers.
Stream Delivery Service
 TCP is a stream-oriented protocol.
  TCP allows the sending process to deliver data as a stream of
bytes and allows thereceiving process to obtain data as a stream of
bytes.
 TCP creates an environment in which the two processes seem to be
connected by animaginary “tube” that carries their bytes across the
Internet.
 The sending process produces (writes to) the stream and the
receiving processconsumes (reads from) it.

Full-Duplex Communication
 TCP offers full-duplex service, where data can flow in both
directions at the sametime.
 Each TCP endpoint then has its own sending and receiving
buffer, and segments move in both directions.

Multiplexing and Demultiplexing

TCP performs multiplexing at the sender and demultiplexing at the receiver.

Connection-Oriented Service
 TCP is a connection-oriented protocol.
 A connection needs to be established for each pair of processes.
 When a process at site A wants to send to and receive
data from anotherprocess at site B, the following three
phases occur:
1. The two TCP’s establish a logical connection between them.
2. Data are exchanged in both directions.
3. The connection is terminated.

Reliable Service
 TCP is a reliable transport protocol.
 It uses an acknowledgment mechanism to check the safe and sound
arrival of data.

TCP SEGMENT
 A packet in TCP is called a segment.
 Data unit exchanged between TCP peers are called segments.
  A TCP segment encapsulates the data received from the application
layer.
 The TCP segment is encapsulated in an IP datagram, which in turn
is encapsulated ina frame at the data-link layer.

 TCP is a byte-oriented protocol, which means that the sender writes

bytes into a TCPconnection and the receiver reads bytes out of the
TCP connection.
 TCP does not, itself, transmit individual bytes over the Internet.
 TCP on the source host buffers enough bytes from the sending
process to fill areasonably sized packet and then sends this packet
to its peer on the destination host.
 TCP on the destination host then empties the contents of the
packet into a receivebuffer, and the receiving process reads from
this buffer at its leisure.
 TCP connection supports byte streams flowing in both directions.
 The packets exchanged between TCP peers are called segments,
since each onecarries a segment of the byte stream.

TCP PACKET FORMAT

 Each TCP segment contains the header plus the data.
 The segment consists of a header of 20 to 60 bytes, followed
by data from theapplication program.
 The header is 20 bytes if there are no options and up to 60
bytes if it containsoptions.
SrcPort and DstPort―port number of source and
destination process. SequenceNum―contains sequence
number, i.e. first byte of data segment.
Acknowledgment― byte number of segment, the receiver
expects next.
HdrLen―Length of TCP header as 4-byte words.
Flags― contains six control bits
known as flags. o URG
— segment contains
urgent data.
o ACK — value of acknowledgment field is valid.
o PUSH — sender has invoked the push operation.
o RESET — receiver wants to abort the connection.
o SYN — synchronize sequence numbers during connection
establishment.
o FIN — terminates the TCP connection.

Advertised Window―defines receiver’s window size and acts as flow control.

Checksum―It is computed over TCP header, Data, and pseudo header
containing IP fields
(Length, SourceAddr &
DestinationAddr).
UrgPtr ― used when the segment contains urgent data. It defines a
value that must beadded to the sequence number.
Options - There can be up to 40 bytes of optional information in the TCP
header.

TCP CONNECTION MANAGEMENT

 TCP is connection-oriented.
 A connection-oriented transport protocol establishes a logical
path between thesource and destination.
 All of the segments belonging to a message are then sent over this logical
path.
 In TCP, connection-oriented transmission requires
three phases: Connection Establishment, Data Transfer
and Connection Termination.

Connection Establishment
 While opening a TCP connection the two nodes(client and server)
want to agree on aset of parameters.
 The parameters are the starting sequence numbers that is to be
used for theirrespective byte streams.
 Connection establishment in TCP is a three-way handshaking.

1. Client sends a SYN segment to the server containing its initial sequence
number (Flags
= SYN, SequenceNum = x)
2. Server responds with a segment that acknowledges client’s segment
and specifies itsinitial sequence number (Flags = SYN + ACK, ACK =
x + 1 SequenceNum = y).
3. Finally, client responds with a segment that acknowledges server’s
sequence number
(Flags = ACK, ACK = y + 1).
  The reason that each side acknowledges a sequence number that
is one larger than the one sent is that the Acknowledgment field
actually identifies the “next sequence number expected,”
 A timer is scheduled for each of the first two segments, and if the
expected response is not received, the segment is retransmitted.

Data Transfer
 After connection is established, bidirectional data transfer can take
place.
 The client and server can send data and acknowledgments in both
directions.
 The data traveling in the same direction as an acknowledgment
are carried on thesame segment.
 The acknowledgment is piggybacked with the data.

Connection Termination
 Connection termination or teardown can be done in two ways :
Three-way Close and Half-Close

Three-way Close—Both client and server close simultaneously.

 Client sends a FIN

segment.
 The FIN segment
can include last
chunk of data.
 Server responds
with FIN + ACK
segment to inform
its closing.
 Finally,
client sends
an ACK
segment

Half-Close—Client stops sending but receives data.

 Client half-closes the connection by sending a FIN segment.
 Server sends an ACK
 segment.
 Data transfer from
client to the server
stops.
 After sending all
data, server sends
FIN segment to
client, which is
acknowledged by
the client.

STATE TRANSITION DIAGRAM

 To keep track of all the different events happening during

connection establishment, connection termination, and data transfer,
TCP is specified as the finite state machine(FSM).
 The transition from one state to another is shown using directed lines.
 States involved in opening and closing a connection is shown
above and below ESTABLISHED state respectively.
 States Involved in TCP :
Opening a TCP Connection

1. Server invokes a passive open on TCP, which causes TCP to move to

LISTEN state
2. Client does an active open, which causes its TCP to send a SYN
segment to the serverand move to SYN_SENT state.
3. When SYN segment arrives at the server, it moves to SYN_RCVD state
and responds
with a SYN + ACK segment.
4. Arrival of SYN + ACK segment causes the client to move to
ESTABLISHED stateand sends an ACK to the server.
5. When ACK arrives, the server finally moves to ESTABLISHED state.

Closing a TCP Connection

 Client / Server can independently close its half of the connection or

simultaneously.
Transitions from ESTABLISHED to CLOSED state are:
 One side closes:
ESTABLISHED → FIN_WAIT_1 → FIN_WAIT_2 → TIME_WAIT →
CLOSED
Other side closes:

ESTABLISHED → CLOSE_WAIT → LAST_ACK → CLOSED

Simultaneous close:

ESTABLISHED → FIN_WAIT_1 → CLOSING → TIME_WAIT →

CLOSED

TCP FLOW CONTROL

 TCP uses a variant of sliding window known as adaptive
flow control that:o guarantees reliable delivery of
data
o ensures ordered delivery of data
oenforces flow control at the sender
 Receiver advertises its window size to the sender using
AdvertisedWindow field.
 Sender thus cannot have unacknowledged data greater than
AdvertisedWindow.

Send Buffer
 Sending TCP maintains send buffer which contains 3 segments
(1) acknowledged data
(2) unacknowledged data
(3) data to be transmitted.
 Send buffer maintains three pointers
(1) LastByteAcked, (2) LastByteSent, and (3)
LastByteWrittensuch that:
LastByteAcked ≤ LastByteSent ≤ LastByteWritten

 A byte can be sent only after being written and only a sent
byte can be
acknowledged.
 Bytes to the left of LastByteAcked are not kept as it had been
 acknowledged.

Receive Buffer
 Receiving TCP maintains receive buffer to hold data even if it arrives
out-of-order.
 Receive buffer maintains three pointers namely
(1) LastByteRead, (2) NextByteExpected, and
(3) LastByteRcvdsuch that:
LastByteRead ≤ NextByteExpected ≤ LastByteRcvd + 1

 A byte cannot be read until that byte and all preceding bytes have been
received.
 If data is received in order, then NextByteExpected = LastByteRcvd +
1
 Bytes to the left of LastByteRead are not buffered, since it is read by the
application.

Flow Control in TCP

 Size of send and receive buffer is MaxSendBuffer and MaxRcvBuffer
respectively.
 Sending TCP prevents overflowing of send buffer by maintaining
LastByteWritten − LastByteAcked ≤ MaxSendBuffer

 Receiving TCP avoids overflowing its receive buffer by maintaining

LastByteRcvd − LastByteRead ≤ MaxRcvBuffer

 Receiver throttles the sender by having AdvertisedWindow based on

free space

available for buffering.

AdvertisedWindow = MaxRcvBuffer − ((NextByteExpected − 1) – LastByteRead)

 Sending TCP adheres to AdvertisedWindow by computing

EffectiveWindow that
limits how much data it should send.
EffectiveWindow = AdvertisedWindow − (LastByteSent − LastByteAcked)

 When data arrives, LastByteRcvd moves to its right and

AdvertisedWindow shrinks.
  Receiver acknowledges only, if preceding bytes have arrived.
 AdvertisedWindow expands when data is read
by the application.o If data is read as fast as it
arrives then
AdvertisedWindow = MaxRcvBuffer

o If data is read slowly, it eventually leads to a AdvertisedWindow of

size 0.
 AdvertisedWindow field is designed to allow sender to keep the pipe full.

TCP TRANSMISSION
 TCP has three mechanism to trigger the transmission of a segment.
 They are
o Maximum Segment Size (MSS) - Silly Window Syndrome
o Timeout - Nagle’s Algorithm

Silly Window Syndrome

 When either the sending application program creates data
slowly or the receivingapplication program consumes data
slowly, or both, problems arise.
 Any of these situations results in the sending of data in very small
segments, whichreduces the efficiency of the operation.
 This problem is called the silly window syndrome.
 The sending TCP may create a silly window syndrome if it is
serving an applicationprogram that creates data slowly, for example,
1 byte at a time.
 The application program writes 1 byte at a time into the buffer of the
sending TCP.
 The result is a lot of 1-byte segments that are traveling through an
internet.
 The solution is to prevent the sending TCP from sending the data byte by
byte.
 The sending TCP must be forced to wait and collect data to send in a
larger block.
Nagle’s Algorithm
 If there is data to send but is less than MSS, then we may want to
wait some amountof time before sending the available data
 If we wait too long, then it may delay the process.
 If we don’t wait long enough, it may end up sending small
segments resulting inSilly Window Syndrome.
 The solution is to introduce a timer and to transmit when the timer
expires
 Nagle introduced an algorithm for solving this problem

TCP CONGESTION CONTROL

 Congestion occurs if load (number of packets sent) is greater than
capacity of thenetwork (number of packets a network can handle).
 When load is less than network capacity, throughput increases
proportionally.
 When load exceeds capacity, queues become full and the routers
discard somepackets and throughput declines sharply.
 When too many packets are contending for the same link
o The queue overflows
o Packets get dropped
 o Network is congested
 Network should provide a congestion control mechanism to deal
with such asituation.
 TCP maintains a variable called CongestionWindow for each connection.
 TCP Congestion Control mechanisms are:

1. Additive Increase / Multiplicative Decrease (AIMD)

2. Slow Start
3. Fast Retransmit and Fast Recovery

Additive Increase / Multiplicative Decrease (AIMD)

 TCP source initializes CongestionWindow based on congestion level in
the network.
 Source increases CongestionWindow when level of congestion goes
down and
decreases the same when level of congestion goes up.
 TCP interprets timeouts as a sign of congestion and reduces the rate of
transmission.
 On timeout, source reduces its CongestionWindow by half, i.e.,
multiplicativedecrease. For example, if CongestionWindow = 16
packets, after timeout it is 8.
 Value of CongestionWindow is never less than maximum segment size
(MSS).
 When ACK arrives CongestionWindow is incremented marginally,
i.e., additiveincrease.
Increment = MSS ×
(MSS/CongestionWindow)
CongestionWindow += Increment

 For example, when ACK arrives for 1 packet, 2 packets are sent.
When ACK for bothpackets arrive, 3 packets are sent and so on.
 CongestionWindow increases and decreases throughout lifetime of the
connection.
  When CongestionWindow is plotted as a function of time, a saw-
tooth patternresults.

Slow Start
 Slow start is used to increase CongestionWindow exponentially from a
cold start.
 Source TCP initializes CongestionWindow to one packet.
 TCP doubles the number of packets sent every RTT on successful
transmission.
 When ACK arrives for first packet TCP adds 1 packet to
CongestionWindow andsends two packets.
 When two ACKs arrive, TCP increments CongestionWindow by 2
packets and sendsfour packets and so on.
 Instead of sending entire permissible packets at once (bursty traffic),
packets are sentin a phased manner, i.e., slow start.
 Initially TCP has no idea about congestion,
henceforth it increasesCongestionWindow rapidly until
there is a timeout. On timeout:
 CongestionThreshold =
CongestionWindow/ 2
CongestionWindow = 1

 Slow start is repeated until CongestionWindow reaches

CongestionThreshold andthereafter 1 packet per RTT.

 The congestion window trace will look like

Fast Retransmit And Fast Recovery

 TCP timeouts led to long periods of time during which the connection
went dead while waiting for a timer to expire.
 Fast retransmit is a heuristic approach that triggers retransmission of
a dropped packet sooner than the regular timeout mechanism. It does
not replace regular timeouts.
 When a packet arrives out of order, receiving TCP resends the same
acknowledgment (duplicate ACK) it sent last time.
 When three duplicate ACK arrives at the sender, it infers that
corresponding packet may be lost due to congestion and retransmits
that packet. This is called fast retransmit before regular timeout.
 When packet loss is detected using fast retransmit, the slow start phase
is replaced byadditive increase, multiplicative decrease method. This
is known as fast recovery.
  Instead of setting CongestionWindow to one packet, this method uses
the ACKs that are still in pipe to clock the sending of packets.
 Slow start is only used at the beginning of a connection and after
regular timeout. At other times, it follows a pure AIMD pattern.


 For example, packets 1 and 2 are received whereas packet 3 gets lost.
o Receiver sends a duplicate ACK for packet 2 when packet 4 arrives.
o Sender receives 3 duplicate ACKs after sending packet 6
retransmits packet 3.
o When packet 3 is received, receiver sends cumulative ACK up to
packet 6.
 The congestion window trace will look like

TCP CONGESTION AVOIDANCE

 Congestion avoidance mechanisms prevent congestion before it actually
occurs.
  These mechanisms predict when congestion is about to happen and
then to reduce therate at which hosts send data just before packets
start being discarded.
 TCP creates loss of packets in order to determine bandwidth of the
connection.
 Routers help the end nodes by intimating when congestion is likely to
occur.
 Congestion-avoidance mechanisms are:
o DEC bit - Destination Experiencing Congestion Bit
o RED - Random Early Detection

Dec Bit - Destination Experiencing Congestion Bit

 The first mechanism developed for use on the Digital Network
Architecture (DNA).

 The idea is to evenly split the responsibility for congestion

control between therouters and the end nodes.

 Each router monitors the load it is experiencing and explicitly

notifies the end nodeswhen congestion is about to occur.

 This notification is implemented by setting a binary congestion bit in

the packets thatflow through the router; hence the name DECbit.

 The destination host then copies this congestion bit into the ACK it
sends back to thesource.

 The Source checks how many ACK has DEC bit set for previous window
packets.

 If less than 50% of ACK have DEC bit set, then source increases
its congestionwindow by 1 packet

 Otherwise, decreases the congestion window by 87.5%.

 Finally, the source adjusts its sending rate so as to avoid congestion.

 Increase by 1, decrease by 0.875 rule was based on AIMD for

stabilization.
  A single congestion bit is added to the packet header.

 Using a queue length of 1 as the trigger for setting the congestion bit.

 A router sets this bit in a packet if its average queue length is greater
than or equal to1 at the time the packet arrives.

Computing average queue length at a router using DEC bit

 Average queue length is measured over a time interval that includes the
last busy + last idle cycle + current busy cycle.
 It calculates the average queue length by dividing the curve area with time
interval.

Red - Random Early Detection

 The second mechanism of congestion avoidance is called as
Random EarlyDetection (RED).

 Each router is programmed to monitor its own queue length, and when
it detects thatthere is congestion, it notifies the source to adjust its
congestion window.
 RED differs from the DEC bit scheme by two ways:
a. In DECbit, explicit notification about congestion is sent to
source, whereas RED implicitly notifies the source by dropping
a few packets.

b. DECbit may lead to tail drop policy, whereas RED drops

packet based ondrop probability in a random manner. Drop
each arriving packet with some drop probability whenever the
queue length exceeds some drop level. This idea is called early
random drop.
 Computation of average queue length using RED

 AvgLen = (1 − Weight) × AvgLen + Weight × SampleLen

where 0 < Weight < 1 and
SampleLen – is the length of the queue when a
sample measurement is made.
 The queue length is measured every time a new packet arrives at the
gateway.

 RED has two queue length thresholds that trigger certain activity:
MinThreshold andMaxThreshold
When a packet arrives at a gateway it compares Avglen with these two values
according to the following
  Stream Control Transmission Protocol (SCTP) is a reliable,
message-orientedtransport layer protocol.
 SCTP has mixed features of TCP and UDP.
 SCTP maintains the message boundaries and detects the lost data,
duplicate data aswell as out-of-order data.
 SCTP provides the Congestion control as well as Flow control.
 SCTP is especially designed for internet applications as
well as multimediacommunication.

SCTP SERVICES

Process-to-Process Communication
 SCTP provides process-to-process communication.

Multiple Streams
 SCTP allows multistream service in each connection, which is
called association inSCTP terminology.
 If one of the streams is blocked, the other streams can still deliver their

data.
Multihoming

 An SCTP association supports multihoming service.

 The sending and receiving host can define multiple IP addresses in
each end for anassociation.
 In this fault-tolerant approach, when one path fails, another
interface can be used fordata delivery without interruption.
Full-Duplex Communication
 SCTP offers full-duplex service, where data can flow in both
directions at the same time. Each SCTP then has a sending and
receiving buffer and packets are sent in bothdirections.

Connection-Oriented Service
 SCTP is a connection-oriented protocol.
 In SCTP, a connection is called an association.
 If a client wants to send and receive message from server , the steps are :
Step1: The two SCTPs establish the connection with each other.
Step2: Once the connection is established, the data gets
exchanged in both thedirections.
Step3: Finally, the association is terminated.

Reliable Service
 SCTP is a reliable transport protocol.
 It uses an acknowledgment mechanism to check the safe and sound
arrival of data.

SCTP PACKET FORMAT

An SCTP packet has a mandatory general header and a set of blocks called
chunks.

General Header
 The general header (packet header) defines the end points of
each association towhich the packet belongs
 It guarantees that the packet belongs to a particular association
 It also preserves the integrity of the contents of the packet including the
header itself.
 There are four fields in the general header.
Source port
This field identifies the sending port.

Destination port
This field identifies the receiving port that hosts use to route
 the packet to theappropriate endpoint/application.

Verification tag
A 32-bit random value created during initialization to
distinguish stale packetsfrom a previous connection.
Checksum
The next field is a checksum. The size of the checksum is 32
bits. SCTP usesCRC-32 Checksum.

Chunks
 Control information or user data are carried in chunks.
 Chunks have a common layout.
 The first three fields are common to all chunks; the information
field depends on thetype of chunk.

 The type field can define up to 256 types of chunks. Only a few have
been defined sofar; the rest are reserved for future use.
 The flag field defines special flags that a particular chunk may need.
 The length field defines the total size of the chunk, in bytes,
including the type, flag,and length fields.

Types of Chunks
 An SCTP association may send many packets, a packet may contain
several chunks,and chunks may belong to different streams.
 SCTP defines two types of chunks - Control chunks and Data chunks.
 A control chunk controls and maintains the association.
  A data chunk carries user data.

SCTP ASSOCIATION
 SCTP is a connection-oriented protocol.
 A connection in SCTP is called an association to emphasize
multihoming.
 SCTP Associations consists of three phases:
 Association Establishment
 Data Transfer
 Association Termination

Association Establishment
 Association establishment in SCTP requires a four-way handshake.
 In this procedure, a client process wants to establish an
association with a serverprocess using SCTP as the transport-layer
protocol.
 The SCTP server needs to be prepared to receive any association (passive
open).
  Association establishment, however, is initiated by the client (active

open).

 The client sends the first packet, which contains an INIT chunk.
 The server sends the second packet, which contains an INIT ACK
chunk. The INIT ACK also sends a cookie that defines the state of the
server at this moment.
 The client sends the third packet, which includes a COOKIE ECHO
chunk. This is a very simple chunk that echoes, without change, the
cookie sent by the server. SCTP allows the inclusion of data chunks
in this packet.
 The server sends the fourth packet, which includes the COOKIE ACK
chunk that acknowledges the receipt of the COOKIE ECHO chunk.
SCTP allows the inclusion of data chunks with this packet.

Data Transfer
 The whole purpose of an association is to transfer data between two ends.
 After the association is established, bidirectional data transfer can take
place.
 The client and the server can both send data.
 SCTP supports piggybacking.

 Types of SCTP data Transfer :

1. Multihoming Data Transfer
 Data transfer, by default, uses the primary address of the
destination.
 If the primary is not available, one of the alternative addresses
is used.
 This is called Multihoming Data Transfer.
2. Multistream Delivery
 SCTP can support multiple streams, which means that the
sender process can define different streams and a message
can belong to one of these streams.
 Each stream is assigned a stream identifier (SI) which
uniquely definesthat stream.
 SCTP supports two types of data delivery in each stream:
ordered (default)and unordered.

Association Termination
 In SCTP,either of the two parties involved in exchanging data
(client or server) canclose the connection.
 SCTP does not allow a “half closed” association. If one end closes
the association,the other end must stop sending new data.
 If any data are left over in the queue of the recipient of the
termination request, theyare sent and the association is closed.
 Association termination uses three packets.

SCTP FLOW CONTROL

 Flow control in SCTP is similar to that in TCP.
 Current SCTP implementations use a byte-oriented window for flow
control.

Receiver Site
 The receiver has one buffer (queue) and three variables.

 The queue holds the received data chunks that have not yet been read by
 the process.
 The first variable holds the last TSN received, cumTSN.
 The second variable holds the available buffer size; winsize.
 The third variable holds the last accumulative acknowledgment,
lastACK.
 The following figure shows the queue and variables at the receiver site.

 When the site receives a data chunk, it stores it at the end of the buffer
(queue) and subtracts the size of the chunk from winSize.
 The TSN number of the chunk is stored in the cumTSN variable.
 When the process reads a chunk, it removes it from the queue and adds
the size of theremoved chunk to winSize (recycling).
 When the receiver decides to send a SACK, it checks the value of
lastAck; if it is lessthan cumTSN, it sends a SACK with a cumulative
TSN number equal to the cumTSN.
 It also includes the value of winSize as the advertised window size.

Sender Site
 The sender has one buffer (queue) and three variables: curTSN, rwnd,
and inTransit.
 We assume each chunk is 100 bytes long. The buffer holds the
chunks produced bythe process that either have been sent or are
ready to be sent.
 The first variable, curTSN, refers to the next chunk to be sent.
 All chunks in the queue with a TSN less than this value have
been sent, but notacknowledged; they are outstanding.
 The second variable, rwnd, holds the last value advertised by the receiver
(in bytes).
 The third variable, inTransit, holds the number of bytes in transit,
bytes sent but notyet acknowledged.
 The following figure shows the queue and variables at the sender site.
  A chunk pointed to by curTSN can be sent if the size of the data is
less than or equalto the quantity rwnd - inTransit.
 After sending the chunk, the value of curTSN is incremented by 1
and now points tothe next chunk to be sent.
 The value of inTransit is incremented by the size of the data in the
transmitted chunk.
 When a SACK is received, the chunks with a TSN less than or equal
to the cumulative TSN in the SACK are removed from the queue and
discarded. The senderdoes not have to worry about them anymore.
 The value of inTransit is reduced by the total size of the discarded chunks.
 The value of rwnd is updated with the value of the advertised window in
the SACK.

SCTP ERROR CONTROL

 SCTP is a reliable transport layer protocol.
 It uses a SACK chunk to report the state of the receiver buffer to the
sender.
 Each implementation uses a different set of entities and timers for
the receiver andsender sites.

Receiver Site
 The receiver stores all chunks that have arrived in its queue
including the out-of-order ones. However, it leaves spaces for any
missing chunks.
 It discards duplicate messages, but keeps track of them for reports to the
sender.
  The following figure shows a typical design for the receiver site
and the state of thereceiving queue at a particular point in time.

 The available window size is 1000 bytes.

 The last acknowledgment sent was for data chunk 20.
 Chunks 21 to 23 have been received in order.
 The first out-of-order block contains chunks 26 to 28.
 The second out-of-order block contains chunks 31 to 34.
 A variable holds the value of cumTSN.

 An array of variables keeps track of the beginning and the end of

each block that is out of order.
 An array of variables holds the duplicate chunks received.
 There is no need for storing duplicate chunks in the queue and they will
be discarded.

Sender Site
 At the sender site, it needs two buffers (queues): a sending
queue and aretransmission queue.
 Three variables were used - rwnd, inTransit, and curTSN as
described in the previoussection.
 The following figure shows a typical design.
  The sending queue holds chunks 23 to 40.
 The chunks 23 to 36 have already been sent, but not acknowledged;
they areoutstanding chunks.
 The curTSN points to the next chunk to be sent (37).
 We assume that each chunk is 100 bytes, which means that
1400 bytes of data(chunks 23 to 36) is in transit.
 The sender at this moment has a retransmission queue.
 When a packet is sent, a retransmission timer starts for that packet
(all data chunks inthat packet).
 Some implementations use one single timer for the entire
association, but otherimplementations use one timer for each
packet.

SCTP CONGESTION CONTROL

 SCTP is a transport-layer protocol with packets subject to congestion in

the network.
 The SCTP designers have used the same strategies for congestion
control as thoseused in TCP.
NOTE : REFER TCP CONGESTION CONTROL