Chapter 3

The Application Layers

Application Layer
▪ provides user interfaces and support services such
as email, remote file access and transfer, access to
the WWW
▪ three general issues related to the application
layer:
▪ the client-server paradigm, addressing, and services

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1. Addressing
▪ a client and a server communicate with each other using
addresses
▪ addressing mechanism in the application layer is different from
the ones in other layers
▪ email address: [email protected]
▪ Web page (host name): http://www.cs.aau.edu.et
▪ these are aliases convenient for human beings; they must be
mapped to IP addresses
▪ an application program needs the services of another program
for this; this application program is called DNS - Domain Name
System
▪ it uses port 53

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▪ DNS
▪ a domain-based naming scheme and a distributed
database system for implementing the naming scheme

▪ used for mapping host names and email addresses to IP

addresses

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▪ Name Space
▪ names assigned to machines must be carefully
selected from a name space;
▪ names must be unique (as are addresses)
▪ Hierarchical Name Space
▪ each name is made of several parts;
▪ the first may define the nature of the organization,
▪ the second the name, the third departments, ...

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▪ the tree can have only 128 levels

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 Domain
▪ a domain is a subtree of the domain name space
▪ the name of the domain is the domain name of the node at the top of
the subtree

▪ the Internet is divided into over 200 top-level domains; each partitioned
into subdomains,
▪ a leaf domain may contain a single host or represent a company and
contain thousands of hosts

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▪ Hierarchy of Name Servers
▪ storing the information contained in the domain name space
in a single computer is inefficient and unreliable
▪ distribute the information among many computers called
DNS servers
▪ there is a hierarchy of name servers as we have a hierarchy
of names

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▪ Zone
▪ the server makes a database called a zone file and
keeps all the information for every node under that
domain
▪ it can divide its domain into subdomains and
delegate part of its authority to other servers

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▪ Root Server
▪ a server whose zone consists of the whole tree
▪ each covering the whole domain name space and
distributed all around the world

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Primary and Secondary Servers

▪ A primary server is one that stores a file about

the zone for which it is an authority;
▪ it is responsible for creating, maintaining, and
updating the zone file
▪ A secondary server is one that transfers the
complete information about a zone from
another server
▪ it does not create or update the file

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Types of Top-Level Domains
▪ There are two types top level domain :
▪ generic domains and country domains;
▪ Generic Domains
▪ define registered hosts according to their generic behavior

Label Description
com Commercial organizations
edu Educational institutions
gov Government institutions
int International organizations
mil Military groups
net Network support centers
org Nonprofit organizations

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▪ Country Domains
▪ Include one entry for every country (as defined by
ISO)

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▪ Resolution
▪ Mapping a name to an address or an address to a name is called
name-address resolution
▪ Resolver
▪ a host that needs to map an address to a name or a name to an
address calls a DNS client named a resolver
▪ the resolver accesses the closest DNS server with a mapping
request
▪ if the server has the information it satisfies the resolver;
otherwise,
▪ It either refers the resolver to other servers called Iterative
Resolution or asks other servers to provide the information
called Recursive Resolution

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3.3 Application Layer Services

▪ Electronic mail (SMTP, MIME, POP3, IMAP, Webmail)

▪ File transfer (FTP - File Transfer Protocol)
▪ HTTP - Hypertext Transfer Protocol for accessing data on
the WWW

▪ WWW
▪ Multimedia

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1. Electronic Mail
▪ an email has an envelope and a message (similar to paper
mail - snail mail)

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▪ Email systems consist of two subsystems:
▪ User Agent (UA) and
▪ Message Transfer Agent (MTA)

User User

SMTP SMTP
UA MTA MTA MTA UA

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 User Agent
▪ a user agent can be command-driven or GUI-based

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Message Transfer Agent
▪ Relays messages from the sender to the receiver
▪ to send mail, a system must have a client MTA and to receive mail, a
system must have a server MTA

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SMTP
▪ SMTP transmits mail from the sender's computer to
the recipient's mail server's mailbox
▪ SMTP uses port 25
▪ SMTP uses commands and responses to transfer messages
between an MTA client and an MTA server
▪ originally, emails consisted of 7-bit ASCII text

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▪ MIME - Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions
▪ MIME is a supplemental protocol that allows non-ASCII data
to be sent using the existing mail programs and protocols;

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▪ There are two mail access protocols: POP3 and IMAP
▪ POP3 - Post Office Protocol, version 3
▪ is a commonly used standard protocol for receiving emails.
▪ It retrieves email messages from a server over
a TCP/IP connection

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IMAP - Internet Mail Access Protocol
▪ IMAP is similar to POP3 but with the following additional
features
▪ a user can check the email header prior to downloading
▪ a user can search the contents of the email for a specific
string
▪ it uses port 143

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▪ Web-Based Mail
▪ some websites provide email service to
anyone
▪ examples are Yahoo and Gmail
▪ mail transfer from the user to the mail server
and from the receiving server (the web server)
to the user’s browser is through HTTP (instead
of POP3 or IMAP)
▪ a TCP connection is still created using SMTP
at port 25 before mail transfer begins
▪ authentication is done by filling a form

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 FTP - File Transfer Protocol
▪ a standard mechanism provided by the Internet for
copying a file from one host to another
▪ FTP establishes two connections between the client and
the server one is used for data transfer, the other for
control information (commands and responses)

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3. HTTP - Hypertext Transfer Protocol
▪ a file transfer protocol specifically designed to facilitate access to the
WWW
▪ it transfers data in the form of plain text, hypertext, audio, video, ...
▪ designed for an environment where there are rapid jumps from one
document to another
▪ similar to FTP (but only one TCP connection on well-known port 80)
and SMTP (but differs on how messages are sent from the client to the
server and from the server to the client)
▪ two kinds of messages: request and response

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▪ Proxy Server
▪ HTTP supports proxy servers
▪ a computer that keeps copies of responses to recent
requests
▪ the HTTP client sends a request to the proxy server
▪ the proxy server checks its cache;
▪ if the response is not stored in the cache, it sends the
request to the corresponding server
▪ the proxy server reduces the load on the original server,
decreases traffic, and improves latency

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4. WWW
▪ A repository of information spread all over the world and
linked together
▪ WWW is a client-server service distributed over many
locations called websites

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5. Multimedia
▪ the combination of text, graphics, images, video and
audio used together
▪ Multimedia System
▪ the integrated production, processing, storage,
representation, and transmission of several time-
dependent and time-independent media streams

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▪ Compression
▪ storing or transmitting uncompressed
video/audio requires huge resources
▪ compression is required to send data over
the Internet
▪ many compression algorithms designed for
both audio and video

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