Chapter 1. Introduction to Network Protocols

Just as diplomats use diplomatic protocols in their meetings, computers use network protocols to communicate in computer networks. There are many network protocols in existence; TCP/IP is a family of network protocols that are used for the Internet.

A network protocol is a standard written down on a piece of paper (or, more precisely, with a text editor in a computer). The standards that are used for the Internet are called Requests For Comment (RFC) . RFCs are numbered from 1 onwards. There are more than 4,500 RFCs today. Many of them have become out of date, so only a handful of the first thousand RFCs are still used today.

The International Standardization Office (ISO) has standardized a system of ...

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