Problem: Applications Need Their Own Protocols¶

We started this book by talking about application programs—everything from web browsers to videoconferencing tools—that people want to run over computer networks. In the intervening chapters, we have developed, one building block at a time, the networking infrastructure needed to make such applications possible. We have now come full circle, back to network applications. These applications are part network protocol (in the sense that they exchange messages with their peers on other machines) and part traditional application program (in the sense that they interact with the windowing system, the file system, and ultimately the user). This chapter explores some popular network applications available today.

Looking at applications drives home the systems approach that we have emphasized throughout this book. That is, the best way to build effective networked applications is to understand the building blocks that a network can provide and how those blocks can interact with each other. Thus, for example, a particular networked application might need to make use of a reliable transport protocol, authentication and privacy mechanisms, and resource allocation capabilities of the underlying network. Applications often work best when the application developer knows how to make the best use of these facilities (and there are also plenty of counter-examples of applications making poor use of available networking capabilities). Applications typically need their own protocols, too, in many cases using the same principles that we have seen in our prior examination of lower layer protocols. Thus, our focus in this chapter is on how to put together the ideas and techniques already described to build effective networked applications. Said another way, if you ever imagine yourself writing a network application, then you will by definition also become a protocol designer (and implementer).

We proceed by examining a variety of familiar, and not so familiar, network applications. These range from exchanging email and surfing the Web, to integrating applications across businesses, to multimedia applications like videoconferencing, to managing a set of network elements, to emerging peer-to-peer and content distribution networks. This list is by no means exhaustive, but it does serve to illustrate many of the key principles of designing and building applications. Applications need to pick and choose the appropriate building blocks that are available at other layers either inside the network or in the host protocol stacks and then augment those underlying services to provide the precise communication service required by the application.