Difference between revisions of "Communications protocol"

Revision as of 10:29, 28 April 2016

In telecommunications, a communication protocol is a system of rules that allow two or more entities of a communication system to communicate between them to transmit information via any kind of variation of a physical quantity.

These are the rules or standard that defines the syntax, semantics and synchronization of communication and possible error recovery methods.

Protocols may be implemented by hardware, software, or a combination of both.

Communicating systems use well-defined formats (protocol) for exchanging messages.

Each message has an exact meaning intended to elicit a response from a range of possible responses pre-determined for that particular situation.

The specified behavior is typically independent of how it is to be implemented.

Communication protocols have to be agreed upon by the parties involved.

To reach agreement, a protocol may be developed into a technical standard.

A programming language describes the same for computations, so there is a close analogy between protocols and programming languages:

Analogy:

Protocols are to communications
as
programming languages are to computations

@@ Line 25: / Line 25: @@
 Analogy:
-<blockquote>Protocols are to [[communications]]
+<blockquote>
+Protocols are to [[communications]]
 as
 [[programming languages]] are to [[computations]]
 </blockquote>