SH1668

Host-to-Host Communications
I. IP Packet
• Header - contains information about the packet
• Payload - contains the upper-layer information

A. IP Header:
a. Version Field – It is a 4-bit field that identifies the IP version being used. It
specifies the format of the IP header.
b. Internet Header Length (IHL) Field – It is a 4-bit field containing the length
of the IP header in 32-bit increments. Also, it used to specify how long the IP
header is in 32-bit words which is the minimum value for this field is 5.
c. Types of Service (ToS) Field – The 8-bit ToS uses 3 bits, it specifies the
quality of service that will be used.
d. Total Length Field – It specifies the length of the IP packet that includes the
IP header and the user data. The length field is 2 bytes, so the maximum size
of an IP packet is 216 – 1 or 65,535 bytes.
e. Identification Field – It used to identify the packet as belonging to a
datagram that has been fragmented.
f. Flag Field – It used in specifying how the fragmentation of packets is
handled.
g. Fragment Offset – It is used to indicate the offset count of the fragment from
the start of the original packet.
h. Time-To-Live (TTL) Field – The TTL field is primarily set to a number and
decremented by every router that is passed through. When TTL reaches 0,
the packet is castoff.
i. Protocol Field – In the layered protocol model, the layer that regulates which
application the data is from or which application the data is for is indicated
using the Protocol field. This field does not identify the application but
identifies a protocol that sits above the IP layer that is used for application
identification. Numeric values are based on RFC 1700: Assigned Numbers.
j. Header Checksum Field – A value calculated based on the contents of the
IP header. It is used to determine if any error have been introduced during
transmission.
k. Source and Destination Address Field – Source IP Address is 32-bit IP
address of the sender while Destination IP Address is 32-bit IP address of
the intended recipient.
l. Options and Padding Field – It is a field that varies in length from 0 to a
multiple of 32-bits. If the option values are not a multiple of 32-bits, 0s are
added or padded to ensure this field contains a multiple of 32 bits.

B. Packet Flow Control – It describes how hosts handle packets that are received
from other hosts.

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 SH1668

II. Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) – It is a connection-oriented host-to-host

protocol that establishes a reliable logical connection between hosts.
A. TCP Header:
a. Source and Destination Port Fields – These are the communication
endpoints for sending and receiving devices.
b. Sequence and Acknowledgement Numbers Fields – Message senders
use sequence numbers to mark the ordering of a group of messages. Equally,
senders and receivers use the acknowledgment numbers field to connect the
sequence numbers of messages that are either recently received or expected
to be sent.
c. Header Length Field – It is used to specify the length of the TCP header in
32-bit words.
d. Reserved Field - Reserved data in TCP headers always have a value of zero
(0).
e. Code Bits Field - TCP senders use a number called window size to regulate
how much data they send to a receiver before requiring an acknowledgment
in return.
f. Windows Field – It is used to announce the available buffer size, in octets,
of the sending host.
g. Checksum Field - The checksum value inside a TCP header is generated
by the protocol sender as a mathematical technique to help the receiver
detect messages that are corrupted or tampered with.
h. Urgent Pointer Field - The urgent pointer field is often set to zero (0) and
ignored, but in conjunction with one (1) of the control flags, it can be used as
a data offset to mark a subset of a message as requiring priority processing.
i. Options Field – It allows for additional TCP options during packet exchange.
B. The TCP Handshake – Also known as SYN-SYN-ACK, is used to define the
agreement between hosts on host packet exchange should go about.

III. User Datagram Protocol (UDP)

A. UDP Header:
a. Source and Destination Port Fields – It is used to identify the network
service or application information transported by the packet.
b. Message Length Field – It indicates the length of the entire UDP segment
in bytes – UDP header and payload.
c. Checksum – It is used to ensure data integrity of the received UDP header.
B. Network Session – It is a virtual connection that transports the application layer
information over the tangible connections.
References:

Chauhan, S., & Soni, P. (2016). Computer network. New Delhi, India: University Science Press, an Imprint of Laxmi Publications, Pvt.
Ltd.
Comer, D. (2014). The Internetworking. Internetworking with TCP/IP (Vol.1). Boston, Massachusettes: Pearson.
Parkhurst, W. R. (2004), Internet Addressing and Routing First Step. In Cisco Press. Retrieved from
http://www.ciscopress.com/articles/article.asp?p=348253&seqNum=4
Peterson, L., & Davie, B. (2012). Computer networks: A systems approach. Amsterdam: Morgan Kaufmann.
Wang, P.C. (2010). IP packet forwarding research progress. New York: Nova Science Publishers, Inc.

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