Computer Networks I

Electrical Engineering Department

College of Engineering
Wasit University

Lecture 13
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User Agent (UA)

 User Agent (UA) provides service to the user to make the process of sending and
receiving a message easier.
 UA is a software package (program) that composes reads, replies to, and forwards
messages. It also handles mailboxes.
 UA provides services to the user Agents as shown in the next fig
 Composing Messages: UA helps the user compose the e-mail message to be sent
out. Most UA provide a template on the screen to be filled in by the user. Also UA
provides spell checking, grammar checking.
 Replying to Messages: After reading a message, a user can use UA to reply to a
message.
 Forwarding Messages: Forwarding is defined as sending the copy of the
message to a third party.
 Handling Mailboxes: UA creates two mailboxes:

a) Inbox keeps all the received e-mails until they are deleted by the user.
b) Outbox keeps all the sent e-mails until deletes by the user.
Message Transfer Agent (MTA)
 The actual mail transfer is done through message transfer agents. To send mail, a
system must have the client message transfer agent (MTA) and to receive mail, a
system must have a server MTA. The formal protocol that defines the MTA client
and server in the Internet is called the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP). Next fig
shows the range of the SMTP in this scenario (this is fourth scenario and
most common used).
 SMTP defines how commands and response must be sent back and forth.
 SMTP is used two times: (a) between the sender and the sender's mail server
(b) between the two mail servers
File Transfer
Transferring files from one computer to another is one of the most common tasks
expected from a networking or internetworking environment. The greatest volume
of data exchange in the Internet today is due to file transfer.
File Transfer Protocol (FTP)
 FTP is the standard mechanism provided by TCP/IP for copying a file from one
host to another. Although transferring files from one system to another seems
simple and straightforward, but include some problems, such as two systems may
use different file name or using different ways to represent text and data or using
different directory structures. All these problems have been solved by FTP in a
very simple and elegant approach.
 FTP use two connections between the hosts. One connection is used for data
transfer, the other for control information (command and response) as shown in
fig
World Wide Web (WWW)
 The World Wide Web (WWW) is a repository (storage) of information linked
together from points all over the world. The WWW has a unique combination of
flexibility, portability, and user-friendly features that distinguish it from other
services provided by the Internet.

Architecture of WWW
 The WWW today is a distributed client/service, in which a client using a browser
can access a service using a server. However, the service provided is distributed
over many locations called sites as shown in next fig:
 Each site holds one or more documents, referred to as Web pages. Each Web
page can contain a link to other pages in the same site or at other sites. The pages
can be retrieved (received) and viewed by using browsers.
The client, in previous fig, needs to see some information that it knows belongs to
site A. It sends a request through its browser (program that is designed to fetch
Web documents).
 Each browser usually consists of three parts (a) controller (b) client protocol
(c) interpreters.
 The controller receives input from the keyboard or the mouse and uses the client
programs to access the document. After the document has been accessed, the
controller uses one of the interpreters to display the document on the screen.
 The client protocol can be one of the protocols described previously such as FTP
or HTTP.
 The interpreter can be HTML/ Java depending on the type of document.
 Web documents, in the WWW can be grouped into three broad categories:
(a) static (b) dynamic (c) active
(a) Static documents are fixed content documents that are created and stored in a
server. The client can get only a copy of the document. The contents cannot change
the content of the document. When a client accesses the document, a copy of the
document is sent. The user can then use a browsing program to display the
document as shown in next fig

(b) A dynamic document is created by a Web server whenever a browser requests

the document.
(c) Active: For many applications, we need a program or a script to be run at the
client site.
Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP)
 The HTTP is a protocol used mainly to access data on the WWW.
 HTTP characteristics can be summarized as follows:-
(a) HTTP functions as a combination of FTP and SMTP.

(b) HTTP is similar to FTP because it transfers files and uses the services of TCP. However, it is
much simpler than FTP.

(c) HTTP is like SMTP because the data transferred between the client and the server look
like SMTP messages
(d) SMTP messages are stored and forwarded, but HTTP message are delivered
immediately.

(e) HTTP uses the services of TCP

Next fig shows the HTTP transaction between the client and server. The client
initializes the transaction by sending a request message. The server replies by
sending a response.
Multimedia
 The term multimedia is often used in the context of the Internet to mean audio
and video (i.e. transmit and received voice over Internet).
 Multimedia is just two or more media.
 The two media are normally video with audio, that is moving picture with sound.
 In the past, we listened to an audio broadcast through a radio and watched a
video program broadcast through a TV. We used the telephone network to
communicate between subscribers.
 Now, people want to use the Internet not only for text and image communications,
but also for audio and video services.
 We can divide audio and video services into three broad categories: streaming
stored audio/video, streaming live audio/video, and interactive audio/video, as
shown in next fig.
(a)Streaming stored audio/video: The files are compressed and stored on a
server. A client downloads the files through the Internet. Examples of
stored audio filesare songs, books on tape, and lectures. Examples of
stored video files are movies,TV shows, and music video clips.
(b)Streaming live audio/video: A user listens to broadcast audio and video
through the Internet. A good example of this type of application is the
Internet radio. Some radio stations broadcast their programs only on the
Internet and on the air TV stations will broadcast their programs on the
Internet in the future.
(c) Interactive audio/video, people use the Internet to interactively
communicate with one another. A good example of this application is
Internet telephony and Internet teleconferencing.
 compare between
Digitizing Audio
 When sound is fed into a microphone, an electronic analog signal is generated
which represents the sound amplitude as a function of time. The signal is called an
analog audio signal.
 An analog signal can be digitized according Nyquist theorem.
 Voice is sampled at 8000 samples per second with 8 bits/sample. This results in a
digital signal of 64 kbps.
 Music is sampled at 44100 samples/second with 16 bits/sample. This results in a
digital signal of 705.6 kbps for monaural and 1.411 Mb/se.
Digitizing Video
 A video consists of a sequence of frames. If the frames are displayed on the
screen fast enough, we get an impression of motion. There is no standard number
of frames per second.
 In North America 25 frames/sec is common. However, to avoid a condition
known as flickering, a frame needs to be refreshed. The TV industry repaints each
frame twice to solve this problem. This means 50 frames need to be sent.
 Each frame is divided into small grids, called picture elements called Pixels.
Voice over IP
 Let us consider on one real time interactive audio/video application: voice over
IP, or Internet telephony. The idea is to use the Internet as a telephone network
with some additional capabilities. Instead of communicating over a circuit
switched network, this application allows communication between two parties
over the packet switched Internet. Two protocols have been designed to handle
this type of communication

a) The Session Initiation Protocol (SIP). It is an application layer protocol that

establishes, manages and terminates a multimedia session. SIP is designed to be
independent of the underlying transport layer.

b) H.323 is a standard designed by ITU to allow telephones on the public telephone

network to talk to computers (called terminals in H.323) connected to the Internet
as shown in next fig
A gateway connects the Internet to the telephone network. The gateway is a
five layer device that can translate a message from one protocol stack to
another.

This is the End of This Semester