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Home > Archive > Unix administration > January 2004 > basic socket question
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basic socket question
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| Eduard Ralph 2004-01-23, 5:11 pm |
| Hi,
this question might be a bit strange so please bear with me.
I'm currently doing some network theory as a course at my university,
so this question is a bit theoretical. I seem to be too blind or maybe
a child of the modern era that I don't understand the point trying to
be made.
The Prof. mentiones that there are several different ways in opening a
communication chanel between two processes. He makes a point in
differentiating between a Pipe, a Mailbox, a Port and a Socket. I'm
aware of the difference between a Pipe and a Socket from a programming
point of view (yes I also read the Socket FAQ) but I don't see the big
thing in Sockets. It's an important abstraction of Network
communication but what did it do so revolutionary different compared
to other methods? I'm trying to put this concept in perspective to
other methods and I sort of fail. Can somebody help?
Eduard Ralph
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| Doug Freyburger 2004-01-23, 5:11 pm |
| Eduard Ralph wrote:quote:
>
> The Prof. mentiones that there are several different ways in opening a
> communication chanel between two processes. He makes a point in
> differentiating between a Pipe, a Mailbox, a Port and a Socket. I'm
> aware of the difference between a Pipe and a Socket from a programming
> point of view (yes I also read the Socket FAQ) but I don't see the big
> thing in Sockets. It's an important abstraction of Network
> communication but what did it do so revolutionary different compared
> to other methods? I'm trying to put this concept in perspective to
> other methods and I sort of fail. Can somebody help?
A pipe will only work for two processes on the same machine, no network.
It is also one way data flow.
A socket is both networked and two-way data flow. Sockets enabled the
entire client-server realm to reach across a network and to have duplex
conversations between the client and the server ends.
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