Protocol

We have often heard that this technology is the routing protocol, or this technology is the bridging protocol and so on, well many people are still confused to as to what exactly is a protocol. This article with specifically deal with the term protocol and will explains that what does this term means.
A protocol is basically an agreed upon format by the different networking companies and this format is used in the networking world for the transportation of the data between two devices, like computer and printer, computer and router, router and switch and many other networking devices. Without this format for sending the information the process of communication or data exchange held over the network would be impossible. A protocol can include various different qualities or just a single quality. The list of capabilities that a protocol may include is authentication, verification, routing, error detection and error correction capabilities.

According to some people a protocol defines the syntax, semantics and synchronization of communication and specifies behavior, and due to this property, a protocol can be implemented as software or as hardware, without any problem as these characteristics of the protocol does not change with the change in implementation.

To make a working a working protocol there are some requirements that needs to be fulfilled. They are data formats for data exchange, that is, the protocol must be designed in such a way that it is able to deal with any kind of data that is sent its way. The second thing is Address formats for data exchange, that is, make up your mind and decide that how are you going to label the data with the address so that it can reach its destined place. The third thing is Address mapping, fourth is routing, fifth is detection of transmission errors, sixth is acknowledgements, seventh is loss of information, eight is direction of information flow, ninth is sequence control and the last one is flow control.