EECS20N: Signals and Systems

Protocol Stacks in the Internet

In the internet, protocols are organized in a stack. Each protocol interacts with the corresponding layer in a remote computer. The dotted lines in the figure below indicate conceptual interactions, whereas the solid lines indicate physical interactions.:

Each dotted interaction can be modeled as a timed automaton. The protocol shown previously, which retransmits if it fails to receive an acknowledgement, is a transport layer protocol.