Understanding UDP and Its Functions

So, what is UDP or User Datagram Protocol? UDP is an internet protocol for the transmission of brief messages known as datagram. The User Datagram Protocol is only one part of a bigger Web Protocol suite. UDP is used networks designed for TCP. Nevertheless, UDP is much less dependable and you aren’t at all times positive you will get the info in the precise sequence. David P. Reed formulated user Datagram Protocol in 1980.

To grasp what UDP is, you should first understand what a typical IP network looks like. A typical IP network has five layers. The primary layer is the physical layer, which consists of fiber optic, coaxial, or twisted cables. The second layer is the data link layer equivalent to GPRS, Wi-Fi and ISDN. The third layer is the internet or the network layer. The forth layer is where UDP lies and that is the transport layer. The final layer is the application layer and common applications are Telnet, HTTP, and DNS.

To grasp UDP, you should note that with this protocol, there isn’t a requirement that the recipient of the info acknowledges that the data has been sent. There are no implicit checks on transmission to guarantee datagram integrity and to guarantee the right sequence is maintained. Although the lack of transmission checks could make you doubt whether UDP is a useful protocol, you need to note that in some applications, pace is more useful than reliability. With UDP, errors are checked and corrected in the applications and never the network layer. At any time when error correction is required throughout transmission, the application makes use of the TCP, or Transmission Control Protocol, or the SCTP, or Stream Control Transmission Protocol. These protocols are designed for this precise reason.

To know UDP, you need to observe that the protocol is stateless. That is essential for servers which are utilized by several clients to answer brief queries. UDP is therefore advantageous over TCP in that it can be used for multicasting or packet broadcasting where data is sent to different clients while TCP is only used between one client and the server. Most of today’s network applications similar to VoIP, or Voice over Internet Protocol, DNS or Domain Name System, and TFTP or Trivial File Transfer Protocol use UDP because of this advantage. Since UDP does not have a mechanism that can be used to keep away from congestion in a network, there are several solutions which are used. Probably the most common solutions is the Datagram Congestion Control Protocol, or DCCP.

Despite the great speed and the truth that UDP can be used by several clients, to understand UDP, you need to know the limitations of the protocol. The most obvious limitations are the truth that there isn’t a avoidance mechanism and the truth that there isn’t a congestion control. These are severe limitations and it means the protocol cannot be used where sensitive data is being transmitted. If an individual sends you two messages through UDP, you can not predict the one that can arrive first. To study more concerning the protocol such as how checksum is used to examine errors, the protocol is documented in IETF RFC 768.