Protocol Specials
SCTP - Stream Control Transmission Protocol
The Stream Control Transmission Protocol is an approach to mix several charactersitics of TCP and UDP and enhance with some features to fullfil some non-achieved requirements. SCTP is a reliable, sequenced, ordered transport protocol via a message based approach (like UDP, TCP is stream based). Furthermore, SCTP offers multi-homing and multi-streaming capabilities (called message framing through one association).
The SCTP packet layout can be divided into two classes:
- Packet Header
- Packet Chunk
Where the former (the packet header) always reflect the same anatomy, the chunk differs. In addition: the chunk does not neccesary form the user data. Depending on the packet header, the packet chunk is interpreted individually. For example: the chunk also provide heartbeat functionality via SCTP's chunk. Beside that, communication initiation messages, shutdown or congestion controll data are also transfered.
For a complete SCTP introduction or reference ask you search engine of choice. The following paragraphs will only present some of netsend's SCTP features!