CODEWITHSUNDEEP
network-programming
Radoslaw Krasimirow
Radoslaw Krasimirow

Reputation: 1873

Where in the TCP/IP stack the actual payload is placed

I am a beginner in this area and reading the about the tcp/ip stack I see that each layer has its own payload field. If we assume that the structure of the stack components is as follows:

Aplication
Transport
Network
Data Link
Physical Link

And we know that each of the abovementioned layers has its own payload layer following question arises: In which layer is placed the actual payload data being transferred? If the answer (for example) is the data is placed into the application layer, then what's inside the other layers payloads? Are they empty? Excuse me, English is not my native language!

Upvotes: 0

Views: 460

Answers (1)

Wernsey
Wernsey

Reputation: 5491

The application layer's payload contains the data you're transferring. For example an HTTP response containing the HTML of the web page you're visiting.

All the application layer's bytes are placed in the Transport layer's payload. Your HTTP packet is now the payload of the TCP packet and the TCP packet contains link control information.

The TCP packet is now placed inside the Network layer's payload. Continuing the example, your TCP packet is now placed inside an IP packet that contains the IP addresses of the source and destination computers.

This concept is called encapsulation. You can read more on the Wikipedia.

Here's a picture from that Wikipedia article that illustrates it:

enter image description here

Upvotes: 1

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