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This section presents a high level overview of the services of the Transport Interface, which supports the transfer of data between two user processes. ``Transport Interface'' illustrates the Transport Interface.
Transport Interface
The transport provider is the entity that provides the services of the Transport Interface, and the transport user is the entity that requires these services. An example of a transport provider is the TCP/IP transport protocol, while a transport user may be a networking application or session layer protocol.
The transport user accesses the services of the transport provider by issuing the appropriate service requests. One example is a request to transfer data over a connection. Similarly, the transport provider notifies the user of various events, such as the arrival of data on a connection.
The Network Services Library of
UNIX
System V includes a set
of functions that support the services of the Transport Interface
for user processes (see
intro(3N)).
These functions enable a user to make requests to the provider
and process incoming events.
Programs using the Transport Interface can link the appropriate
routines as follows:
cc prog.c -lnsl
or
cc prog.c -lxti
Both commands will yield a program that uses XTI semantics.