6.5.1 Define port and handshaking.
(No teaching notes for this one.)
JSR Notes:
Gonna go back to good ‘ol www.webopedia for definitions, so here we go:
Port: An interface on a computer to which you can connect a device. Personal computers have various types of ports. Internally, there are several ports for connecting disk drives, display screens, and keyboards. Externally, personal computers have ports for connecting modems, printers, mice, and other peripheral devices.
A simpler way to put it would be it’s a place where you plug something into your computer. The problem with this definition is that, as you can read above, there are both internal ports and external ports. When you think about it even a hard drive can be seemingly attached internally, but one that you attach externally behaves exactly the same way.
The other important point is that a port can be associated with a physical plug, or it can be associated logically as well. All access to the Internet comes in through, say, your Ethernet cable, to one physical Ethernet port. But then the signal is routed within the computer depending on which logical port number it is. For example, the http port is port number on most PCs is 80, whereas if you had an FTP host, for example, running on your computer, you could set its logical port to 7003 if you wanted. Limewire, and similar software will commandeer other ports, don’t you worry. And there are various other kinds of Internet traffic that should be dealt with differently, and so are assigned different logical port numbers.
…but the assessment statement just says Define, so there you go; come up with a good succinct, but correct definition of your own.
Handshaking Definition: The process by which two devices initiate communications. Handshaking begins when one device sends a message to another device indicating that it wants to establish a communications channel. The two devices then send several messages back and forth that enable them to agree on a communications protocol.
Good one. Couldn’t have said it better myself. I feel like re-naming the course IB WP (for Webopedia).
Coming up with your own analogy helps though, too. The point is that whenever any two devices want to communicate, they first have to come up with a common language in which they can do so, if indeed there is on.