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Protocol Stack Interfaces

A protocol stack is the software subsystem that manages data traffic according to the rules of a particular communications protocol. There are two ways in which a protocol stack can be integrated into the IRIX kernel. The TCP/IP stack creates and uses the ifnet interface to drivers (bottom left of Figure 16-1) and the socket interface to applications (top left of Figure 16-1).

Alternatively, a stack written to the DLPI architecture can communicate with STREAMS drivers (bottom right of Figure 16-1).


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