I like to think of the transport layer as the layer of the OSI Model that enables more interesting traffic. While we network engineers may love a lot of the simpler uses of the IP protocol and ...

Layers 7 through 4 are geared more to the application than the lower layers, which are designed to move packets from one place to another no matter what they contain. This top layer defines the ...

The reason it makes sense NOT to jump into deep packet inspection (or, as you ask, starting at L1), is that starting at an app layer you have a holistic view of *every* possible link in the chain. If ...

For many in the communication industry, the open system interconnect (OSI) network model is a simply a stack. But, designers shouldn't be so quick to diminish the value that the OSI model provides to ...

The Open System Interconnect (OSI) network model, referred to by many as simply a stack, is in fact a well-designed, layered architecture for efficient intersystem and intrasystem communications. In ...

First, and foremost, the OSI stack is just a theoretical reference model. There is no actual OSI software. It has been around since about 1980, and it is based upon recommendations from the ITU-T and ...

The third layer of the OSI Model, the network layer, is where most network engineers focus their time and expertise. As Darragh commented in my post on the data link layer, Layer 2 is cool but Layer 3 ...

Getting started on designing a network is a task of formidable proportions, but all the more so if you are looking to build a secure IT network. Often, IT system administrators are not fully familiar ...

Other tips in this series have examined the seven-layer OSI model from the perspective of security. Although security was not the No. 1 goal of the designers of the OSI model, the idea behind these ...