Sockets

Depends on	Interprocess Communication

Sockets (in the software context) are another facilitator of serial interprocess communication. They may be compared to the endpoints of pipes but are rather more sophisticated/abstracted. For example, a form of socket may be used for communication across a network, providing interprocess communication between processes on remote computers. They are probably most commonly associated with network communications and TCP.

A socket is a specific endpoint of a communications and will be identified by a handle in the appropriate process.

In the Unix family of operating systems, sockets can be used connect streams or (more structured) datagrams internally rather than to another computer via an external network.

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Also refer to:	Operating System Concepts, 10th Edition: Chapter 3.8.1, pages 146-149

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Cacheability • Device Drivers • Direct Memory Access (DMA) • IO • Interprocess Communication • Interrupt Controller • Interrupt Service Routines (ISRs) • Interrupts • Libraries • Peripheral devices • Pipes • Queues • Queues Extra • Resources • Shell • Sockets • Spooling and Buffering • Starvation • Streams • System Calls • Thrashing • Timers • Using Peripherals • Virtualisation • Write Buffer

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