Link Capacity and Capability
The dynamic nature and the diversity of the Internet and its components provide no guarantee that any particular path is actually capable of, or suitable for, performing the data transmission requested, even if the path is available and reliable. One of the technical constraints is the size of data packets allowed on a given link. An application must assure that it uses proper transmission characteristics. Some of this responsibility lies also in the upper layer protocols. Facilities exist to examine the maximum transmission unit (MTU) size of the local link and Path MTU Discovery can be used for the entire projected path to the destination. The IPv4 internetworking layer has the capability to automatically fragment the original datagram into smaller units for transmission. In this case, IP provides re-ordering of fragments delivered out of order.
The Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) is an example of a protocol that adjusts its segment size to be smaller than the MTU. The User Datagram Protocol (UDP) and the Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP) disregard MTU size, thereby forcing IP to fragment oversized datagrams.
Read more about this topic: IPv9
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