Communications Protocol - Protocol Development

Protocol Development

For communication to take place, protocols have to be agreed upon. Recall that in digital computing systems, the rules can be expressed by algorithms and datastructures, raising the opportunity of hardware independence. Expressing the algorithms in a portable programming language, makes the protocolsoftware operating system independent. The sourcecode could be considered a protocol specification. This form of specification, however is not suitable for the parties involved.

For one thing, this would enforce a source on all parties and for another, proprietary software producers would not accept this. By describing the software interfaces of the modules on paper and agreeing on the interfaces, implementers are free to do it their way. This is referred to as source independence. By specifying the algorithms on paper and detailing hardware dependencies in an unambiguous way, a paper draft is created, that when adhered to and published, ensures interoperability between software and hardware.

Such a paper draft can be developed into a protocol standard by getting the approval of a standards organization. To get the approval the paper draft needs to enter and successfully complete the standardization process. This activity is referred to as protocol development. The members of the standards organization agree to adhere to the standard on a voluntary basis. Often the members are in control of large market-shares relevant to the protocol and in many cases, standards are enforced by law or the government, because they are thought to serve an important public interest, so getting approval can be very important for the protocol.

It should be noted though that in some cases protocol standards are not sufficient to gain widespread acceptance i.e. sometimes the sourcecode needs to be disclosed enforced by law or the government in the interest of the public.