OSI model

Layer 1 - Physical
Physical layer defines the cable or physical medium itself, e.g., thinnet, thicknet, unshielded twisted pairs (UTP). All media are functionally equivalent. The main difference is in convenience and cost of installation and maintenance. Converters from one media to another operate at this level.

Layer 2 - Data Link

Data Link layer defines the format of data on the network. A network data frame, aka packet, includes checksum, source and destination address, and data. The largest packet that can be sent through a data link layer defines the Maximum Transmission Unit (MTU). The data link layer handles the physical and logical connections to the packet's destination, using a network interface. A host connected to an Ethernet would have an Ethernet interface to handle connections to the outside world, and a loopback interface to send packets to itself. Ethernet addresses a host using a unique, 48-bit address called its Ethernet address or Media Access Control (MAC) address. MAC addresses are usually represented as six colon-separated pairs of hex digits, e.g., 8:0:20:11:ac:85. This number is unique and is associated with a particular Ethernet device. Hosts with multiple network interfaces should use the same MAC address on each. The data link layer's protocol-specific header specifies the MAC address of the packet's source and destination. When a packet is sent to all hosts (broadcast), a special MAC address (ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff) is used.

Layer 3 - Network
NFS uses Internetwork Protocol (IP) as its network layer interface. IP is responsible for routing, directing datagrams from one network to another. The network layer may have to break large datagrams, larger than MTU, into smaller packets and host receiving the packet will have to reassemble the fragmented datagram. The Internetwork Protocol identifies each host with a 32-bit IP address. IP addresses are written as four dot-separated decimal numbers between 0 and 255, e.g., 129.79.16.40. The leading 1-3 bytes of the IP identify the network and the remaining bytes identifies the host on that network. The network portion of the IP is assigned by InterNIC Registration Services, under the contract to the National Science Foundation, and the host portion of the IP is assigned by the local network administrators. For large sites, the first two bytes represents the network portion of the IP, and the third and fourth bytes identify the subnet and host respectively. Even though IP packets are addressed using IP addresses, hardware addresses must be used to actually transport data from one host to another. The Address Resolution Protocol (ARP) is used to map the IP address to it hardware address.

Layer 4 - Transport
Transport layer subdivides user-buffer into network-buffer sized datagrams and enforces desired transmission control. Two transport protocols, Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) and User Datagram Protocol (UDP), sits at the transport layer. Reliability and speed are the primary difference between these two protocols. TCP establishes connections between two hosts on the network through 'sockets' which are determined by the IP address and port number. TCP keeps track of the packet delivery order and the packets that must be resent. Maintaining this information for each connection makes TCP a stateful protocol. UDP on the other hand provides a low overhead transmission service, but with less error checking. NFS is built on top of UDP because of its speed and statelessness. Statelessness simplifies the crash recovery.

Layer 5 - Session
The session protocol defines the format of the data sent over the connections. The NFS uses the Remote Procedure Call (RPC) for its session protocol. RPC may be built on either TCP or UDP. Login sessions uses TCP whereas NFS and broadcast use UDP.

Layer 6 - Presentation
External Data Representation (XDR) sits at the presentation level. It converts local representation of data to its canonical form and vice versa. The canonical uses a standard byte ordering and structure packing convention, independent of the host.

Layer 7 - Application
Provides network services to the end-users. Mail, ftp, telnet, DNS, NIS, NFS are examples of network applications.

cryptography
definition Cryptography is the science of information security. The word is derived from the Greek kryptos, meaning hidden. Cryptography is closely related to the disciplines of cryptology and cryptanalysis. Cryptography includes techniques such as microdots, merging words with images, and other ways to hide information in storage or transit. However, in today's computer-centric world, cryptography is most often associated with scrambling plaintext (ordinary text, sometimes referred to as cleartext) into ciphertext (a process called encryption), then back again (known as decryption). Individuals who practice this field are known as cryptographers.

Simple explanation of encryption and decryption methods

What is a Digital Signature?

An introduction to Digital Signatures, by David Youd

(Bob's public key)

Bob

(Bob's private key)

Bob has been given two keys. One of Bob's keys is called a Public Key, the other is called a Private Key. Bob's Co-workers:
Anyone can get Bob's Public Key, but Bob keeps his Private Key to himself

Pat

Doug

Susan

Bob's Public key is available to anyone who needs it, but he keeps his Private Key to himself. Keys are used to encrypt information. Encrypting information means "scrambling it up", so that only a person with the appropriate key can make it readable again. Either one of Bob's two keys can encrypt data, and the other key can decrypt that data. Susan (shown below) can encrypt a message using Bob's Public Key. Bob uses his Private Key to decrypt the message. Any of Bob's coworkers might have access to the message Susan encrypted, but without Bob's Private Key, the data is worthless.
"Hey Bob, how about lunch at Taco Bell. I hear they have free refills!" HNFmsEm6Un BejhhyCGKOK JUxhiygSBCEiC 0QYIh/Hn3xgiK BcyLK1UcYiY lxx2lCFHDC/A HNFmsEm6Un BejhhyCGKOK JUxhiygSBCEiC 0QYIh/Hn3xgiK BcyLK1UcYiY lxx2lCFHDC/A "Hey Bob, how about lunch at Taco Bell. I hear they have free refills!"

With his private key and the right software, Bob can put digital signatures on documents and other data. A digital signature is a "stamp" Bob places on the data which is unique to Bob, and is very difficult to forge. In addition, the signature assures that any changes made to the data that has been signed can not go undetected.

To sign a document, Bob's software will crunch down the data into just a few lines by a process called "hashing". These few lines are called a message digest. (It is not possible to change a message digest back into the original data from which it was created.)

Bob's software then encrypts the message digest with his private key. The result is the digital signature.

Finally, Bob's software appends the digital signature to document. All of the data that was hashed has been signed.

Bob now passes the document on to Pat.

First, Pat's software decrypts the signature (using Bob's public key) changing it back into a message digest. If this worked, then it proves that Bob signed the document, because only Bob has his private key. Pat's software then hashes the document data into a message digest. If the message digest is the same as the message digest created when the signature was decrypted, then Pat knows that the signed data has not been changed.

Plot complication...
Doug (our disgruntled employee) wishes to deceive Pat. Doug makes sure that Pat receives a signed message and a public key that appears to belong to Bob. Unbeknownst to Pat, Doug deceitfully sent a key pair he created using Bob's name. Short of receiving Bob's public key from him in person, how can Pat be sure that Bob's public key is authentic?

It just so happens that Susan works at the company's certificate authority center. Susan can create a digital certificate for Bob simply by signing Bob's public key as well as some information about Bob. Bob Info:
Name Department Cubical Number

Certificate Info:
Expiration Date Serial Number

Bob's Public Key:

Now Bob's co-workers can check Bob's trusted certificate to make sure that his public key truly belongs to him. In fact, no one at Bob's company accepts a signature for which there does not exist a certificate generated by Susan. This gives Susan the power to revoke signatures if private keys are compromised, or no longer needed. There are even more widely accepted certificate authorities that certify Susan. Let's say that Bob sends a signed document to Pat. To verify the signature on the document, Pat's software first uses Susan's (the certificate authority's) public key to check the signature on Bob's certificate. Successful de-encryption of the certificate proves that Susan created it. After the certificate is de-encrypted, Pat's software can check if Bob is in good standing with the certificate authority and that all of the certificate information concerning Bob's identity has not been altered.
Pat's software then takes Bob's public key from the certificate and uses it to check Bob's signature. If Bob's public key de-encrypts the signature successfully, then Pat is assured that the signature was created using Bob's private key, for Susan has certified the matching public key. And of course, if the signature is valid, then we know that Doug didn't try to change the signed content.