TCP

The Transmission Control Protocol is the most widely used transport protocol. It also forms the basis for other protocols. TCP establishes a failsafe, direct, connection-based communication channel over IP between two endpoints, which are known as sockets.

UDP

The User Datagram Protocol is a connectionless, non-reliable communication channel between endpoints. In contrast to TCP, the receiver does not notice when data packets go missing. The transmission speed is higher than that of TCP.

FTP

The File Transfer Protocol is used to transmit character-based or binary files over TCP/IP.

HTTP

The Hypertext Transfer Protocol is a stateless, point-to-point protocol. In addition to being used to call web pages, it also forms the basis for a number of protocols for addressing web services.

IIOP

The Internet Inter-ORB protocol is defined in the CORBA standard and is used by distributed Object Request Brokers (ORBs) to communicate with one another across the network. This involves methods being called by remote components or objects. IIOP is a specialized version of the abstract GIOP (General Inter-ORB Protocol) based on TCP/IP. ORBs from different manufacturers can communicate with one another using IIOP.

IIOP is also an alternative communication protocol for RMI.

RMI

The Java Remote Method Invocation describes RPCs (Remote Procedure Calls) for Java applications, which are the method calls made by an object running in one JVM (Java Virtual Machine) to an object running in another. This JVM may also be on a different physical machine.

RMI is also the communication protocol for remote calls to Java objects. As an alternative, IIOP can be used, in which case the complete protocol is referred to as RMI over IIOP.

ODBC

Open Database Connectivity is a standardized API used as a database interface for applications. Product-specific ODBC drivers are required.

JDBC

Java Database Connectivity is a Java EE API specification which gives Java applications standardized access to databases. A JDBC-ODBC bridge allows ODBC databases to be addressed via JDBC. Product-specific JDBC drivers are used to access databases.

JMS

Java Message Service is a Java EE API specification for exchanging messages between Java applications. Point-to-point communication is defined on the basis of queues, while publish/subscribe communication is based on topics.

SQL*NET/

Net8

This is Oracle client/server middleware, which establishes connections between the client and the database, or between two databases. It is based on TNS (Transparent Network Substrate). This is Oracle's network architecture, which provides a standardized API, giving applications transparent access to the lower-level network protocols.

SOAP

SOAP is a protocol specification for exchanging structured information in the implementation of Web Services in computer networks. The transport formats are based on XML, and HTTP is generally used as the transport protocol. SOAP forms the foundation layer of a web services protocol stack.

XML-RPC

In historical terms, the XML Remote Procedure Call is the predecessor of SOAP. The protocol defines simple XML data containers for transporting information from service providers to service consumers. It is used for synchronous calls from remote service interfaces. It is generally based on HTTP, but JMS and XMPP (Jabber-RPC) can also be used.

MSMQ

Microsoft Message Queuing is a queue-based message protocol from Microsoft.

SMTP

The Simple Mail Transmission Protocol is used to exchange e-mails.

IMAP

The Internet Message Access Protocol is used to download e-mails from a mail server. The mails remain physically on the server.

POP3

The Post Office Protocol 3 is used to physically download e-mails from a mail server.

XMPP

The Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol allows for real-time communication through XML protocols (referred to as instant messaging). XMPP forms the basis for the widely used Jabber protocol for instant messaging.

NFS

The Network File System protocol, originally developed by SUN Microsystems, gives access to files over a network. The files are not transferred in the same way as with FTP, but instead they remain a shared resource on the server. NFS is based on TCP/IP.

SMB

The Service Message Block is the Microsoft Windows equivalent of NFS, which comes originally from the Unix world.

iSCSI

The Internet Small Computer System Interface (iSCSI) protocol enables clients (referred to here as initiators) to send SCSI commands (known as CDBs) to an SCSI storage device on a remote computer. This is a distributed SAN (Storage Area Network) protocol, which creates virtual disk space. iSCSI can be used over longer distances on an existing network infrastructure. In contrast, fiber channel protocols require special cabling.

DCOM

The Distributed Component Object Model is an object-oriented RPC system, based on the DCEstandard. It was defined by Microsoft to allow COM technology to communicate over a network. Although DCOM was developed by, and is largely used, by Microsoft (for example, ActiveX), there are a range of adapters which make it possible to communicate through DCOM without using DCOM directly.

ADO.NET

ADO.NET is part of the Microsoft .NET platform. It consists of a collection of classes which allow access to relational databases.

ADO.NET is the successor to ActiveX Data Objects (ADO).

ebXML

ebXML stands for Electronic Business using XML. It is not an individual standard, but a family of different standards from UN/CEFACT and OASIS. The ebXML standards include the ebXML Technical Architecture Specification, an XML Business Process Specification Schema, a Registry Services Specification with Registry Information Model (ebRIM), and a Message Service Specification (Patil, Newcomer 2003).

EdiFact

United Nations Electronic Data Interchange for Administration, Commerce and Transport (EDI, UN/Edifact) is a global standard which allows the traceable processing of business transactions among companies, or between companies and public authorities using the standardized electronic exchange of data (Grangard et al. 2001).

SWIFT

The Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications is a society which supplies telecommunications services between banks all over the world. The term SWIFT is also used to refer to the network that the society provides. SWIFT is used to exchange messages between banks (CSSWIFT 2005).

HL7

Health Level 7 is an international standard for exchanging data between applications and systems in the healthcare sector. It (HL7V3 1998) describes communication at an application level on the basis of level 7 of the ISO/OSI reference model for communication (ISO7498-1).

BAPI

Business Application Programming Interface is a standardized programming interface for SAP Business Objects. BAPIs enable external programs to access SAP R/3 data and business processes (Moser 2003).

IDoc

Intermediate Document is a SAP format for exchanging data from a business transaction. Different IDoc types are available to support different message types. For example, the IDoc format ORDERS01 can be used for orders and order confirmations (Krawczyk 2006).

AdsML

Accelerating Advertising Processes in the Digital Age is a collection of e-commerce standards that support the exchange of business messages using XML in the advertising industry (Brunner 2007).

RosettaNet

Within the RosettaNet organization, user groups and members agree on and standardize open, cross-industry communication and workflow processes for the electronic exchange of business documents between the users' IT systems. This enables suppliers and customers to exchange data with as few media and data conversion problems as possible (B2B). The focus is primarily on logistics and production, but the exchange of product and material data and service processes are also included (Damodaran 2004).