GPT README: TCP/IP Illustrated Concepts Implemented in Go Overview

This educational project is designed to demonstrate the core concepts from "TCP/IP Illustrated, Volume 2" by Kevin R. Fall and Richard Stevens, but with a unique focus on how these networking concepts can be mapped and interpolated into application-level concurrency models in Go. Instead of purely focusing on low-level network programming, this project emphasizes the translation of TCP/IP principles into Go's processes, goroutines, channels, and concurrency mechanisms. Purpose

The main goal of this project is to teach how network communication principles like flow control, packet handling, and protocol communication can be abstracted and applied within Go applications. The project explores how core networking ideas from the book can be modeled in application layers, using Go's concurrency patterns (such as goroutines, channels, and synchronization primitives).

This project is intended as a learning tool for those studying network programming, concurrency, and parallelism in Go. It highlights how networking principles influence internal processes and communication channels within Go applications.

Each folder contains Go modules that implement networking concepts using Go’s concurrency primitives. The design models internal application communication as if it were network communication, using channels to represent TCP connections and goroutines as processes. Key Concepts Covered

Reliable Delivery (tcp_reliable_delivery/):
This module maps TCP's reliability concepts, such as acknowledgment (ACK) and retransmission, to Go’s concurrency tools like channels and synchronization mechanisms.

Flow Control (flow_control/):
This demonstrates TCP’s flow control concepts using Go’s buffered and unbuffered channels. The channel’s buffering mechanisms are used to simulate TCP's sliding window, showing how flow can be managed between producer and consumer goroutines.

Process Scheduling (process_scheduling/):
Implements process scheduling and multiprocessing using Go’s goroutines. It models the behavior of multiple network processes interacting asynchronously, highlighting Go’s ability to handle concurrency with efficiency.

Fragmentation Handling (fragmentation_handling/):
Simulates packet fragmentation and reassembly using Go's concurrency model. Different pieces of data (fragments) are passed through channels and reassembled by goroutines, showcasing how Go applications can handle fragmented inputs in parallel.

Multiplexing (multiplexing/):
This module demonstrates protocol multiplexing, where multiple data streams (goroutines) are handled by a select statement, mimicking how TCP/IP multiplexes different data connections across the network.

Congestion Handling (congestion_handling/):
Simulates TCP congestion control algorithms using Go’s synchronization tools like Mutexes and WaitGroups. It shows how congestion detection, avoidance, and control can be implemented at the application level to manage concurrent tasks efficiently.

Error Control (error_control/):
Models error detection and control in Go, using retry mechanisms, timeouts, and error-handling strategies in goroutines to replicate the behavior of error handling in TCP.

Technologies and Tools Used

Go Language: The entire project is written in Go, making heavy use of its concurrency primitives (goroutines, channels, mutexes).
Goroutines: Used to model processes and parallel tasks, simulating how multiple connections are handled in a network.
Channels: Key tool for communication between goroutines, modeling the transmission of packets or data streams between entities.
Select Statement: Used for multiplexing and managing multiple channels of data at once, similar to how multiple network connections are managed.
Go Sync Package: Provides synchronization mechanisms such as WaitGroups and Mutexes, which are used to control concurrency and manage shared state.

Educational Focus

This project is an educational tool aimed at teaching the principles of concurrent programming in Go, while abstracting networking concepts from TCP/IP. It offers hands-on experience for developers looking to understand:

How networking ideas can be implemented inside applications.
How to use Go’s concurrency patterns to manage internal communication efficiently.
The parallels between Go’s application-level constructs and TCP/IP’s network-level principles.

Getting Started

To begin, choose a module that aligns with the concept you are interested in, read through the provided code and comments, and experiment with the implementation. Each module builds upon fundamental Go principles to demonstrate how high-level networking ideas can be applied within software design. License

This project is licensed under the MIT License. Feel free to use it for educational purposes, modify it, and share it. Author

Yaroslav Baienko - DevOps and SysOps Engineer, Microservices developer (Python and GO). For more information, reach out via my GitHub​.