The User Datagram Protocol (UDP) is one of the core
members of Internet protocol suite. With UDP, computer applications can be sent
via messages, in this referred to as datagrams, to other hosts on an IP
protocol network without communications to set up special transmission channels
or data paths. Since TCP consumes immense bandwidth resources, therefore UDP
was conceived. UDP is suitable for purposes where error-checking and correction
is either not necessary or performed in the application, thus reducing the time
taken for handover and synchronization.
UDP is suitable for very large number of clients. It works well in unidirectional communication. UDP is used in connection-less applications with the packet headers less than 512 bytes. Since UDP has an advantage of speed, it is preferred in heavy applications such as video. When data is sent, UDP does not check whether it is received by each recipient and does not re-transmit it. This is an advantage because it takes less time but this is also a disadvantage as no one is sure whether all the information is received or not. After the source and destination ports are transmitted, an additional 16 bits of length and check sum is transmitted. Due to low bandwidth utilization, transfer is faster and time is effectively saved.
The disadvantages of UDP are -it is unreliable, it does not send data in a sequence and it does not check for errors. And the main advantage is that it is speedy.
Submitted by -Km. Angana Borah
Class X
Class X