.NET Sockets Programming Using C

Chapter 13

.NET Sockets Programming Using C#

Microsoft has introduced a new programming interface called .NET Application Frameworks version 1, which is a large collection of object-oriented classes that allows applications to work better in a highly distributed environment such as the Internet. .NET Frameworks provides a myriad amount of functionality from drawing graphics on a screen to processing Extensible Markup Language (XML) data. This chapter primarily focuses on one of the .NET Framework classes, .NET Sockets, which allows a .NET application to take advantage of the Winsock programming interface in a new object oriented fashion. The .NET Sockets programming interface is actually known as the System.Net.Sockets namespace that is included in the new .NET Framework SDK. The .NET Frameworks version 1 can be installed on Windows 98, Windows Me, Windows NT 4.0, Windows 2000, and Windows XP.

The .NET Framework classes can be accessed from Visual Basic, Visual C++, and a new language named C# (pronounced C sharp). This chapter is intended to introduce you to the new .NET Sockets namespace, providing basic information about how to use the methods and properties available in the library to perform Winsock communication. Our discussion will demonstrate .NET Sockets using primarily the IPv4 protocol to perform simple TCP and UDP communication over a socket. We also will describe IPv6 in a limited fashion. The information is presented using the C# programming language. This chapter does not detail all of the methods available to make every Winsock call, functionality, or protocol and assumes you have familiarity with C# and Winsock programming techniques.