README.md

TCP File Processor

A program that establishes a TCP connection with a remote server, sends a local file to the server for processing, and receives and stores the processed file in the local file system. Watch a GIF of me interacting with it below!

 

Features

• Server ECHO: The server sends back the same data it receives from the client without any modification.
• Server ZIP: The server receives data from the client, compresses it using the GZIP format, and sends it back to the client.
• Server UNZIP: The server receives GZIP compressed data from the client, decompresses it, and sends it back to the client.
• The client opens a TCP Socket to communicate with the server; it first sends the service code provided as a command line argument to the server, followed by the input file to be processed. At the same time (ie. simultaneously), it reads the server's processed file chunks from the Socket and writes them to the output file. The server works analogously in the opposite direction (it reads the regular file from the Socket, processes it, and writes to the Socket).
• The server continues reading from its Socket input stream by repeatedly calling the read() method until it returns -1 (indicating the stream is at the end of the file). The client signals to the server that transmission is complete (allowing it to stop its reading) by calling shutdownOutput() to close its side of the connection. The client can no longer send but can still read the processed data coming from the server (analogous to sending a segment with FIN = 1); the client state goes from ESTAB -> FIN_WAIT1 -> FIN_WAIT2. See the image below:

In the above image, we see that the client can still receive data from the server even after sending a segment with FIN = 1. This is exactly what is happening in our program; the client closes its side of the connection after the entire file is sent, but continues reading the processed file from the server.

• Client uses a parallel rather than serial design to prevent deadlock; with a serial design, the client would need to transmit its entire file before reading from the server. For very large files, the client would not yet read anything from its Socket; the Socket buffer would quickly fill up with the server's processed data. This would then block the server when it calls write() on the Socket output stream (this is the flow control of TCP and is how the Socket is designed); a blocked server would not read from its Socket input stream, which then blocks the client. Both the client and server would be blocked, leading to a deadlock. The client uses two threads to work around this; one for sending data, and another for reading processed data.

Usage/Limitations

When Running the Client:

• -i <input_file> specifies the name of the file to be processed by the server; REQUIRED
• -o <output_file> specifies the name of the processed output file; defaults to input_file.out
• -c <service_code> specifies the service code requested from the server; 0 is ECHO, 1 is GZIP, 2 is UNZIP. Defaults to 1 (GZIP).
• -b <buffer_size> specifies the buffer size in bytes used for writing the file to the server and reading processed data. Defaults to 10000.
• -p <port_number> specifies the server's port; default is 2025.
• -s <server_name> specifies the server's hostname; default is localhost.

When Running the Server:

• -p <port_number> specifies the server's port; default is 2025; the -p flags should match when running both the client and server. Otherwise, the client will be unable to connect.
• -b <buffer_size> specifies the buffer size (in bytes) used at the server for read/write operations; default is 1000.
• quit shuts the server down if it is already running.

If you want to start up the project on your local machine:

1. Download the code as a ZIP:
   
    

2. Unzip the code:
   
    

3. Open the folder in an IDE, such as VSCode:
   
    

4. Start the server by running streamserver.jar, as follows:

   cd server
   java -jar streamserver.jar
         [-b <buffer_size>]
         [-p <port_number>]
   

 

5. Start the client by compiling all files and running ClientDriver.java, as follows:

cd client
javac *.java
java ClientDriver -i ../files/<input_file>
      [-o <output_file>]
      [-c <service_code>]
      [-b <buffer_size>]
      [-p <port_number>]
      [-s <server_name>]