Applying the object-oriented approach to the OSI communication protocols

The complexity of the OSI communication protocols and the need for frequent changes cause difficulties when conventional software engineering methods are used to design and implement communication software. This paper describes a general framework for the object-oriented design of communication software based upon the OSI protocols. The general framework captures the common structure and behaviour found in the protocols for layers 3 to 7 of the OSI reference model. We found that the object-oriented approach fits in well with the nature of the OSI communication protocols and confirmed that the object-oriented approach is appropriate for the development of OSI communication software