Network socket
internal endpoint for sending or receiving data within a node on a computer network
A network socket is a software structure within a network node of a computer network that serves as an endpoint for sending and receiving data across the network. The structure and properties of a socket are defined by an application programming interface (API) for the networking architecture. Sockets are created only during the lifetime of a process of an application running in the node.
Because of the standardization of the TCP/IP protocols in the development of the Internet, the term network socket is most commonly used in the context of the Internet protocol suite, and is therefore often also referred to as Internet socket. In this context, a socket is externally identified to other hosts by its socket address, which is the 3-tuple of transport protocol, IP address, and port number.
The term socket is also used for the software endpoint of node-internal inter-process communication (IPC), which often uses the same API as a network socket.
Use
The use of the term socket in software is analogous to the function of an electrical female connector, a device in hardware for communication between nodes interconnected with an electrical cable. Similarly, the term port refers to external physical endpoints at a node or device.
The application programming interface (API) for the network protocol stack creates a handle for each socket created by an application, commonly referred to as a socket descriptor. In Unix-like operating systems, this descriptor is a type of file descriptor.
The public source identifies “Network socket” as internal endpoint for sending or receiving data within a node on a computer network. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Network, socket and internal.
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A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Network socket”, the useful work is to connect “internal endpoint for sending or receiving data within a node on a computer network” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.
Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 10, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q632343. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference.
The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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This entry incorporates text from “Network socket” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.