Socket programming is a way of connecting two nodes on a network to communicate with each other. One socket(node) listens on a particular port at an IP, while other socket reaches out to the other to form a connection. Server forms the listener socket while client reaches out to the server.
State diagram for server and client model
Writing networking code that is portable is easy to maintain has been an issue since long. C++ took a step to resolve this issue by introducing boost.asio. It is a cross-platform C++ library for network and low-level I/O programming that provides developers with a consistent asynchronous model using a modern C++ approach. Here’s a list of what it offers:
Cross platform networking code (code would work on Windows, Linux, etc.)
IPv4 and IPv6 support
Asynchronous event support
Timer support
iostream compatibility
And much more. You can get the complete overview of the library here.
I’m currently in Linux so would be covering environment setup for the same.
We just need the following to get started:
boost.asio
C++ compiler (preferably g++)
Text-editor
The simplest way to get asio on linux is by executing the following command:
sudo apt-get install libboost-all-dev
If you’re using some other platform or the above doesn’t seem a good fit for you, follow the document here to get asio on your system.
The next step is to make sure you have C++ compiler on your compiler. I’m using g++. You can get the same with the following command in linux.
sudo apt-get install g++
Once you have the compiler, you’re good to follow along. I don’t have any text-editor preference. You can choose one of your choice.
Now that we have everything, we are in a position to start coding.