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Glossary of Data Communications Terms
Courtesy Enterprise-Wide Computing, Inc.
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Term:
gateway
Definition:
the hardware and software necessary to make two techno-
logically different networks communicate with one another;
a gateway provides protocol conversion from one network
architec- ture to another and may, therefore, use all seven
layers of the OSI Reference Model; a special purpose,
dedicated computer that attaches to two or more networks
and routes packets from one to the other. The term is
loosely applied to any machine that transfers information
from one network to another, as in mail gateway. A
hardware/software package that runs on the OSI application
layer and allows incompatible protocols to communicate.
Includes X.25 gateways. Usually connects PCs to a host
machine such as an IBM mainframe.
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