Sandman
In article <ln1a99l8do45a63svi40iuv6be85u8thb2@4ax.com>, Tony Cooper wrote:

Tony Cooper
A policy determines what people do, but the protocol determines what a program does.

Sandman
Well, there's your problem. You think a protocol determines what a program does... Maybe that's why you were talking about the totally unrelated FTP before? You think programs are filled with developer-enabled protocols or something like that.

The word "protocol" isn't tied to programs at all. In fact, few would use "protocol" to anything software related unless you are in reference to that alternate definition of "protocol" that deals with *communication between computers*, like FTP or HTTP, or NNTP - all protocols, but not a fixed set of steps.

"What a program does" is defined by the code, which few would consider to be a "protocol" by any stretch of the imagination. Most, if not all, code consists of conditional statements that decide the outcome of any process, usually in the form of if/else statements. So, a crude backup software could look something like this:

-- if (isset($backup_destination)){ exec("/bin/cp -R /home/$USER /mnt/$backup_destination"); } else { $backup_destination = prompt("Where do you want to backup to?"); } --

Few, if any, developers would call this a protocol. It's just conditional code. And I fear that nospam's suspicion was correct, you're way out of your league here because you're ignorant about the technical nature of these things. Maybe "protocol" is your way to make sense, in your head, for a series of steps taken by the software that you don't understand how it is done? No shame in that, you're in good company if you know nothing about the tech trivia of computers.