Apple Certified Support Professional (ACSP) Practice Exam

The protocol that is primarily used for end-to-end data connectivity between two IP devices is TCP, or Transmission Control Protocol. TCP operates at the transport layer of the Internet Protocol suite and is responsible for facilitating reliable communication between devices. It establishes a connection between the sender and receiver before the actual data transmission occurs, ensuring that all packets are sent and received in the correct order. This connection-oriented nature of TCP allows it to provide error checking and recovery, meaning it can retransmit lost packets and ensure that the data sent is complete and accurate.

In contrast, other protocols like UDP (User Datagram Protocol) offer a connectionless service, which does not guarantee delivery, order, or error correction. While UDP can be suitable for applications that require faster transmission and can tolerate some data loss, it lacks the reliability that TCP provides.

FTP (File Transfer Protocol) and HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol) are both higher-level protocols that rely on TCP to achieve their functions, whether it’s transferring files or delivering web content. Thus, TCP is the foundational transport protocol that enables end-to-end data connectivity reliably between IP devices.