For a transaction to take place between a client and a server, a conversation must be established. A conversation is established when a client makes a request by broadcasting a service name and topic name, and a server responds. Transactions can then take place across the conversation. When no more transactions are to be made, the conversation is terminated.
The following list identifies the elements involved with client/server activity:
A conversation is established when a server responds to a client.
A service name is a string broadcast by a client hoping to establish a conversation with a server that recognizes the service name. The service name is usually clearly related to the server application name.
The topic name identifies what the conversation between client and server is to be about. For example, it could be the name of a file that is open in the server application. Each topic is attached to one particular server. A server can have many topics.
The item usually identifies an element of the file identified by the topic which should be read (in the case of a request) or written to (in the case of a poke). For example, it might refer to a cell in a spreadsheet document.