[C++]Structs in Socket Programming

Below are IP structs used in socket programming.

struct addrinfo

struct addrinfo {
    int              ai_flags;     // AI_PASSIVE, AI_CANONNAME, etc.
    int              ai_family;    // AF_INET, AF_INET6, AF_UNSPEC
    int              ai_socktype;  // SOCK_STREAM, SOCK_DGRAM
    int              ai_protocol;  // use 0 for "any"
    size_t           ai_addrlen;   // size of ai_addr in bytes
    struct sockaddr *ai_addr;      // struct sockaddr_in or _in6
    char            *ai_canonname; // full canonical hostname

    struct addrinfo *ai_next;      // linked list, next node
};

struct sockaddr

struct sockaddr {
    unsigned short    sa_family;    // address family, AF_xxx
    char              sa_data[14];  // 14 bytes of protocol address
}; 

struct sockaddr_in

// (IPv4 only--see struct sockaddr_in6 for IPv6)

struct sockaddr_in {
    short int          sin_family;  // Address family, AF_INET
    unsigned short int sin_port;    // Port number
    struct in_addr     sin_addr;    // Internet address
    unsigned char      sin_zero[8]; // Same size as struct sockaddr
};

struct in_addr

// (IPv4 only--see struct in6_addr for IPv6)

// Internet address (a structure for historical reasons)
struct in_addr {
    uint32_t s_addr; // that's a 32-bit int (4 bytes)
};

struct sockaddr_in6

// (IPv6 only--see struct sockaddr_in and struct in_addr for IPv4)

struct sockaddr_in6 {
    u_int16_t       sin6_family;   // address family, AF_INET6
    u_int16_t       sin6_port;     // port number, Network Byte Order
    u_int32_t       sin6_flowinfo; // IPv6 flow information
    struct in6_addr sin6_addr;     // IPv6 address
    u_int32_t       sin6_scope_id; // Scope ID
};

struct in6_addr {
    unsigned char   s6_addr[16];   // IPv6 address
};

struct sockaddr_storage

struct sockaddr_storage {
    sa_family_t  ss_family;     // address family

    // all this is padding, implementation specific, ignore it:
    char      __ss_pad1[_SS_PAD1SIZE];
    int64_t   __ss_align;
    char      __ss_pad2[_SS_PAD2SIZE];
};

Above from:
http://beej.us/guide/bgnet/output/html/multipage/ipstructsdata.html#structs


struct hostent

struct  hostent
{
  char    *h_name;        /* official name of host */
  char    **h_aliases;    /* alias list */
  int     h_addrtype;     /* host address type */
  int     h_length;       /* length of address */
  char    **h_addr_list;  /* list of addresses from name server */
  #define h_addr  h_addr_list[0]  /* address, for backward compatiblity */
};

It defines a host computer on the Internet. The members of this structure are:

h_name       Official name of the host.
h_aliases    A zero  terminated  array  of  alternate
             names for the host.
h_addrtype   The  type  of  address  being  returned;
             currently always AF_INET.
h_length     The length, in bytes, of the address.
h_addr_list  A pointer to a list of network addresses
             for the named host.  Host addresses are
             returned in network byte order.

Note that h_addr is an alias for the first address in the array of network addresses.