Which statement about sockets is correct?

• A. A socket designates a specific program on a host by mapping to an IP and port.
• B. A socket is a physical cable connecting devices.
• C. A socket guarantees real-time data delivery.
• D. A socket is the HTTP protocol.

Answer: (A)

A socket is the endpoint a program uses to communicate over a network. It designates a specific program on a host by mapping to an IP address and a port, so messages sent to that IP and port are delivered to that particular process. This concept is the reason the statement is the best fit: the socket ties a running program to a network endpoint, enabling inter-process communication across machines. It’s not a physical cable, so the option describing a hardware connection isn’t correct. It doesn’t by itself guarantee real-time delivery—that depends on the transport protocol (for example, TCP vs UDP) and network conditions, not the socket as an abstraction. And it isn’t the HTTP protocol; HTTP is an application-layer protocol that can run over a socket (as its transport), but the socket itself is the transport endpoint, not HTTP.