IPX

 IPX (Internetwork Packet Exchange) is a network protocol suite that was developed by Novell for communication between devices on a local area network (LAN). It was commonly used in the 1990s and early 2000s, particularly in Novell NetWare networks.

IPX provides a connectionless communication service, meaning that packets are transmitted without establishing a dedicated connection between the sender and receiver. It uses a network address and a node address to identify devices on the network.

IPX packets are similar to IP packets, but they have different headers and are addressed using different addressing schemes. IPX packets are typically transmitted using the Ethernet or Token Ring physical layer protocols.

One advantage of IPX over TCP/IP is that it can be more efficient in certain network configurations, particularly in small, homogeneous networks. However, TCP/IP has become the dominant protocol suite for internet communication, and IPX is now mostly obsolete.