Network Byte Order - C++ server and Java Client

Hi all,
Is it necessary that the byte order should be taken care at the client end to suit the server requirements through bitwise shifting or other techniques?
If that is the case, how application protocol clients work without even knowing about the server implementation?
I am using DataOutputstream at the Java Client end to send some data to Server implemented in C++, everything works fine but the order EXACTLY REVERSED.
Could anyone please explain how to address this and reason for this behavior?
Rgds
Muthu

Hi all,
Could anyone please help me on the above issue?
Rgds
Muthu

DataInputStream writes the high byte first. If that's not what you want, it looks like you've got two options. First, write your own OutputStream that writes the low word first. Second, if you're using Java 1.4 make use of the handy ByteOrder class to reverse your ByteBuffers as necessary.
The other option is of course the modify the C++.
"If that is the case, how application protocol clients work without even knowing about the server implementation?". In this case how you encode values isn't an implementation detail, it's a protocol spec detail. If you declare in the protocol specification that integers should be encoded low-word first, than so be it.

Anything data that is sent over a socket regardless of the application should be in network byte order, ie big endian. Byte order is hardware dependent, ie intel x86 cpus are little endian and motorola cpus for example are big endian.
Java will send data for you in network byte order (big endian) so if your C++ application is on an intel cpu, then you will need to convert from big endian (network byte order) to little endian to be able to interpret the data properly.
The c++ application should call ntohl (network to host long) and ntohs (network to host short) to convert big endian integer values to the local host little endian values. You do not need to do any conversions for ascii strings. If you are sending floating point numbers, you will need to send those as a string and then convert the string back into a floating point value. Similarly, you could send the interger values as a string and then convert the string back to an integer.
This link may explain things clearer.
http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&th=18cc9e8a8f1cf78c&seekm=VA.000000be.0086bef3%40trmphrst&frame=off

byteorder(3N)           Network Functions           byteorder(3N)
NAME
     byteorder,  htonl,  htons,  ntohl,  ntohs  -  convert values
     between host and network byte order
SYNOPSIS
     #include <sys/types.h>
     #include <netinet/in.h>
     ulong htonl(u_long hostlong);
     u_short htons(u_short hostshort);
     u_long ntohl(u_long netlong);
     u_short ntohs(u_short netshort);
MT-LEVEL
     Safe
DESCRIPTION
     These routines convert 16 and 32 bit quantities between net-
     work  byte order and host byte order.  On some architectures
     these routines are defined as NULL  macros  in  the  include
     file  <netinet/in.h>.  On other architectures, if their host
     byte order is different from network byte order, these  rou-
     tines are functional.
     These  routines  are  most  often  used  in conjunction with
     Internet addresses and ports as returned by gethostent() and
     getservent().   (See gethostbyname(3N) and getservbyname(3N)
     respectively.)
SEE ALSO
     gethostbyname(3N), getservbyname(3N)