The document discusses layered protocols and how they enable communication across open systems. It describes the seven layers of the OSI model from physical to application layer. Each layer has a specific role like physical for transmission, data link for error detection, network for routing, transport for reliable delivery, and above for session control and common applications. Remote procedure calls allow programs to call procedures on other machines through client and server stubs that marshal parameters and results. Distributed objects extend this to encapsulate data and operations through proxies and skeletons.