Noun

Singular protocol

Plural protocols

protocol (plural protocols)

1. A rule, guideline, or document which guides how an activity should be performed.
2. The original copy of any writing, as of a deed, treaty, dispatch, or other instrument.
3. The minutes, or rough draft, of an instrument or transaction.
4. (diplomacy) A preliminary document upon the basis of which negotiations are carried on.
5. (diplomacy) A convention not formally ratified.
6. (diplomacy) An agreement of diplomatists indicating the results reached by them at a particular stage of a negotiation.
7. (computing) A set of formal rules describing how to transmit data, especially across a network. A message syntax or electrical specification and a description 2 or more communication nodes: finite state machines, the transition functions of which take messages or times as input and, when then so triggered, may themselves send messages.

Standards in information automation

• Communications protocol
• Protocol (computing), a set of instructions for transferring data
  • Internet Protocol
• Protocol (object-oriented programming)
• Cryptographic protocol

Procedures for human behavior

• Protocol (diplomacy)
• Protocol (politics), a formal agreement between nation states (cf: treaty).
• Protocol, a.k.a. etiquette
• Clinical protocol, a.k.a. guideline (medical)
• Research methods:
  • Protocol (natural sciences)
  • Clinical trial protocol

Other

• Protocol (film)
• Protocol (band), British