THE FOLLOWING COMPTIA NETWORK+ EXAM OBJECTIVES ARE COVERED IN THIS CHAPTER:
IP routing is the process of moving packets from one network to another network using routers. The IP routing process is a super-important subject to understand because it pertains to all routers and configurations that use IP.
Before you read this chapter, you need to understand the difference between a routing protocol and a routed protocol. A routing protocol is a tool used by routers to dynamically find all the networks in the internetwork as well as to ensure that all routers have the same routing table. Basically, a routing protocol determines the path of a packet through an internetwork. Examples of routing protocols are Routing Information Protocol (RIP), Routing Information Protocol version 2 (RIPv2), Enhanced Interior Gateway Routing Protocol (EIGRP), and Open Shortest Path First (OSPF).
Once all routers know about all networks, a routed protocol can be used to send user data (packets) through the established internetwork. Routed protocols are assigned to an interface and determine the method of packet delivery. Examples of routed protocols are Internet Protocol (IP) and Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6).
In this chapter, I'm going to describe IP routing with routers. I will explain, in a step-by-step fashion, the IP routing process. I will also explain static and dynamic routing on a conceptual level, with more details about dynamic routing in Chapter 10, “Routing Protocols.”
To find up-to-the-minute updates for this chapter, please see www.lammle.com/networkplus or the book's website at www.sybextestbanks.wiley.com.
Once you create an internetwork by connecting your wide area networks (WANs) and local area networks (LANs) to a router, you need to configure logical network addresses, such as IP addresses, to all hosts on the internetwork so that they can communicate via routers across that internetwork.
In IT, routing essentially refers to the process of taking a packet from one device and sending it through the network to another device on a different network. Routers don't really care about hosts—they care only about networks and the best path to each network. The logical network address of the destination host is used to get packets to a network through a routed network, and then the hardware address of the host is used to deliver the packet from a router to the correct destination host.
If your network has no routers, then it should be apparent that, well, you are not routing. But if you do have them, they're there to route traffic to all the networks in your internetwork. To be capable of routing packets, a router must know at least the following information:
The router learns about remote networks from neighbor routers or from an administrator. The router then builds a routing table (a map of the internetwork) that describes how to find the remote networks. If a network is directly connected, then the router already knows how to get to it.
If a network isn't directly connected to the router, the router must use one of two ways to learn how to get to it. One way is called static routing, which can be a ton of work because it requires someone to hand-type all network locations into the routing table. The other way is dynamic routing.
In dynamic routing, a protocol on one router communicates with the same protocol running on neighbor routers. The routers then update each other about all the networks they know about and place this information into the routing table. If a change occurs in the network, the dynamic routing protocols automatically inform all routers about the event. If static routing is used, the administrator is responsible for updating all changes by hand into all routers. Understandably, in a large network, it's common to find that a combination of both dynamic and static routing is being used.
Before we jump into the IP routing process, let's take a look at a simple example that demonstrates how a router uses the routing table to route packets out of an interface. We'll be going into a more detailed study of this process in a minute.
Figure 9.1 shows a simple two-router network. Lab_A has one serial interface and three LAN interfaces.
Looking at Figure 9.1, can you figure out which interface Lab_A will use to forward an IP datagram to a host with an IP address of 10.10.10.10?
By using the Cisco IOS command show ip route, we can see the routing table (map of the internetwork) that router Lab_A will use to make all forwarding decisions:
Router_A#show ip route [output cut] Gateway of last resort is not set C 10.10.10.0/24 is directly connected, FastEthernet0/0 C 10.10.20.0/24 is directly connected, FastEthernet0/1 C 10.10.30.0/24 is directly connected, FastEthernet0/2 C 10.10.40.0/24 is directly connected, Serial 0/0
The C in the routing table output means that the networks listed are “directly connected,” and until we add a routing protocol—something like RIP, EIGRP, and so on—to the routers in our internetwork, or use static routes, we'll have only directly connected networks in our routing table.
So, let's get back to the original question: By looking at the figure and the output of the routing table, can you tell what Lab_A will do with a received packet that has a destination IP address of 10.10.10.10? If you answered, “The router will packet-switch the packet to interface FastEthernet 0/0, and this interface will then frame the packet and send it out on the network segment,” you're right.
Just because we can, let's look at a different example. Based on the output of the next routing table, which interface will a packet with a destination address of 10.10.10.14 be forwarded from?
Router_A#sh ip route [output cut] Gateway of last resort is not set C 10.10.10.16/28 is directly connected, FastEthernet0/0 C 10.10.10.8/29 is directly connected, FastEthernet0/1 C 10.10.10.4/30 is directly connected, FastEthernet0/2 C 10.10.10.0/30 is directly connected, Serial 0/0
First, you can see that the network is subnetted and that each interface has a different mask. And I have to tell you, you positively can't answer this question if you can't subnet—no way! Here's the answer: 10.10.10.14 would be a host in the 10.10.10.8/29 subnet connected to the FastEthernet 0/1 interface. Don't freak if this one left you staring vacantly. Instead, if you're struggling, go back and reread Chapter 8, “IP Subnetting, Troubleshooting IP, and Introduction to NAT,” until you get it. This should then make perfect sense to you.
When the routing tables of all routers in the network are complete (because they include information about all the networks in the internetwork), they are considered converged, or in a steady state. This is covered in more detail in Chapter 10.
Now, let's get into this process in more detail.
The IP routing process is actually pretty simple, and it doesn't change, regardless of the size of your network. I'm going to use Figure 9.2 to give you a picture of this step-by-step process. The question I'm asking is this: What happens when Host_A wants to communicate with Host_B on a different network? I'll go through how to answer that question by breaking down the process with headings to make it easier to understand. First, check out Figure 9.2.
Here you can see that a user on Host_A pings Host_B's IP address. Routing doesn't get any simpler than this, but it still involves a lot of steps. Let's work through them.
A packet is created on the host:
The packet is forwarded:
MAC addresses are always local on the LAN and never go through and past a router.
C:>arp -a Interface: 172.16.10.2 --- 0x3 Internet Address Physical Address Type 172.16.10.1 00-15-05-06-31-b0 dynamic
If the hardware address isn't already in the ARP cache of the host, an ARP broadcast is sent out onto the local network to search for the hardware address of 172.16.10.1. The router responds to that request and provides the hardware address of Ethernet 0, and the host caches this address.
The router receives the packet:
The router routes the packet:
Lab_A>sh ip route Codes:C - connected,S - static,I - IGRP,R - RIP,M - mobile,B - BGP, D - EIGRP,EX - EIGRP external,O - OSPF,IA - OSPF inter area, N1 - OSPF NSSA external type 1, N2 - OSPF NSSA external type 2, E1 - OSPF external type 1, E2 - OSPF external type 2, E - EGP,i - IS-IS, L1 - IS-IS level-1, L2 - IS-IS level-2, ia - IS-IS intearea * - candidate default, U - per-user static route, o - ODR P - periodic downloaded static route Gateway of last resort is not set 172.16.0.0/24 is subnetted, 2 subnets C 172.16.10.0 is directly connected, Ethernet0 C 172.16.20.0 is directly connected, Ethernet1
Lab_A#sh ip arp Protocol Address Age(min) Hardware Addr Type Interface Internet 172.16.20.1 - 00d0.58ad.05f4 ARPA Ethernet1 Internet 172.16.20.2 3 0030.9492.a5dd ARPA Ethernet1 Internet 172.16.10.1 - 0015.0506.31b0 ARPA Ethernet0 Internet 172.16.10.2 12 0030.9492.a4ac ARPA Ethernet0
The dash (-) means that this is the physical interface on the router. From this output, we can see that the router knows the 172.16.10.2 (Host_A) and 172.16.20.2 (Host_B) hardware addresses. Cisco routers will keep an entry in the ARP table for 4 hours. But if the hardware address hasn't already been resolved, the router then sends an ARP request out E1 looking for the hardware address of 172.16.20.2. Host_B responds with its hardware address, and the packet and hardware-destination address are both sent to the Data Link layer for framing.
Finally, the remote host receives the packet:
The destination host becomes a source host:
Time for the router to route another packet:
IP does not run a complete CRC the way the Data Link layer does—it only checks the header for errors.
Because the IP destination address doesn't match any of the router's interfaces, the routing table is checked to see whether it has a route to 172.16.10.0. If it doesn't have a route over to the destination network, the packet will be discarded immediately. (This is the source point of confusion for a lot of administrators—when a ping fails, most people think the packet never reached the destination host. But as we see here, that's not always the case. All it takes is just one of the remote routers to be lacking a route back to the originating host's network and—poof!—the packet is dropped on the return trip, not on its way to the host.)
Just a quick note to mention that when (if) the packet is lost on the way back to the originating host, you will typically see a Request Timed Out message because it is an unknown error. If the error occurs because of a known issue, such as a route that is not in the routing table on the way to the destination device, you will see a Destination Unreachable message. This should help you determine if the problem occurred on the way to the destination or on the way back.
The original source host, now the destination host, receives the reply packet:
You've just been introduced to “Todd's 36 easy steps to understanding IP routing.” The key point to understand here is that if you had a much larger network, the process would be the same. In a really big internetwork, the packet just goes through more hops before it finds the destination host.
It's super important to remember that when Host_A sends a packet to Host_B, the destination hardware address used is the default gateway's Ethernet interface. Why? Because frames can't be placed on remote networks—only local networks. So packets destined for remote networks must go through the default gateway.
Let's take a look at Host_A's ARP cache now by using the arp -a command from the DOS prompt:
C: >arp -a Interface: 172.16.10.2 --- 0x3 Internet Address Physical Address Type 172.16.10.1 00-15-05-06-31-b0 dynamic 172.16.20.1 00-15-05-06-31-b0 dynamic
Did you notice that the hardware (MAC) address that Host_A uses to get to Host_B is the Lab_A E0 interface?
Hardware addresses are always local, and they never pass a router's interface. Understanding this process is as important to internetworking as breathing air is to you, so carve this into your memory!
I want to make sure you understand IP routing because it's really that important. So, I'm going to use this section to test your understanding of the IP routing process by having you look at a couple of figures and answer some very basic IP routing questions.
Figure 9.4 shows a LAN connected to RouterA, which is, in turn, connected via a WAN link to RouterB. RouterB has a LAN connected with an HTTP server attached. Take a look.
The critical information you need to glean from this figure is exactly how IP routing will occur in this example. Okay—we'll cheat a bit. I'll give you the answer, but then you should go back over the figure and see if you can answer example 2 without looking at my answers:
That example was a pretty simple one, and it was also very to the point. One thing to remember is that if multiple hosts are communicating to the server using HTTP, they must all use a different source port number. That is how the server keeps the data separated at the Transport layer.
Let's mix it up a little and add another internetworking device into the network and then see if you can find the answers. Figure 9.5 shows a network with only one router but two switches.
What you want to understand about the IP routing process here is what happens when HostA sends data to the HTTPS server:
Notice that neither switch was used as either a default gateway or another destination. That's because switches have nothing to do with routing. I wonder how many of you chose the switch as the default gateway (destination) MAC address for HostA. If you did, don't feel bad—just take another look with that fact in mind. It's very important to remember that the destination MAC address will always be the router's interface—if your packets are destined for outside the LAN, as they were in these last two examples.
How does a router send packets to remote networks when the only way it can send them is by looking at the routing table to find out how to get to the remote networks? And what happens when a router receives a packet for a network that isn't listed in the routing table? It doesn't send a broadcast looking for the remote network—the router just discards the packet.
There are several ways to configure the routing tables to include all the networks so that packets will be forwarded. Understand that what's best for one network isn't necessarily what's best for another. Knowing about and being able to recognize the different types of routing will really help you come up with the best solution for your specific environment and business requirements.
Looking at Figure 9.6, we can see that we can configure a router either with static or dynamic routing. If we choose static routing, then we have to go to each router and type in each network and the path that IP will use to send packets. However, static routing does not scale well in large networks, but dynamic routing does because network routes are automatically added to the routing table via the routing protocol.
Dynamic routing protocols break up into many different categories or types of protocols, as shown in Figure 9.7. The first split in the dynamic protocol branch is the division of interior gateway protocols (IGPs) and exterior gateway protocols (EGPs). We are going to talk about each protocol and category in the next few sections, but for now the difference between IGP and EGP is interior or exterior routing of an autonomous system (AS).
An autonomous system is a collection of networks or subnets that are in the same administrative domain. This is another way of saying an administrative domain is within your company's network, and you control or administer all the subnets that are within it. You control and set the policy for what happens in the network or autonomous system. I hope you can now see that an IGP operates and routes within an AS, and an EGP works outside or between more than one AS.
The most popular protocol for an EGP is Border Gateway Protocol (BGP), which is typically used by ISPs or really large corporations. As an administrator of a small to medium-size network, you'll probably never use BGP. (BGP will be discussed in Chapter 10.)
Now that we have that out of the way, let's talk about all the great things that dynamic routing protocols do for us. The thing that comes to mind first is the amount of time and energy we save configuring routers. We won't have to go to every single router and define for it, with a static route, what and where every destination network is. If that was the only way to configure routing, there would probably be a lot fewer of us interested in doing this for a living. Thankfully, we have routing protocols that do much of the work for us. We still have to know what the routing protocols are going to do and how they will do it, but the protocols will take care of most of the updating and sending information to each other.
That is the end of the EGP branch of the tree, but the IGP branch continues to split out as we go down further. Looking at Figure 9.8, with the IGP split, you can see that there are two primary categories: distance vector (DV) and link state (LS) routing protocols.
No worries—I’m going to discuss all of these types of protocols in the next chapters. But in the distance vector category, for example, we have RIP and Interior Gateway Routing Protocol (IGRP). Under the link state category are the nonproprietary OSPF and Intermediate System-to-Intermediate System (IS-IS) that were designed to work in larger internetworks.
Now, in Figure 9.9, you can see from the diagram that there is a third category: the hybrid protocol category.
The only protocol under this category is EIGRP. It is Cisco proprietary and uses the features of both DV and LS. The Network+ objectives list BGP as a hybrid routing protocol as well because it can work on internal networks as well as external, but it's really an EGP; just keep this in mind.
Now that we have a handle on IP routing, let's move on to Chapter 10 and discuss the IGP routing protocols introduced in this chapter.
This chapter covered the IP routing process in detail. It's extremely important that you really understand the basics we covered in this chapter because everything that's done on a router typically will have some type of IP routing configured and running.
You learned in this chapter how IP routing uses frames to transport packets between routers and to the destination host. Understanding the process of how packets and frames traverse a network is critical to your fundamental understanding of IP routing.
After I covered the basics of IP routing, I went through some examples to test your understanding and to emphasize the importance of the IP routing fundamentals that you need. I finished the chapter with an introduction to static and dynamic routing, and explained IGP and EGP as well as the difference between distance vector and link state routing protocols. In the next chapter, we'll continue with dynamic routing by discussing the various dynamic routing protocols.
Understand the basic IP routing process. You need to remember that the frame changes at each hop but that the packet is never changed or manipulated in any way until it reaches the destination device.
Understand that MAC addresses are always local. A MAC (hardware) address will only be used on a local LAN. It will never pass a router's interface.
Understand that a frame carries a packet to only two places. A frame uses MAC (hardware) addresses to send a packet on a LAN. The frame will take the packet to either a host on the LAN or a router's interface if the packet is destined for a remote network.
Remember the difference between static and dynamic routing. Static routing is where you, as the administrator, by hand, add every route into every routing table on every router on the network. This is as much work as it sounds like, which is why we use dynamic routing protocols that do the work for us. Of course, we'll discuss dynamic routing protocols more in the next chapter, but the main job of a routing protocol is to update routing tables.
You can find the answers in Appendix A. Write the answers to the following questions:
You can find the answers to the review questions in Appendix B.
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