Chapter 5
Designing IP addressing and selecting routing protocols
5.2.1. Primary Address Classes
To provide the flexibility required to support networks of varying sizes, Internet designers decided
that IP address space should be divided into 5 address classes, namely Class A, Class B, Class C,
Class D and Class E. This is often referred to as classful addressing. Each class fixes the boundary
between network prefix and host number at a different point within the 32-bit address. The formats
of the fundamental address classes are illustrated below.
One of the fundamental features of classful IP addressing is that each address contains a self-
encoding key that identifies the dividing point between the network prefix and the host number.
For example, if the first two bits of an IP address are 1-0, the dividing point falls between the 15th
and 16th bits. This simplified the routing system during the early years of the Internet because the
original routing protocols did not supply a deciphering key or mask with each route to identify the
length of the network prefix.
Class A Networks (/8 Prefixes)
Each Class A network address has an 8-bit network prefix, with the highest order bit set to
0 (zero) and a 7-bit network number, followed by a 24-bit host number.
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Maximum of 126 (2 7– 2) /8 networks can be defined. The calculation subtracts two
because:
o The /8 network 0.0.0.0is reserved for use as the default route, and
o The /8 network [Link](also written as 127/8) is reserved for the “loopback”
function.
• Each /8 supports a maximum of 224 – 2 (16,777,214) hosts per network. The host calculation
subtracts two because:
• All-0s, aka “this network”, and all-1s, aka “broadcast”, host numbers may not be assigned to
individual hosts.
• Since the /8 address block contains 2 31 (2,147,483,648) individual addresses, and
o remember that IPv4 address space contains maximum of 2 32 (4,294,967,296)
addresses,
o Therefore, the /8 address space is 50%of the total IPv4 unicast address space.
Class B Networks (/16 Prefixes)
• Each Class B network address has a 16-bit network prefix, with the two highest order bits set to
1-0and a 14-bit network number, followed by a 16-bit host number.
• Each /16 supports a maximum of 216– 2 (65,534) hosts per network.
-0s (“this network”) and all-1s (“broadcast”)
host numbers may not be assigned to individual hosts.
• Since the entire /16 address block contains 230 (1,073,741,824) addresses, it represents 25% of
the total IPv4 unicast address space.
Class C Networks (/24 Prefixes)
• Each Class C network address has a 24-bit network prefix, with the three highest order bits set
to 1-1-0and a 21-bit network number, followed by an 8-bit host number.
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-2) hosts per network
can be defined.
one eighth) of the total IPv4 unicast address space.
Other Classes:
• Class D addresses have their leading 4 bits set to 1-1-1-0, used to support IP Multicasting.
• Class E addresses have their leading 4 bits set to 1-1-1-1, are reserved for experimental use.
5.2.2. Dotted-Decimal Notation
To make Internet addresses easier for people to read and write, IP addresses are often expressed
as four decimal numbers, each separated by a dot. This format is called “dotted-decimal notation.”
Dotted-decimal notation divides the 32-bit Internet address into four 8-bit fields and specifies the
value of each field independently as a decimal number with the fields separated by dots. Figure 5-
1 shows how a typical /16 (Class B) Internet address can be expressed in dotted-decimal notation.
Figure 5.1 Dotted Decimal Notation
Table 5-1 displays the range of dotted-decimal values that can be assigned to each of the three
principle address classes. The “xxx” represents host number field of the address that is assigned
by the local network administrator.
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Table 5-1: Dotted Decimal Ranges for Each Address Class
5.2.4. Unforeseen Limitations of Classful Addressing
The original Internet designers never envisioned that the Internet would grow into what it has
become today. Many of the problems that the Internet is facing today can be traced back to the
early decisions that were made during its formative years.
• During the early days of the Internet, the seemingly unlimited address space allowed IP addresses
to be allocated to an organization based on its request rather than its actual need. As a result,
addresses were freely assigned to those who asked for them without concerns about the eventual
depletion of the IP address space.
• The decision to standardize on a 32-bit address space meant that there were only 232
(4,294,967,296) IPv4 addresses available. A decision to support a slightly larger address space
would have exponentially increased the number of addresses thus eliminating the current address
shortage problem.
• The classful A, B, and C octet boundaries were easy to understand and implement, but they did
not foster the efficient allocation of a finite address space. Problems resulted from the lack of a
network class that was designed to support medium-sized organizations.
For example, a /24, which supports 254 hosts, is too small while a /16, which supports 65,534
hosts, is too large. In the past, sites with several hundred hosts were assigned a single /16 address
instead of two /24 addresses. This resulted in a premature depletion of /16 network address space.
Now the only readily available addresses for medium-sized organizations are /24s, which have the
potentially negative impact of increasing the size of the global Internet’s routing table.
The subsequent history of Internet addressing involved a series of steps that overcame these
addressing issues and supported the growth of the global Internet.
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5.3. Internet Scaling Problems
Over the past few years, the Internet has experienced two major scaling issues as it has struggled
to provide continuous and uninterrupted growth:
of IP version 4 (IPv4) address space
The first problem is concerned with the eventual depletion of the IP address space. IPv4 defines a
32-bit address which means that there are only 2 32 (4,294,967,296) IPv4 addresses available. As
the Internet continues to grow, this finite number of IP addresses will eventually be exhausted.
This address shortage problem is aggravated by the fact that portions of the IP address space have
not been efficiently allocated. Also, the traditional model of classful addressing does not allow the
address space to be used to its maximum potential. If the Internet’s address supply problem is not
solved, new users may be unable to connect to the global Internet.
The second problem is caused by the rapid growth in the size of the Internet routing tables. Internet
backbone routers are required to maintain complete routing information for the Internet. Over
recent years, routing tables have experienced exponential growth as increasing numbers of
organizations connect to the Internet.
Unfortunately, the routing problem cannot be solved by simply installing more router memory and
increasing the size of the routing tables. Other factors related to the capacity problem include the
growing demand for CPU horsepower to compute routing table/topology changes, the increasingly
dynamic nature of WWW connections and their effect on router forwarding caches, and the ever
increasing volume of information that needs to be managed by people and machines. If the number
of entries in the global routing table is allowed to increase without bounds, core routers will be
forced to drop routes and portions of the Internet will become unreachable.
The long-term solution to these problems can be found in the widespread deployment of IP Next
Generation (IPng or IPv6). The 6boneis an IPv6 test bed that is an outgrowth of the IETF IPng
project that created the IPv6 protocols intended to eventually replace IPv4. The initial 6 bone focus
was on testing of standards and implementations, while the current focus is more on testing of
transition and operational procedures.
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5.3.1. Subnetting (Fixed-Length Subnet Masking)
In 1985, RFC 950 defined a standard procedure to support the subnetting, or division, of a single
Class A, B, or C network number into smaller pieces. Subnetting was introduced to overcome
some of the problems that parts of the Internet were beginning to experience with the classful two-
level addressing hierarchy, such as:
network could be installed at their site.
Both of these problems were attacked by adding another level of hierarchy to the IP addressing
structure. Instead of the classful two-level hierarchy, subnetting supports a three-level hierarchy.
Figure 5-2 illustrates the basic idea of Subnetting, which is to divide the standard classful host
number field into two parts, namely the subnet number and the host number on that subnet.
Figure 5.2 Subnet Address Hierarchy
Subnetting attacked the expanding routing table problem by ensuring that subnet structure of a
network is never visible outside of organization’s private network. The route from the Internet to
any subnet of a given IP address is the same, no matter which subnet the destination host is on.
This is because all subnets of a given network number use the same network prefix but different
subnet numbers.
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The routers within the private organization need to differentiate between the individual subnets,
but as far as the Internet routers are concerned, all of the subnets in the organization are collected
into a single routing table entry. This allows the local administrator to introduce arbitrary
complexity into the private network without affecting the size of the Internet’s routing tables.
Subnetting overcame the registered number issue by assigning each organization one (or at most
a few) network numbers from the IPv4 address space. The organization was then free to assign a
distinct subnetwork number for each of its internal networks. This allowed the organization to
deploy additional subnets without obtaining a new network number from the Interne the
deployment of subnetting within the private network provides several benefits:
• The size of the global Internet routing table does not grow because the site administrator does
not need to obtain additional address space and the routing advertisements for all of the subnets
are combined into a single routing table entry.
• The local administrator has the flexibility to deploy additional subnets without obtaining a new
network number from the Internet.
• Route flapping(i.e. the rapid changing of routes) within the private network does not affect the
Internet routing table since Internet routers do not know about the reachability of the individual
subnets – they just know about the reachability of the parent network number
5.3.2. Extended Network Prefix
Internet routers use only network prefix of destination to route traffic to subnetted environment.
Routers within the LAN use extended network prefix o route traffic between individual subnets.
The extended network prefix is composed of the classful network prefix and the subnet number.
Figure 5.3 Extended Network Prefix
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The extended network prefix has traditionally been identified by the subnet mask. For example, if
an administrator has the /16 address of [Link] and wants to use the entire third octet to represent
the subnet number, the administrator must specify a subnet mask of [Link].
The bits in the subnet mask and Internet address have 1-to-1 correspondence. Bits of the subnet
mask are set to 1(one) if the system examining the address should treat the corresponding bit in
the IP address as part of the extended network prefix. The bits in the mask are set to 0(zero) if the
system should treat the bit as part of the host number.
Table 5. 1 Subnet Mask
Standards describing modern routing protocols refer to extended network prefix length rather than
subnet mask. Prefix length is equal to the number of contiguous one-bits in traditional subnet mask.
This means, specifying network address [Link] with subnet mask of [Link] can also
be expressed as [Link]/24. The /notation is more compact and easier to understand than writing
out the mask in its traditional dotted-decimal format. This is illustrated in Figure 10.
Figure 5.4 Subnet Mask
Note that modern routing protocols still carry the subnet mask. None of the Internet standard
routing protocols have a 1-byte field in the header that contains the number of bits in the extended
network prefix. Each routing protocol is still required to carry the complete four-octet subnet mask.
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5.3.3. Subnet Design Considerations
The deployment of an addressing plan requires careful thought. Four key questions that must be
answered before any design should be undertaken are:
How many total subnets does the organization need today?
How many total subnets will the organization need in the future?
How many hosts are on the organization’s largest subnet today?
How many hosts will there be on the organization’s largest subnet in the future?
The first step in the planning process is to take the maximum number of subnets required and
round up to the nearest power of two. For example, if organization needs 9 subnets, 23= 8 will not
provide enough subnet addressing space, so the network administrator will need to round up to
24= 16.
The network administrator must always allow adequate room for growth. For example, although
14 subnets are required today, 16 subnets might not be enough in two years when the 17th subnet
needs to be deployed. In this case, it would be wise to select 25 = 32 as the maximum number of
subnets.
The second step is to ensure that there are enough host addresses for the organization’s largest
subnet. If the largest subnet needs to support 50 host addresses today, 25 = 32 will not provide
enough host address space so the network administrator will need to round up to 26 =64.
The final step is to make sure that the organization’s address allocation provides enough bits to
deploy the required subnet addressing plan. For example, if the organization has a single /16, it
could easily deploy 4 bits for subnet and 6 bits for host number. However, if the organization has
several /24s and it needs to deploy 9 subnets, it may have to subnet each of its /24s into four
subnets (using 2 bits) and then build the network by combining the subnets of three /24 network
numbers.
An alternative solution would be to deploy network numbers from the private address space (RFC
1918) for internal connectivity and use a Network Address Translator (NAT) to provide external
Internet access.
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Subnet Example #1
Given: An organization is assigned the network number [Link]/24and it needs to define
Six subnets. The largest subnet is required to support 25hosts.
Solution:
Defining the Subnet Mask / Extended Prefix Length: The first step in defining the subnet mask is
to determine the number of bits required to define 6 subnets. Since a network address can only be
subnetted along binary boundaries, subnets must be created in blocks of powers of 2 [2 = 21, 4
=22, 8 = 23 and so on). Thus, it is impossible to define an IP address block such that it contains
exactly six subnets. For this example, the network administrator must define a block of 8 = 23 and
have two unused subnets that can be reserved for future growth. Since 8 = 23, 3 bits required to
create 8 subnets in the block, and since the organization is subnetting a /24 network, it’ll need 3
more bits, or /27, as extended network prefix. A 27-bit extended network prefix can be expressed
in dotted-decimal notation as [Link], as illustrated in Figure 5-5.
Figure 5.5 Defining the Subnet Mask/Extended Prefix Length
A 27-bit extended network prefix leaves 5bits (32 – 27) to define host addresses on each subnet.
This means that each sub network with 27-bit prefix represents a contiguous block of 25 =32
Individual IP addresses. However, since the all-0s and all-1s host addresses cannot be allocated,
there are 30 (25–2=32–2=30) assignable host addresses on each subnet. Defining the Subnet
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Numbers: The 8 subnets will number 0 through 7, and their 3-bit binary representations are: 0 =
000, 1 = 001, 2 = 010, 3 = 011, 4 = 100, 5 = 101, 6 = 110, and 7 = 111. In general, to define Subnet
#N, the network administrator places the binary representation of N into the bits of the subnet
number field. For example, to define Subnet #6, the network administrator simply places the binary
representation of 6 = 110 into the 3 bits of the subnet number field.
The 8 subnet numbers for this example are listed in the following code sample. Underlined portion
of each address identifies extended network prefix, and among them the bold digits identify the 3
bits representing the subnet number field:
The 8 subnet numbers for this example are listed in the following code sample. Underlined portion
of each address identifies extended network prefix, and among them the bold digits identify the 3
bits representing the subnet number field:
An easy way to verify the subnets are correct is to ensure that they are all multiples of the Subnet
#1 address. In this example, all subnets are multiples of 32: 0, 32, 64, 96, 128, 160, 192 and 224.
Defining Host Addresses for Each Subnet: According to Internet practices, host number field of
IP address can’t contain all 0 and all 1-bits. All-0shost number identifies base network
(subnetwork) number, while all-1shost number represents broadcast address for the network
(subnetwork).
In our example, there are 5 bits in host number field of each subnet address. This means that each
subnet represents a block of 30 host addresses (25 – 2 = 30, NB:2 is subtracted because the all-0s
and the all-1s host addresses cannot be used). The hosts on each subnet are numbered 1 through
30.
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In general, to define the address assigned to Host #N of a particular subnet, the network
administrator places the binary representation of N into the subnet’s host number field. For
example, to define the address assigned to Host #15 on Subnet #2, the network administrator
simply places the binary representation of 15 (01111) into the 5-bits of Subnet #2’s host number
field.
Valid host addresses for Subnet #2 in this example are listed in the following sample code. The
underlined portion of each address identifies the extended network prefix, while the bold digits
identify the 5-bit host number field:
The valid host addresses for Subnet #6 are listed in the following sample code. The underlined
portion of each address identifies the extended network prefix, while the bold digits identify the
5-bit host number field:
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Defining the Broadcast Address for Each Subnet: The broadcast address for Subnet #2 is the all-
1s host address or: 11000001.00000001.00000001.010 11111= [Link]
Note that the broadcast address for Subnet #2 is exactly one less than the base address for Subnet
#3 ([Link]). This is always the case-the broadcast address for Subnet #n is one less than the
base address for Subnet #(n+1). The broadcast address for Subnet #6 is simply the all-1s host
address or:
5.3.4. Variable Length Subnet Masking (VLSM) and CIDR
By 1992, the exponential growth of the Internet was raising serious concerns among members of
the IETF about the ability of the Internet’s routing system to scale and support future growth.
These problems were related to:
1. The near-term exhaustion of the Class B network address space
2. The rapid growth in the size of the global Internet’s routing tables
3. The eventual exhaustion of the 32-bit IPv4 address space
Throughout the Internet’s growth, the first two problems listed became critical and the response to
these immediate challenges was the development of Classless Inter-Domain Routing (CIDR). The
third problem, which is of a more long-term nature, is currently being explored by the IP Next
Generation (IPng or IPv6) working group of the IETF.
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5.4. CIDR Promotes the Efficient Allocation of the IPv4 Address Space
CIDR was officially documented in September 1993 in RFC 1517, 1518, 1519, and 1520. CIDR
supports two important features that benefit the global Internet routing system:
• CIDR eliminates the traditional concept of Class A, Class B, and Class C network addresses and
replaces them with the generalized concept of a network prefix. Routers use the network prefix,
rather than the first 3 bits of the IP address, to determine the dividing point between the network
number and the host number. As a result, CIDR supports the deployment of arbitrarily sized
networks rather than the standard 8-bit, 16-bit, or 24-bit network numbers associated with classful
addressing.
• CIDR supports route aggregation where a single routing table entry can represent the address
space of thousands of traditional classful routes. This allows a single routing table entry to specify
how to route traffic to many individual network addresses. Route aggregation helps control the
amount of routing information in the Internet’s backbone routers, reduces route flapping (rapid
changes in route availability), and eases the local administrative burden of updating external
routing information.
Without the rapid deployment of CIDR in 1994 and 1995, the Internet routing tables would have
a lot of classful routes and the Internet would probably not be functioning today.
The IETF (Internet Engineering Task Force) introduced CIDR in 1993 to replace the previous
Classful network addressing architecture on the Internet. Its goal was to slow the growth of routing
tables on routers across the Internet, and to help slow the rapid exhaustion of IPv4 addresses.
In CIDR, each routing information is advertised with bit mask (prefix length). Prefix length is a
way of specifying number of left most contiguous bits in the network portion of each routing table
entry. For example, a network with 20 bits of network number and 12 bits of host number would
be advertised with a 20-bit prefix length (/20). The IP address advertised with the /20 prefix could
be a former Class A, B, or C address. Routers that support CIDR do not make assumptions based
on the First three bits of the address; they rely on the prefix length information provided with the
route.
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Table 5-2 provides information about the most commonly deployed CIDR address blocks. The
table shows that a /15 allocation can also be specified using the traditional dotted-decimal mask
notation of [Link]. Also, a /15 allocation contains a bitwise contiguous block of 128K
(131,072) IP addresses that can be classfully interpreted as two Class B networks or 512 Class C
networks.
5.4.1. Host Implications for CIDR Deployment
There may be severe host implications when CIDR-based networks are deployed. Since many
hosts are classful, their user interface will not permit them to be configured with a mask that is
shorter than the natural mask for a traditional classful address.
For example, to deploy [Link] as a /20 to define a network capable of supporting 4,094(212
-2) hosts, ensure that the software executing on each end station will allow a traditional Class C
([Link]) to be configured with a 20-bit mask since the natural mask for a Class C network is
a 24-bit mask. If the host software supports CIDR, shorter masks can be configured.
There will be no host problems by deploying the [Link]/20 (traditional Class C) allocation as
a block of 16 /24s since non-CIDR hosts will interpret their local /24 as a Class C. Likewise,
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[Link]/16 (a traditional Class B) could be deployed as a block of 255 /24s since the hosts will
interpret the /24s as subnets of /16. If host software supports configuration of shorter than expected
masks, the network manager has tremendous flexibility in network design and address allocation
Efficient Address Allocation
How does CIDR lead to the efficient allocation of the IPv4 address space? In a classful
environment, an Internet Service Provider (ISP) can only allocate /8, /16, or /24 addresses. In a
CIDR environment, the ISP can carve out a block of its registered address space that specifically
meets needs of each client, provides additional room for growth, and doesn’t waste scarce resource.
Assume that an ISP has been assigned the address block [Link]/18. This block represents
16,384 (214) IP addresses, which can be interpreted as 64 /24s. If a client requires 800 host
addresses, rather than assigning a Class B address (and wasting approximately 64,700 addresses)
or four individual Class C addresses (and introducing 4 new routes into the global Internet routing
tables), the ISP could assign the client the address block [Link]/22, which is a block of 1,024
(210) IP addresses (4 contiguous /24s). The efficiency of this allocation is illustrated in Figure 5-
6
Figure 5.6 CIDR Efficient Address Allocation
CIDR Address Allocation Example: For this example, assume that an ISP owns the address block
[Link]/16. This block represents 65,536 (216) IP addresses (or 256 /24s). ISP wants to allocate
smaller [Link]/20 address block, which represents 4,096 (212) IP addresses (or 16 /24s).
Address Block: 11001000.00011001.00010000.00000000 [Link]/20
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In a classless environment, the ISP is free to divide its address block any way it wants. It could
slice the original pie into pieces (each one half of the address space) and assign one portion to
Organization A, then cut the other half into two pieces (each one-fourth of the address space) and
assign one piece to Organization B, and then slice the remaining fourth into two pieces (each one
eighth of the address space) and assign them to Organization C and Organization D. Each of the
organizations is free to allocate the address space within its “Intra network” as desired. This
example is illustrated in Figure 5-7.
Figure 5.7 Slicing the Pie-Classless Environment
5.4.2. Comparing CIDR to VLSM
CIDR and VLSM both allow portion of IP address space to be recursively divided into
subsequently smaller pieces. Difference is that with VLSM, the recursion is performed on address
space previously assigned to an organization and is invisible to global Internet. CIDR, on the other
hand, permits the recursive allocation of an address block by an Internet Registry to a high-level
ISP, a mid-level ISP, a low-level ISP, and a private organization’s network.
Like VLSM, the successful deployment of CIDR has three prerequisites:
• Routing protocols must carry network prefix information with each route advertisement.
• All routers must implement a consistent forwarding algorithm based on the longest match.
• For route aggregation to occur, addresses must be assigned so that they are topologically
significant.
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5.5. Controlling the Growth of Internet’s Routing Tables
CIDR helps control the growth of Internet’s routing tables by reducing amount of routing
information. This process requires that the Internet be divided into addressing domains. Within a
domain, detailed information is available about all of the networks that reside in the domain.
Outside of an addressing domain, only the common network prefix is advertised. This allows
single routing table entry to specify a route to many individual network addresses.
Figure 5.8 Reduced Size of Internet Routing Tables
Figure 5-11 illustrates how the allocation described in the previous CIDR example helps reduce
the size of the Internet routing tables. Assume that a portion of the ISP’s address block
([Link]/20) has been allocated as described in the previous example:
• Organization A aggregates eight /24s into a single advertisement ([Link]/21)
• Organization B aggregates four /24s into a single advertisement ([Link]/22)
• Organization C aggregates two /24s into a single advertisement ([Link]/23)
• Organization D aggregates two /24s into a single advertisement ([Link]/23)
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Then the ISP can inject the 256 /24s in its allocation into the Internet with a single advertisement-
[Link]/16.
5.5.1. New Solutions for Scaling the Internet Address Space
In this 21st century, the problems of IPv4 address shortages and expanding Internet routing tables
are still with us. The good news is that CIDR is working. The bad news is that recent growth trends
indicate that the number of Internet routes is increasing at an exponential rate. The Internet must
find a way to keep the routing table growth linear. The IETF is continuing its efforts to develop
solutions that will overcome these problems, enabling the continued growth and scalability of the
Internet.
Appeal to Return Unused IP Network Prefixes
RFC 1917 requests that the Internet community return unused address blocks to the Internet
Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) for redistribution. This includes unused network numbers,
addresses for networks that will never be connected to global Internet for security reasons, and
sites that using small percentage of their address space. RFC 1917 also petitions ISPs to return
unused network prefixes that are outside of their assigned address blocks.
Address Allocation for Private Internets
The IP address space is divided into public and private spaces. Private addresses are reserved IP
addresses that are to be used only internally within a company’s network, not on the Internet. RFC
1918 requests that organizations use the private Internet address space for hosts that require IP
connectivity within their enterprise network, but don’t require external connections to Internet.
The IANA has reserved the following three address blocks for private Internets:
• [Link] – [Link] (10/8 prefix)
• [Link] – [Link] (172.16/12 prefix)
• [Link] – [Link] (192.168/16 prefix)
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Any organization can use addresses from these reserved blocks can do so without contacting the
IANA or an Internet registry. Since these addresses are never injected into the global Internet
routing system, the address space can simultaneously be used by many different organizations.
The disadvantage to this addressing scheme is that it requires an organization to use a Network
Address Translator (NAT) for global Internet access. Private addresses must therefore be mapped
to a company’s external registered address when sending anything on the Internet. Public IP
addresses are provided for external communication. Figure 5-12 illustrates the use of private and
public addresses in a network. However, the use of the private address space and a NAT make it
much easier for clients to change their ISP without renumbering in a previously aggregated
advertisement. A benefit of this addressing scheme to the Internet is that it reduces the demand for
IP addresses so large organizations may require only a small block of the globally unique IPv4
address space.
Figure 5.9 Private and Public Addresses Can Be Used in a Network
When selecting addresses, the network designer should consider the following questions:
Are private, public, or both IP address types required?
How many end systems need only access to the public network?
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This is the number of en systems that need a limited set of external services (such as e-mail, file
transfer, or we browsing) but do not need unrestricted external access. These end systems do not
have to be visible to the public network.
How many end systems must have access to and be visible to the public network? This is
the number of Internet connections and various servers that must be visible to the public
network (such as public servers and servers used for e-commerce, such as web servers,
database servers, and application servers) and defines the number of required public IP
addresses. These end systems require globally unambiguous IP addresses.
Where will the boundaries between the private and public IP addresses be, and how will
they be implemented?
5.6. Impact of Poorly Designed IP Addressing
A poorly designed IP addressing scheme usually results in IP addresses that are randomly assigned
on an as-needed basis. In this case, the IP addresses are most likely dispersed through the network
with no thought as to whether they can be grouped or summarized. A poor design provides no
opportunity for dividing the network into contiguous address areas, and therefore no means of
implementing route summarization.
Impacts of poorly designed IP addressing include the following:
Excess routing traffic consumes bandwidth: When any route changes, routers send
routing updates. Without summarization, more updates are sent, and the routing traffic
consumes more bandwidth.
Increased routing table recalculation: Routing updates require routing table
recalculation, which affects the router’s performance and ability to forward traffic.
Possibility of routing loops: When too many routing changes prevent routers from
converging with their neighbors, routing loops might occur, which might have global
consequences for an organization
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