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CCIE Professional Development: Routing TCP/IP pot
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CCIE Professional Development: Routing TCP/IP, Volume I
Copyright Information
Copyright© 1998 by Macmillan Technical Publishing
Cisco Press logo is a trademark of Cisco Systems, Inc.
All rights reserved. No part of this book m ay be reproduced or transm itted in any form
or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by
any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the
publisher, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review.
Printed in the United States of America 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Number 98-84220
Warning and Disclaimer
This book is designed to provide information about TCP/IP. Every effort has been
made to make this book as complete and as accurate as possible, but no warranty or
fitness is implied.
The information is provided on an "as is" basis. The author, Macmillan Technical
Publishing, and Cisco Systems, Inc. shall have neither liability nor responsibility to any
person or entity with respect to any loss or damages arising from the information
contained in this book or from the use of the discs or programs that may accompany
it. The opinions expressed in this book belong to the author and are not necessarily
those of Cisco Systems, Inc.
Dedications
This book would not have been possible without the concerted efforts of many
dedicated people. I would like to thank the following people for their contributions:
First, thanks to Laurie McGuire, development editor, who not only improved the book
but improved me as a writer.
Thanks to Jenny DeHaven Carroll and Mike Tibodeau for their careful technical editing.
I would also like to thank the following people, who provided technical advice or
reviews on selected sections of the book: Howard Berkowitz, Dave Katz, Burjiz
Pithawala, Mikel Ravizza, Russ White, and Man-Kit Yueng.
I would like to thank the following people at Macmillan Technical Publishing: Tracy
Hughes and Lynette Quinn, who managed the project, and Julie Fairweather, the
Executive Editor. In addition to being highly competent, they are three of the nicest
people anyone could hope to work with. Also, thanks to Jim LeValley, Associate
Publisher, who first approached me about writing this book.
Thanks to Wandel & Golterman, and to Gary Archuleta, W&G's Regional Sales
Manager in Denver, for arranging the use of one of their excellent protocol analyzers
for the length of the project.
Finally, I want to thank my wife, Sara, and my children: Anna, Carol, James, and
Katherine. Their patience, encouragement, and support were critical to the completion
of this book.
Feedback Information
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We greatly appreciate your assistance.
Trademark Acknowledgments
All terms mentioned in this book that are known to be trademarks or service marks have been
appropriately capitalized. Macmillan Technical Publishing or Cisco Systems, Inc. cannot attest to the
accuracy of this information. Use of a term in this book should not be regarded as affecting the
validity of any trademark or service mark.
About the Reviewers
Jennifer DeHaven Carroll is a principal consultant for International Network Services. She is CCIE
number 1402. Jennifer has planned, designed and implemented many IP networks over the past 10
years, utilizing RIP version 2, IGRP, E-IGRP, OSPF and BGP. She has also developed and taught
theory and Cisco implementation classes on all IP routing protocols.
Michael Tibodeau is a Systems Engineer for Cisco Systems. Over the past two years, Michael has
specialized in security technologies for both his own customers and Networkers audiences. He also
focuses on the Electronic Com m erce and Quality of Service arenas. Michael holds a Bachelor's
degree in Systems Engineering from the University of Virginia and holds a Master's degree in
Systems Engineering and Management, concentrating on telecommunications.
I ntroduction
Routing is an essential element of all but the smallest data communications networks. At one level,
routing and the configuration of routers are quite simple. But as internetworks grow in size and
complexity, routing issues can become at once both large and subtle. Perversely, perhaps, I am
grateful for the difficult problems large-scale routing can present—as a network systems consultant,
these problems are my bread and butter. Without them, the phrase "You want fries with that?" could
be an unfortunate part of my daily vocabulary.
Cisco Certified Internetwork Experts are widely recognized for their ability to design, troubleshoot,
and manage large internetworks. This recognition comes from the fact that you cannot become a
CCIE by attending a few classes and then regurgitating some memorized facts onto a written test. A
CCIE has proven his or her expertise in an intense, famously difficult hands-on lab exam.
Objectives
This book is the first in a series designed to aid you in becoming a Cisco Certified Internetwork
Expert and the first of two volumes that focuses on TCP/IP routing issues. Early in the project, Kim
Lew, Cisco Systems program manager, said, "Our objective is to make CCIEs, not to make people
who can pass the CCIE lab." I entirely agree with that statement and have used it as a guiding
principle throughout the writing of this book. Although the book includes many case studies and
exercises to help you prepare for the CCIE lab, my primary objective is to increase your
understanding of IP routing—both on a generic level and it is implemented on Cisco routers.
Audience
The audience for this book is any network designer, administrator, or engineer who needs a full
understanding of the interior routing protocols of TCP/IP. Although the practical aspects of the book
focus on Cisco's IOS, the information is applicable to any routing platform.
The book is not only for readers who plan to become Cisco Certified Internetwork Experts, but for
anyone who wishes to advance his or her knowledge of TCP/IP routing. These readers will fall into
one of three categories:
The "beginner" who has some basic networking knowledge and wishes to begin a deep study
of internetworking
The intermediate-level networking professional who has experience with routers, Cisco or
otherwise, and plans to advance that experience to the expert level
The highly experienced networking expert. This individual has extensive hands-on expertise
with Cisco routers and is ready to take the CCIE lab; however, he or she wants a structured
review and series of exercises for verification and validation. CCIE Professional Developm ent: Routing TCP/ IP, Volum e I focuses prim arily on the interm ediatelevel networking professional while offering to the beginner a structured outline of fundam ental
inform ation and to the expert the required challenges to hone his or her skills.
Organization
The fourteen chapters of the book are divided into three parts.
Part I examines the basics of networks and routing. Although more advanced readers may wish to
skip the first two chapters, I recommend that they at least skim Chapter 3, "Static Routing," and
Chapter 4, "Dynamic Routing Protocols."
Part II covers the TCP/IP Interior Gateway Protocols. Each protocol-specific chapter begins with a
discussion of the mechanics and parameters of the protocol. This general overview is followed by
case studies on configuring and troubleshooting the protocol on Cisco routers in various network
topologies.
The Exterior Gateway Protocols, as well as such topics as multicast routing, Quality of Service
routing, router security and management, and routing IPv6 will be covered in Volume II.
Part III examines the tools available for creating and managing interoperability with multiple IP
routing protocols, as well as such tools as default routes and route filtering. These chapters, like the
ones in Part II, begin with concepts and conclude with case studies.
Conventions and Features
Most chapters conclude with a set of review questions, configuration exercises, and troubleshooting
exercises. The review questions focus on the theoretical aspects of the chapter topic, whereas the
configuration and troubleshooting exercises address Cisco-specific aspects of the chapter topic.
Also at the end of each chapter is a table with a brief description of all important Cisco IOS
commands used in that chapter. The conventions used to present these commands are the same
conventions used in the IOS Command Reference. The Command Reference describes these
conventions as follows:
Vertical bars (|) separate alternative, mutually exclusive, elements.
Square brackets [] indicate optional elements.
Braces {} indicate a required choice.
Braces within square brackets [{}] indicate a required choice within an optional element.
Boldface indicates commands and keywords that are entered literally as shown.
I talics indicate arguments for which you supply values.
I m portant concepts are called out in m argin notes for quick reference.
Figure I.1 shows the conventions used in the illustrations throughout the book.
Figure I.1. Illustration conventions used in this book.
All protocol analyzer displays shown in the book are taken from a Wandel & Goltermann DA-320
DominoLAN Internetwork Analyzer.
Foreword
In today's world of networking, mission-critical networks are being designed for data, voice, and
video. Due to different traffic patterns and the quality of service required by each type of
inform ation, solid hands-on experience is imperative for managing, designing, and troubleshooting
these networks.
Attaining a strong degree of hands-on experience translates into in-depth understanding of the
concepts, scalability, and deployment issues of today's networks. Such experience also builds the
expertise to analyze traffic patterns and the knowledge of when, where, and how to apply protocol
and bandwidth features to enhance performance.
To help further your hands-on experience, Cisco Press is publishing the CCIE Professional
Development series of books. Books in this series will significantly help your understanding of
protocol concepts, and they provide real-world examples and case studies to strengthen the
theoretical concepts exam ined. I highly recom m end that you use these books as a hands-on
learning tool by duplicating the exam ples and case studies using Cisco products. You can even take
this further by tweaking the configuration parameters to see which changes each network goes
through by using the extensive debugging features provided in each Cisco product.
In the first book of the CCIE Professional Development series, CCIE Professional Developm ent:
Routing TCP/ IP, Volum e I , Jeff Doyle does a fantastic job of building the TCP/IP concepts, from IP
address classes to analyzing protocol metrics. Each chapter contains examples, network topologies
with IP addresses, packet analysis, and Cisco debugging outputs. In my opinion, the best parts are
the case studies, in which Jeff compares different features of the protocol by using more or less the
similar topology. This generates a strong understanding of the protocol concepts and features.
I recommend CCIE Professional Developm ent: Routing TCP/ IP, Volum e I for any networking
certification, and I believe that it also makes an excellent university networking course book.
Imran Qureshi
CCIE Program Manager
Part I: Routing Basics
Chapter 1 Basic Concepts: Internetworks, Routers, and Addresses
Chapter 2 TCP/IP Review
Chapter 3 Static Routing
Chapter 4 Dynamic Routing Protocols
Chapter 1. Basic Concepts: Internetworks, Routers, and
Addresses
Bicycles with Motors
Data Link Addresses
Repeaters and Bridges
Routers
Network Addresses
Once upon a time, computing power and data storage were centralized. Mainframes were locked away in
climate-controlled, highly secure rooms, watched over by a priesthood of IS administrators. Contact with
a computer was typically accomplished by bringing a stack of Hollerith cards to the priests, who
interceded on our behalf with the Big Kahuna.
The advent of the minicomputer took the computers out of the IS temple of corporations and universities
and brought them to the departmental level. For a mere $100K or two, engineering and accounting and
any other department with a need for data processing could have their own machines.
Following on the heels of the minicomputers were microcomputers, bringing data processing right to the
desktop. Affordability and accessibility dropped from the departmental level to the individual level,
making the phrase personal computer part of everyone's vocabulary.
Desktop computing has evolved at a mind-boggling pace, but it was certainly not an immediate
alternative to centralized, mainframe-based computing. There was a ramping-up period in which both
software and hardware had to be developed to a level where personal computers could be taken seriously.
Bicycles with Motors
One of the difficulties of decentralized computing is that it isolates users from one another and from the
data and applications they may need to use in common. When a file is created, how is it shared with Tom,
Dick, and Harriet down the hall? The early solution to this was the storied SneakerNet: Put the file on
floppy disks and hand carry them to the necessary destinations. But what happens when Tom, Dick, and
Harriet modify their copies of the file? How does one ensure that all information in all versions are
synchronized? What if those three coworkers are on different floors or in different buildings or cities?
What if the file needs to be updated several times a day? What if there are not three coworkers, but 300
people? What if all 300 people occasionally need to print a hard copy of some modification they have
made to the file?
The local-area network, or LAN, is a small step back to centralization. LANs are a means of pooling and
sharing resources. Servers enable everyone to access a common copy of a file or a common database; no
more "walkabouts" with floppies, no more worries about inconsistent information. E-mail furnishes a
compromise between phone calls, which require the presence of the recipient, and physical mail service,
which is called snail mail for a good reason. The sharing of printers and modem pools eliminates the need
for expensive, periodically used services on every desk.
Of course, in their infancy, LANs met with more than a little derision from the mainframe manufacturers.
A commonly heard jibe during the early years was, "A LAN is like a bike with a motor, and we don't
make Mopeds!" What a difference a few years and a few billion dollars would make.
NOTE
Data link
Physically, a LAN accomplishes resource pooling among a group of devices by connecting them to a
common, shared medium, or datalink. This medium may be twisted-pair wires (shielded or unshielded),
coaxial cable, optical fiber, infrared light, or whatever. What matters is that all devices attach commonly
to the data link through some sort of network interface.
A shared physical medium is not enough. Rules must govern how the data link is shared. As in any
community, a set of rules is necessary to keep life orderly, to ensure that all parties behave themselves,
and to guarantee that everyone gets a fair share of the available resources. For a local-area network, this
set of rules, or protocol, is generally called a Media Access Control (MAC). The MAC, as the name
implies, dictates how each machine will access and share a given medium.
So far, a LAN has been defined as being a community of devices such as PCs, printers, and servers
coexisting on a common communications medium and following a common protocol that regulates how
they access the medium. But there is one last requirement: As in any community, each individual must be
uniquely identifiable.
Data Link Addresses
In a certain community in Colorado, two individuals are named Jeff Doyle. One Jeff Doyle frequently
receives telephone calls for the person with whom he shares a name—so much so that his clever wife has
posted the correct number next to the phone to redirect errant callers to their desired destination. In other
words, because two individuals cannot be uniquely identified, data is occasionally delivered incorrectly
and a process must be implemented to correct the error.
Among family, friends, and associates, a given name is usually sufficient for accurately distinguishing
individuals. However, as this example shows, most names become inaccurate over a larger population. A
more unique identifier, such as a United States Social Security number, is needed to distinguish one
person from every other.
NOTE
Frame
Devices on a LAN must also be uniquely and individually identified or they, like humans sharing the
same name, will receive data not intended for them. When data is to be delivered on aLAN , it is
encapsulated within an entity called a frame, a kind of binary envelope. Think of data encapsulation as
being the digital equivalent of placing a letter inside an envelope, as in Figure 1.1[1] . A destination address
and a return (source) address are written on the outside of the envelope. Without a destination address, the
postal service would have no idea where to deliver the letter. Likewise, when a frame is placed on a data
link, all devices attached to the link "see" the frame; therefore, some mechanism must indicate which
device should pick up the frame and read the enclosed data. [1] As will be seen later, creating a data link layer frame is really more like putting an envelope inside a larger envelope.
Figure 1.1. Encapsulation means putting data into a frame—a kind of digital "envelope" for delivery.
Figure 1.2 shows the format of most common LAN frames. Notice that every case includes a destination
address and a source address. The format of the address depends on the particular MAC protocol, but all
the addresses serve the same purpose: to uniquely identify the machine for which the frame is destined
and the device from which it was sent.
Figure 1.2. The frame format of a few common LAN data link frames.
The three most common data links currently used in LANs are Ethernet, Token Ring, and FDDI.
Although each link is drastically different from the others, they share a common format for addressing
devices on the network. This format, originally standardized by Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center
(PARC)[2] and now administered by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), is
variously called the burned-in address,[3] the physical address, the machine address, or most commonly,
the MAC address.
[2] The full name, as reading any modern text on networking will tell you, is The Now Famous Xerox PARC. [3] The address is usually permanently programmed, or burned in, to a ROM on the network interface.
The MAC address is a 48-bit number, which, as Figure 1.3 shows, is designed so that every device
anywhere on the planet should be uniquely identifiable. Most everyone has heard the legends of large
batches of network interface cards being turned out with identical burned-in addresses by unscrupulous
"cloning" companies or as the result of "stuck" programming code. Although most of those stories are
nothing more than legends, one can imagine what would happen if all devices on a LAN had the same
MAC address: Imagine a town in which every resident is named Wessvick Smackley. Men, women,
children, dogs, and cats all named Wessvick Smackley. Everyday communication, not to mention the
career of the town gossip, would be unimaginably difficult.[4]
[4] In real life, duplicate MAC addresses on a network are most likely to occur as the result of network administrators using locally administered addresses. This occurrence is common enough on Token Ring networks that one step of the Token Ring insertion process is a duplicate address
check.
Figure 1.3. A MAC address.
Although the MAC addresses are by convention referred to as "addresses," they are really names. Think
about it: Because the identifier is burned in, or permanently assigned, to a device, it is a part of that device
and goes wherever the device goes.[5]
[5] Although some data link addresses may be or must be administratively configured, the point is that they are identifiers, unique within a
network.
Most adults have several street addresses through their lives, but few have more than one given name. A
name identifies an entity—whether a person or a PC. An address describes where that person or PC is
located.
In the interest of clarity, this book uses the term data link identifier or MAC identifier instead of MAC
address. The reason for making such a distinction will soon be clear.
Repeaters and Bridges
The information presented so far may be distilled into a few brief statements:
A data communication network is a group of two or more devices connected by a common, shared
medium.
These devices have an agreed-upon set of rules, usually called the Media Access Control, or
MAC, that govern how the media is shared.
Each and every device has an identifier, and each identifier is unique to only one device.
Using these identifiers, the devices communicate by encapsulating the data they need to send
within a virtual envelope called a frame.
So here's this wonderful resource-sharing tool called a LAN. It's so wonderful, in fact, that everyone
wants to be connected to it. And herein is the rub. As a LAN grows, new problems present themselves.
The first problem is one of physical distance. Figure 1.4 shows that three factors can influence an
electrical signal. These factors may decrease or eliminate any intelligence the signal represents:
Figure 1.4. Attenuation, interference, and distortion prevent a signal from arriving in the same shape it was
in when it left. Attenuation (a) is a function of the resistance of the wire. A certain amount of signal energy
must be spent "pushing past" the resistance. Interference (b) is a function of outside influences—noise—
which adds characteristics to the signal that should not be there. Distortion (c) is a function of the wire
impeding different frequency components of the signal in different ways.
Attenuation
Interference
Distortion
As the distance the signal must travel down the wire increases, so do the degrading effects of these three
factors. Photonic pulses traveling along an optical fiber are much less susceptible to interference but will
still succumb to attenuation and distortion.
Repeaters are added to the wire at certain intervals to alleviate the difficulties associated with excessive
distance. A repeater is placed on the media some distance from the signal source but still near enough to
be able to correctly interpret the signal (see Figure 1.5). It then repeats the signal by producing a new,
clean copy of the old degraded signal. Hence, the name repeater. Figure 1.5. By placing a repeater in the link at a distance where the original signal can still be recognized,
despite the effects of attenuation, interference, and distortion, a fresh signal can be generated and the
length of the wire extended.
A repeater may be thought of as part of the physical medium. It has no real intelligence, but merely
regenerates a signal; a digital repeater is sometimes facetiously called a "bit spitter" for this reason.
The second problem associated with growing LANs is congestion. Repeaters are added to extend the
distance of the wire and to add devices; however, the fundamental reason for having a LAN is to share
resources. When a too-large population tries to share limited resources, the rules of polite behavior begin
to be violated and conflicts erupt. Among humans, poverty, crime, and warfare may result. On Ethernet
networks, collisions deplete the available bandwidth. On Token Ring and FDDI networks, the token
rotation time and timing jitter may become prohibitively high.
Drawing boundaries between populations of LAN devices is a solution to overcrowding. This task is
accomplished by the use of bridges.[6]
[6] If you cut through the marketing hype surrounding modern Ethernet and Token Ring switches, you'll find that these very useful tools are
merely high-performance bridges.
Figure 1.6 shows the most common type of bridge: a transparent bridge. It performs three simple
functions: learning, forwarding, and filtering. It is transparent in that end stations have no knowledge of
the bridge.
Figure 1.6. The transparent bridge segments network devices into manageable populations. A bridging
table tracks the members of each population and manages communication between the populations.
The bridge learns by listening promiscuously on all its ports. That is, every time a station transmits a
frame, the bridge examines the source identifier of the frame. It then records the identifier in a bridging
table, along with the port on which it was heard. The bridge therefore learns which stations are out port 1,
which are out port 2, and so on.
In Figure 1.6, the bridge uses the information in its bridging table to forward frames when a member of
one population—say, a station out port 1—wants to send a frame to a member of another population: a
station out port 2.
A bridge that only learns and forwards would have no use. The real utility of a bridge is in the third
function, filtering. Figure 1.6 shows that if a station out port 2 sends a frame to another station out port 2,
the bridge will examine the frame. The bridge consults its bridging table and sees that the destination
device is out the same port on which the frame was received and will not forward the frame. The frame is
filtered.
Bridges enable the addition of far more devices to a network than would be possible if all the devices
were in a single population, contending for the same bandwidth. Filtering means that only frames that
need to be forwarded to another population will be, and resources are conserved. Ethernet networks are
divided into collision domains; Token Ring and FDDI networks are divided into multiple rings.
Figure 1.7 illustrates two perspectives of a transparent bridge. It is transparent because the end stations
have no knowledge of it. At the same time, a transparent bridge has no real knowledge of the topology of
a network; the bridge only knows which identifiers are heard on each of its ports.
Figure 1.7. Two perspectives of a transparent bridge.
Some other types of bridges are source-route bridges, source-route/transparent bridges, translating
bridges, and encapsulating bridges. For a complete discussion of bridge issues and functionality, see
Perlman [1992], cited in the recommended reading list at the end of this chapter.
The third problem posed by LAN growth is one of locality. Repeaters allow the distance of a LAN to be
extended, but only within certain geographic limitations. Extending a LAN across the city or across the
continent presents prohibitive costs in physical materials, engineering and construction, and legal issues
such as rights-of-way. Such distances require the use of a wide-area network, or WAN.[7] Table 1.1
compares and contrasts LANs and WANs. [7] A third term, which is falling into general disuse, is metropolitan-area network, or MAN. It is just as well that this term is dying off; it grays
the distinction between a LAN and a WAN. Is a MAN a big LAN or a small WAN? Dying also is a truly bad pun, which is that bridges ensure
that no MAN is an island.
A fourth problem is one of scalability. Bridges allow a network to be segregated into smaller populations
of stations; in this way station-to-station traffic is localized. Certain types of frames cannot be localized,
though. Some applications require data to be broad cast—that is, the data must be delivered to all stations
on a network. Ethernet, Token Ring, and FDDI networks use a reserved destination identifier of all ones
(0? ffff.ffff.ffff) for broadcasting. Bridges must forward a broadcast frame out all ports to ensure that all
stations receive a copy. As a bridged network becomes larger and larger, more and more stations will be
originating broadcast traffic; soon, broadcasted frames cause the network to become congested again.
Table 1.1. Fundamental differences between LANs and WANs.
LAN WAN
Limited geographic area Citywide to worldwide geographic area
Privately owned and controlled media Media leased from a service provider
Plentiful, cheap bandwidth Limited, expensive bandwidth
NOTE
Internetwork
To manage broadcast traffic and other scaling challenges, another kind of boundary is necessary. Bridges
allow the network to be divided into populations of stations, but a way to create populations of networks
within a larger network is also needed. This network of networks is better known as an internetwork. The
device that makes internetworks possible is a router.
Routers
Routers have been known by several names. Back in ancient times when what is now the Internet was
called the ARPANET, routers were called IMPs, for interface message processors.[8] More recently,
routers were called gateways; remnants of this nomenclature can still be found in terms such as Border
Gateway Protocol (BGP) and Interior Gateway Routing Protocol (IGRP).[9] In the Open System
Interconnection (OSI) world, routers are known as Intermediate Systems (IS). [8] The parent of modern packet-switched networks was the AlohaNet, created at the University of Hawaii in the late 1960s by Norman
Abramson. Because routers at that time were called IMPs, Dr. Abramson rather impishly named his router Menehune: a Hawaiian elf. [9] The term gateway is now generally accepted to mean an application gateway, as opposed to a router, which would be a network gateway.
All of these aliases are descriptive of some aspect of what a router does. As interface message processor
implies, a router switches data messages, or packets, from one network to another. As gateway implies, a
router is a gateway through which data can be sent to reach another network. And as Intermediate System
implies, a router is an intermediary for the End System–to–End System delivery of internetwork data.
NOTE
Router
Router, as a name, is probably the most descriptive of what the modern versions of these devices do. A
router sends information along a route—a path—between two networks. This path may traverse a single
router or many routers. Furthermore, in internetworks that have multiple paths to the same destination,
modern routers use a set of procedures to determine and use the best route. Should that route become less
than optimal or entirely unusable, the router selects the next-best path. The procedures used by the router
to determine and select the best route and to share information about network reachability and status with
other routers are referred to collectively as a routing protocol. NOTE
Routing protocol
Just as a data link may directly connect two devices, a router also creates a connection between two
devices. The difference is that, as Figure 1.8 shows, whereas the communication path between two
devices sharing a common data link is a physical path, the communication path provided by routers
between two devices on different networks is a higher-level, logical path.
Figure 1.8. A router creates a logical path between networks.
NOTE
Packet
This concept is vitally important for understanding a router's function. Notice that the logical path, or
route, between the devices in Figure 1.8 traverses several types of data links: an Ethernet, an FDDI ring, a
serial link, and a Token Ring. As noted earlier, to be delivered on the physical path of a data link, data
must be encapsulated within a frame, a sort of digital envelope. Likewise, to be delivered across the
logical path of a routed internetwork, data must also be encapsulated; the digital envelope used by routers
is a packet. As noted earlier, each type of data link has its own unique frame format. The internetwork route depicted
in Figure 1.8 crosses several data links, but the packet remains the same from end to end.
How is this possible? Figure 1.9 shows how the packet is actually delivered across the route:
Figure 1.9. The frame changes from data link to data link, but the packet remains the same across the
entire logical path.
1. The originating host encapsulates the data to be delivered within a packet. The packet must then
be delivered across the host's data link to the local router—that host's default gateway—so the
host encapsulates the packet within a frame. This operation is the same as placing an envelope
inside of a larger envelope, for example, inserting an envelope containing a letter into a Federal
Express envelope. The destination data link identifier of the frame is the identifier of the interface
of the local router,[10] and the source data link identifier is the host's.