Patton electronic IM2RC/I-100B user manual PPP Operational Background, Applications

3.0PPP OPERATIONAL BACKGROUND

PPP is a protocol used for multi-plexed transport over a point-to-point link. PPP operates on all full duplex media, and is a symmetric peer-to- peer protocol, which can be broken into three main components: 1. A standard method to encapsulate datagrams over serial links; 2. A Link Control Protocol (LCP) to establish, configure, and test the data-link con- nection; 3. A family of Network Control Protocols (NCPs) to establish and configure different network layer protocols.

In order to establish communications over a point-to-point link, each end of the PPP link must first announce its capabilities and agree on the parameters of the link’s operation. This exchange is facilitated through LCP Configure-Request packets.

Once the link has been established and optional facilities have been negotiated, PPP will attempt to establish a network protocol. PPP will use Network Control Protocol (NCP) to choose and configure one or more network layer protocols. Once each of the network layer protocols have been configured, datagrams from the established network layer protocol can be sent over the link. The link will remain configured for these communications until explicit LCP or NCP packets close the link down, or until some external event occurs.

The PPP Bridging Control Protocol (BCP), defined in RFC 1638, config- ures and enables/disables the bridge protocol on both ends of the point- to-point link. BCP uses the same packet exchange mechanism as the Link Control Protocol (LCP). BCP is a Network Control Protocol of PPP, bridge packets may not be exchanged until PPP has reached the net- work layer protocol phase.

3.1 APPLICATIONS

In situations where a routed network requires connectivity to a remote Ethernet network, the interface on router can be configured as a PPP IP Half Bridge. The serial line to the remote bridge functions as Virtual Ethernet interface, effectively bridge functions as a Virtual Ethernet inter- face, effectively extending the routers serial port connection to the remote network. The bridge device sends bridge packets (BPDU’s) to the router’s serial interface. The router will receive the layer three address information and will forward these packets based on its IP address.

Figure 2 on page 9 shows a typical Cisco router with a serial interface configured as a PPP Half Bridge. The router serial interface uses a remote device that supports PPP bridging to functions as a node on the remote Ethernet network. the serial interface on the Cisco will have an IP address on the same Ethernet subnet as the bridge.

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