Bay Technical Associates RM356 manual IP Addresses and the Internet

Reference Guide for the Model RM356 Modem Router

Using RIP, routers update one another periodically and check to see if there are any changes to be added to the routing table. An important consideration is the convergence time, or how long it takes for a change to the routing topology (such as a new node or a node failure) to be propagated throughout the entire RIP environment. To prevent this convergence process from being excessively long, RIP is limited to 15 hops maximum.

The Model RM356 Modem Router supports both the older RIP-1 and the newer RIP-2 protocols. Among other improvements, RIP-2 supports subnetting and multicasting.

IP Addresses and the Internet

Because TCP/IP networks are interconnected widely across the world, every machine on the Internet must have a unique address to make sure that transmitted data reaches the correct destination. Blocks of addresses are assigned to organizations by the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA). Individual users and small organizations may obtain their addresses either from the IANA or from an Internet service provider (ISP).

The Internet Protocol (IP) uses a 32-bit address structure. The address is usually written in dot notation (also called dotted-decimal notation), in which each group of eight bits is written in decimal form, separated by decimal points. For example, the binary address:

11000011 00100010 00001100 00000111

is normally written as:

195.34.12.7

which is easier to remember and easier to enter into your computer.

In addition, the 32 bits of the address are subdivided into two parts. The first part of the address identifies the network, and the second part identifies the host node or station on the network. The dividing point may vary depending on the address range and the application.

1-6 Introduction