Cisco Systems 78-11741-02 manual DF Election, IPC-473

Configuring Bidirectional PIM

Bidir-PIM Overview

Figure 77 Bidirectional Shared Tree

RP

(*, G)

(*, G) (*, G)

(*, G)

Receiver Source

Receiver

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When packets are forwarded downstream from the RP toward receivers, there are no fundamental differences between bidir-PIM and PIM-SM. Bidir-PIM deviates substantially from PIM-SM when passing traffic from sources upstream toward the RP.

PIM-SM cannot forward traffic in the upstream direction of a tree, because it only accepts traffic from one Reverse Path Forwarding (RPF) interface. This interface (for the shared tree) points toward the RP, therefore allowing only downstream traffic flow. In this case, upstream traffic is first encapsulated into unicast register messages, which are passed from the designated router (DR) of the source toward the RP. In a second step, the RP joins an SPT that is rooted at the source. Therefore, in PIM-SM, traffic from sources traveling toward the RP does not flow upstream in the shared tree, but downstream along the SPT of the source until it reaches the RP. From the RP, traffic flows along the shared tree toward all receivers.

In bidir-PIM, the packet forwarding rules have been improved over PIM-SM, allowing traffic to be passed up the shared tree toward the RP. To avoid multicast packet looping, bidir-PIM introduces a new mechanism called designated forwarder (DF) election, which establishes a loop-free SPT rooted at the RP.

DF Election

On every network segment and point-to-point link, all PIM routers participate in a procedure called DF election. The procedure selects one router as the DF for every RP of bidirectional groups. This router is responsible for forwarding multicast packets received on that network upstream to the RP.

The DF election is based on unicast routing metrics and uses the same tie-break rules employed by PIM assert processes. The router with the most preferred unicast routing metric to the RP becomes the DF. Use of this method ensures that only one copy of every packet will be sent to the RP, even if there are parallel equal cost paths to the RP.

A DF is selected for every RP of bidirectional groups. As a result, multiple routers may be elected as DF on any network segment, one for each RP. In addition, any particular router may be elected as DF on more than one interface.

Cisco IOS IP Configuration Guide

IPC-473