Fragmentation

When an IP datagram travels from one host to another, it can pass through different physical networks. Each physical network has a maximum frame size. This is called the maximum transmission unit (MTU). It limits the length of a datagram that can be placed in one physical frame.

Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP)

ICMP is a standard protocol with STD number 5. That standard also includes IP and IGMP Internet Group Management Protocol (IGMP) Its status is required. It is described in RFC 792 with updates in RFC 950. ICMPv6 used for IPv6 is Internet Control Message Protocol Version 6 (ICMPv6)

ICMP messages

ICMP applications There are two simple and widely used applications based on ICMP: Ping and Traceroute. Ping uses the ICMP Echo and Echo Reply messages to determine whether a host is reachable. Traceroute sends IP datagrams with low TTL values so that they expire en route to a destination. It uses the resulting ICMP Time Exceeded messages to determine where in the internet the datagrams expired and pieces together a view of the route to a host.

Destination Unreachable (3)

If this message is received from an intermediate router, it means that the router regards the destination IP address as unreachable. If this message is received from the destination host, it means that either the protocol specified in the protocol number field of the original datagram is not active or the specified port is inactive.

The ICMP header code field contains one of the following values: 0 Network unreachable 1 Host unreachable 2 Protocol unreachable 3 Port unreachable 4 Fragmentation needed but the Do Not Fragment bit was set

5 Source route failed 6 Destination network unknown 7 Destination host unknown 8 Source host isolated (obsolete) 9 Destination network administratively prohibited 10 Destination host administratively prohibited 11 Network unreachable for this type of service 12 Host unreachable for this type of service 13 Communication administratively prohibited by filtering 14 Host precedence violation 15 Precedence cutoff in effect

Generally, the first test of reachability for a host is to attempt to ping it. If you can successfully ping a host, other applications such as Telnet or FTP should be able to reach that host. However with the advent of security measures on the Internet, particularly firewalls, which control access to networks by application protocol or port number, or both, this is no longer necessarily true. The ICMP protocol can be restricted on the firewall and therefore the host is unable to be successfully pinged.