Internet Routing

 Read Chapters 7 & 8

 Routing - Process of choosing a path over
which to send packets
 Router - A computer making such a choice
 Goal: “… provide a virtual network that
encompasses multiple physical networks
and offers a connectionless datagram
delivery service.” - Comer
© MMII JW Ryder CS 428 Computer Networking 1
Routers
 An internet composed of multiple physical
networks interconnected by computers called
routers
 Router - direct connections to 2 or more
physical networks
 Host computer - a single, direct connection

© MMII JW Ryder CS 428 Computer Networking 2

 Routers
 Multi-homed hosts - direct connections to
2 or more physical networks
 Both hosts and routers route IP datagrams
 Hosts??
 Two or more routers on network? Which to
send to? Host must make decision
 Any computer with multiple network
connections can act as a router
© MMII JW Ryder CS 428 Computer Networking 3
Delivery
 Direct - Local
 Sender encapsulates datagram in a physical frame
 Binds dest IP addr to a physical hardware addr
 Sends frame to destination
 Known local because netid matches host’s
netid
 Indirect - Between physical networks

© MMII JW Ryder CS 428 Computer Networking 4

Indirect Delivery
 Sender must identify a router to send datagram to
 Router then forwards it toward its destination
 When frame reaches the router
 Software extract the encapsulated datagram
 IP software selects next router along the path
 Datagram again placed in a frame
 Sent over physical network to next router

© MMII JW Ryder CS 428 Computer Networking 5

Table Driven Routing
 IP Routing Table on each machine
 netstat -nr
 Want to contain most minimal information at all
times
 Next hop routing done by using the routing tables
 (N, R) pairs
 N = netid part of IP addr
 R = Next router along path to N

© MMII JW Ryder CS 428 Computer Networking 6

 Next Hop Routing
 Important - all routers identified in machine M’s
routing table are physically located on the same
network as M
 When a datagram ready to leave M
 IP software locates dest IP addr
 extracts the network portion to make routing decision
 M will select a router which M can directly reach
 Hosts have minimal information, rely on routers
© MMII JW Ryder CS 428 Computer Networking 7
 10.0.0.0 Routing Example
10.0.0.5
Q
20.0.0.5
20.0.0.0
IP Addr Gateway
20.0.0.0 Direct Delivery
20.0.0.6
R 30.0.0.0 Direct Delivery
30.0.0.6 10.0.0.0 20.0.0.5
30.0.0.0 40.0.0.0 30.0.0.7

30.0.0.7
S
40.0.0.7
40.0.0.0
© MMII JW Ryder CS 428 Computer Networking 8
 Consequences
 All traffic destined for given network use same
path
 Even when multiple paths exist, won’t be used
 Only final router can determine if dest. host
exists or is operational
 Need way for routers to return delivery problem
errors
 Datagrams travelling from A to B may follow a
different path from B to A
© MMII JW Ryder CS 428 Computer Networking 9
Default Routes
 Especially useful when local network has
small set of hosts and 1 connection to internet
 2 tests
 One for local network
 Default that points to default router

© MMII JW Ryder CS 428 Computer Networking 10

 A Routing Algorithm
RouteDatagram (Datagram, RoutingTable)
Extract destination IP addr, D, from the datagram and compute the network
prefix, N;
If N matches any directly connected network address, deliver datagram
to destination D over that network (This involves resolving D to a physical
address, encapsulating the datagram, and sending the frame)
else if the table contains a host-specific route for D send the datagram to
next hop specified in the table
else if the table contains a route for network N, send datagram to next hop
specified in the table
else if the table contains a default route, send datagram to the default router
specified in the table
else declare a routing error
© MMII JW Ryder CS 428 Computer Networking 11