Simulation of routing through packet tracer

BY:

HARJOT KAUR 01876802710 TANPREET KAUR 03076802710 HARJAN SINGH 03976802710 AMANPREET SINGH 05276802710

What is a Computer Network?

A network is a collection of computers, printers, routers, switches, and other devices that are able to communicate with each other over some transmission media.

Types of Networks
There are two basic types of networks currently in existence:
A Local Area Network (LAN) A Wide Area Network (WAN)

Local Area Networks (LAN)

A Local Area Network (LAN) is a group of computers and network communication devices within a limited geographic area, such as an office building. No third party involvement here. They are characterized by the following: High data transfer speeds Generally less expensive technologies Limited geographic area
A Wide Area Network (WAN) interconnects LANs. It is not restricted to a particular geographic area and may be interconnected around the world. Third party network is involved. They are characterized by the following: Multiple interconnected LANs Generally more expensive technology More sophisticated to implement than LANs Exist in an unlimited geographic area Less error resistance due to transmission travel distances

Wide Area Networks (WAN)

A wide area network (WAN) is a network that covers a broad area (i.e., any telecommunications network that links across metropolitan, regional, or national boundaries) using private or public network transports. Business and government entities utilize WANs to relay data among employees, clients, buyers, and suppliers from various geographical locations. In essence, this mode of telecommunication allows a business to effectively carry out its daily function regardless of location. The Internet can be considered a WAN as well, and is used by businesses, governments, organizations, and individuals for almost any purpose imaginable

WAN TECHNOLOGIES

PACKET TRACER

Cisco Packet Tracer is a powerful network simulation program that allows students to experiment with network behaviour and ask what if questions. As an integral part of the Networking Academy comprehensive learning experience, Packet Tracer provides simulation, visualization, authoring, assessment, and collaboration capabilities and facilitates the teaching and learning of complex technology concepts. Packet Tracer supplements physical equipment in the classroom by allowing students to create a network with an almost unlimited number of devices, encouraging practice, discovery, and troubleshooting. The simulation-based learning environment helps students develop 21st century skills such as decision making, creative and critical thinking, and problem solving. Packet Tracer complements the Networking Academy curricula, allowing instructors to easily teach and demonstrate complex technical concepts and networking systems design.

A router is a device that forwards data packets between computer networks, creating an overlay internetwork. A router is connected to two or more data lines from different networks. When a data packet comes in one of the lines, the router reads the address information in the packet to determine its ultimate destination. Then, using information in its routing table or routing policy, it directs the packet to the next network on its journey. Routers perform the "traffic directing" functions on the Internet. A data packet is typically forwarded from one router to another through the networks that constitute the internetwork until it reaches its destination node

A network switch or switching hub is a computer networking device that links network segments or network devices. A switch is a telecommunication device that receives a message from any device connected to it and then transmits the message only to the device for which the message was meant. This makes the switch a more intelligent device than a hub (which receives a message and then transmits it to all the other devices on its network). The network switch plays an integral part in most modern Ethernet local area networks (LANs). Mid-to-large sized LANs contain a number of linked managed switches

An Ethernet cable is one of the most popular forms of network cable used on wired networks. Ethernet cables connect devices on local area networks such as PCs, routers and switches. A crossover cable is a special type of Ethernet cable specially designed for connecting two computers to each other. By contrast, most Ethernet cables are designed to connect one computer to a router or switch.

Routing is of three types. Static

Dynamic and
Default When the destination is known, static and dynamic routing is done. For unknown destinations, default routing is employed. In dynamic routing, the path is fixed by the protocol. Always the shortest path is preferred. Static routing is done by the users. These paths are stored in the routing table.

Classification Of Routing Protocols

Distance Vector
Hybrid Routing Link State Distance Vector: RIP & IGRP Hybrid Routing: EIGRP Link State : OSPF.

RIP
The Routing Information Protocol (RIP) is one of the oldest distance-vector routing protocol, which employs the hop count as a routing metric. RIP prevents routing loops by implementing a limit on the number of hops allowed in a path from the source to a destination. The maximum number of hops allowed for RIP is 15. This hop limit, however, also limits the size of networks that RIP can support. A hop count of 16 is considered an infinite distance, in other words the route is considered unreachable.

RIP (Routing Information Protocol)

Router(config)# router rip Router(config-router)# network (network ip) Router# sh ip protocol (shows the current routing protocol) Router# sh ip route

To test for count to infinity, if any of the router is disabled then the packet is stuck in a infinite loop .the packet doesnt reach the destination.

OSPF is link-state routing protocol . OSPF is an interior gateway protocol that routes Internet Protocol (IP) packets solely within a single routing domain (autonomous system). It gathers link state information from available routers and constructs a topology map of the network. The topology determines the routing table presented to the Internet Layer which makes routing decisions based solely on the destination IP address found in IP packets. OSPF was designed to support variable-length subnet masking (VLSM) or Classless Inter-Domain Routing (CIDR) addressing models.

Required Commands: Router(config)# router ospf process-id Router(config-router)#network address wildcard-mask area area-id

OSPF CONFIGURATION

ADVANTAGES

Changes in an OSPF network are propagated quickly. OSPF is hierarchical, using area 0 as the top as the hierarchy. OSPF is a Link State Algorithm. OSPF supports Variable Length Subnet Masks (VLSM). OSPF uses multicasting within areas. After initialization, OSPF only sends updates on routing table sections which have changed, it does not send the entire routing table. Using areas, OSPF networks can be logically segmented to decrease the size of routing tables. Table size can be further reduced by using route summarization. OSPF is an open standard, not related to any particular vendor.

Disadvantages of OSPF: OSPF is very processor intensive. OSPF maintains multiple copies of routing information, increasing the amount of memory needed. OSPF is not as easy to learn as some other protocols.

COMPARISON

RIP There is no protection from routing loops within RIP based networks. Therefore, the implementation must trust all network participants to prevent such loops. RIP uses a hop count of 15 do denote infinity, which makes it unsuitable for large networks.

OSPF OSPF addresses all RIP shortcomings and thus is better suited for modern large, dynamic networks

RIP has the so called slow convergence or count-toinfinity problem, in which inconsistencies arise because routing update message propagate slowly across the network. particularly, in large networks (or networks with slow links), some routers may still advertise a route that has vanished. (That, by the way, was one of the reasons 15 was chosen as the value of infinity to limit the slow convergence

For example, in contrast to RIP sending the entire routing table from router to router every 30 seconds, OSPF sends its link state information every 30 minutes. OSPF can get away with this, because OSPF routers also send each other small update messages (typically less than 75 bytes), whenever they detect a change in the network (for instance, a failure or a new link). When routers exchange updates that reflect changes in the network, they ``"converge'' on a new representation of the topology quickly and accurately.

Router(config)# router eigrp Router(config-router)# network <network

number> [wildcard mask]

Router(config-router)# no auto-summary

EIGRP Theory of Operation Some of the many advantages of EIGRP are: very low usage of network resources during normal operation; only hello packets are transmitted on a stable network when a change occurs, only routing table changes are propagated, not the entire routing table; this reduces the load the routing protocol itself places on the network rapid convergence times for changes in the network topology (in some situations convergence can be almost instantaneous) EIGRP is an enhanced distance vector protocol, relying on the Diffused Update Algorithm (DUAL) to calculate the shortest path to a destination within a network.

A typical distance vector protocol saves the following information when computing the best path to a destination: the distance (total metric or distance, such as hop count) and the vector (the next hop). For instance, all the routers in the network in Figure 1 are running Routing Information Protocol (RIP). Router Two chooses the path to Network A by examining the hop count through each available path.

Since the path through Router Three is three hops, and the path through Router One is two hops, Router Two chooses the path through One and discards the information it learned through Three. If the path between Router One and Network A goes down, Router Two loses all connectivity with this destination until it times out the route of its routing table (three update periods, or 90 seconds), and Router Three re-advertises the route (which occurs every 30 seconds in RIP). Not including any hold-down time, it will take between 90 and 120 seconds for Router Two to switch the path from Router One to Router Three.

split-horizon route advertisement is a method of preventing routing loops in distance-vector routing protocols by prohibiting a router from advertising a route back onto the interface from which it was learned. Thus when a device that participates in such route advertisements receives an update from an interface, it (the device) does not forward updates through the same interface out. By doing so, routing loops are prevented.

Split-horizon routing with poison reverse is a variant of split-horizon route advertising in which a router actively advertises routes as unreachable over the interface over which they were learned by setting the route metric to infinite (16 for RIP). The effect of such an announcement is to immediately remove most looping routes before they can propagate through the network. The router is said to have poisoned the network by sending 'false' (infinite) metric values to other devices sharing such updates. The main disadvantage of poison reverse is that it can significantly increase the size of routing announcements in certain fairly common network topologies, but it allows for the improvement of the overall efficiency of the network in case of faults. Split horizon states that if a neighboring router sends a route to a router, the receiving router will not propagate this route back to the advertising router on the same interface.

LOAD BALANCING -In general, load balancing is the capability of a router to distribute traffic over all the router network ports that are the same distance from the destination address. Load balancing increases the utilization of network segments, and so increases effective network bandwidth.

In order to test load balancing and to increase the effectiveness of the network we used the command R1# show eigrp topology. If two routes are shown for a router to reach the destination i.e one best route and one feasible route then our test is successful

RIP AND OSPF COMPARISON When considering with RIP, OSPF handles its own error detection and correction functions. RIP uses auto summarization at classfull networks, and in OSPF, we use manual summarization, therefore, we dont have to give commands for auto summarization. While RIP using hop counts to calculate metric value, OSPF uses SPF (Shortest Path First) algorithm to select the best path. RIP uses lots of bandwidth as it sends periodic updates, but OSPF advertise only changes in a network. Rip takes 30-60 seconds to converge, but OSPF converges immediately even in larger network. RIP can be reached hop count of 15 routers, but OSPF can reach unlimited hop counts. Therefore, RIP can be used in smaller networks and OSPF can be used in larger networks.

EIGRP AND OSPF COMPARISON OSPF is able to load balance in equal cost paths, and EIGRP can load balance between unequal cost paths, which can be identified as a specialty of EIGRP. EIGRP shows characteristics of both link state and distance vector protocol, but OSPF is merely a link state protocol. OSPF calculates the metric using cost, but EIGRP uses bandwidth, load,delay and reliability to calculate the metric. Metric is used to select the best route to reach a subnet, and lower metric is considered to be better. As a link state protocol, OSPF converges quickly than EIGRP, also OSPF can be used in larger networks. Neighbor relationship is simpler in EIGRP than OSPF topology