Early research and development:
41-523: Merging the networks and creating the Internet: Commercialization, privatization, broader access leads to the modern Internet: Examples of Internet services: Intermediate System to Intermediate System ( IS-IS , also written ISIS ) is a routing protocol designed to move information efficiently within a computer network , a group of physically connected computers or similar devices. It accomplishes this by determining
82-415: A CPU . More sophisticated devices use application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs) to increase performance or add advanced filtering and firewall functionality. When multiple routers are used in interconnected networks, the routers can exchange information about destination addresses using a routing protocol . Each router builds up a routing table , a list of routes, between two computer systems on
123-680: A switching node using software and an interface computer were first proposed by Donald Davies for the NPL network in 1966. The same idea was conceived by Wesley Clark the following year for use in the ARPANET , which were named Interface Message Processors (IMPs). The first interface computer was implemented at the National Physical Laboratory in the United Kingdom in early 1969, followed later that year by
164-497: A wide area network (WAN), so they may have considerable memory installed, multiple WAN interface connections, and substantial onboard data processing routines. They may also provide connectivity to groups of file servers or other external networks. In enterprises, a core router may provide a collapsed backbone interconnecting the distribution tier routers from multiple buildings of a campus, or large enterprise locations. They tend to be optimized for high bandwidth but lack some of
205-507: A means of distributing uncompromised networking gateways to authorized ports. This has the added benefit of preventing issues with routing protocol loops. Many routing protocols are defined in technical standards documents called RFCs . Although there are many types of routing protocols, three major classes are in widespread use on IP networks : Routing protocols, according to the OSI routing framework, are layer management protocols for
246-414: A security feature by all experts. Some experts argue that open source routers are more secure and reliable than closed source routers because errors and potentially exploitable vulnerabilities are more likely to be discovered and addressed in an open-source environment. Routers are also often distinguished on the basis of the network in which they operate. A router in a local area network (LAN) of
287-632: A single organization is called an interior router . A router that is operated in the Internet backbone is described as exterior router . While a router that connects a LAN with the Internet or a wide area network (WAN) is called a border router , or gateway router . Routers intended for ISP and major enterprise connectivity usually exchange routing information using the Border Gateway Protocol (BGP). RFC 4098 defines
328-418: A variety of sources, such as a default or static routes that are configured manually, or dynamic entries from routing protocols where the router learns routes from other routers. A default route is one that is used to route all traffic whose destination does not otherwise appear in the routing table; it is common – even necessary – in small networks, such as a home or small business where
369-536: Is defined in the IETF proposed standard RFC 6329. Routing protocol A routing protocol specifies how routers communicate with each other to distribute information that enables them to select paths between nodes on a computer network . Routers perform the traffic directing functions on the Internet; data packets are forwarded through the networks of the internet from router to router until they reach their destination computer. Routing algorithms determine
410-738: Is in common use. Some routers can connect to Data service units for T1 connections via serial ports. The hierarchical internetworking model divides enterprise networks into three layers: core, distribution, and access. Access routers, including small office/home office (SOHO) models, are located at home and customer sites such as branch offices that do not need hierarchical routing of their own. Typically, they are optimized for low cost. Some SOHO routers are capable of running alternative free Linux-based firmware like Tomato , OpenWrt , or DD-WRT . Distribution routers aggregate traffic from multiple access routers. Distribution routers are often responsible for enforcing quality of service across
451-407: Is in contrast to exterior gateway protocols , primarily Border Gateway Protocol (BGP), which is used for routing between autonomous systems . IS-IS is a link-state routing protocol , operating by reliably flooding link state information throughout a network of routers . Each IS-IS router independently builds a database of the network's topology, aggregating the flooded network information. Like
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#1732779852284492-413: Is the simplest and most easily implemented: the router simply drops new incoming packets once buffer space in the router is exhausted. RED probabilistically drops datagrams early when the queue exceeds a pre-configured portion of the buffer, until reaching a pre-determined maximum, when it drops all incoming packets, thus reverting to tail drop. WRED can be configured to drop packets more readily dependent on
533-542: Is used to deliver application traffic. It provides appropriate addressing information in its internet layer or network layer to allow a packet to be forwarded from one network to another. Examples of routed protocols are the Internet Protocol (IP) and Internetwork Packet Exchange (IPX). Router (computing) A router is a computer and networking device that forwards data packets between computer networks , including internetworks such as
574-482: Is used to enable data packets to be forwarded from one transmission system to another. Routers may also be used to connect two or more logical groups of computer devices known as subnets , each with a unique network prefix . Routers may provide connectivity within enterprises, between enterprises and the Internet, or between internet service providers ' (ISPs') networks, they are also responsible for directing data between different networks. The largest routers (such as
615-513: Is what gives the Internet its fault tolerance and high availability . The specific characteristics of routing protocols include the manner in which they avoid routing loops, the manner in which they select preferred routes, using information about hop costs, the time they require to reach routing convergence , their scalability , and other factors such as relay multiplexing and cloud access framework parameters. Certain additional characteristics such as multilayer interfacing may also be employed as
656-652: The Cisco CRS-1 or Juniper PTX) interconnect the various ISPs, or may be used in large enterprise networks. Smaller routers usually provide connectivity for typical home and office networks. All sizes of routers may be found inside enterprises. The most powerful routers are usually found in ISPs, academic and research facilities. Large businesses may also need more powerful routers to cope with ever-increasing demands of intranet data traffic. A hierarchical internetworking model for interconnecting routers in large networks
697-520: The International Network Working Group (INWG). These gateway devices were different from most previous packet switching schemes in two ways. First, they connected dissimilar kinds of networks, such as serial lines and local area networks . Second, they were connectionless devices, which had no role in assuring that traffic was delivered reliably, leaving that function entirely to the hosts . This particular idea,
738-482: The OSPF protocol, IS-IS uses Dijkstra's algorithm for computing the best path through the network. Packets ( datagrams ) are then forwarded, based on the computed ideal path, through the network to the destination. The IS-IS protocol was developed by a team of people working at Digital Equipment Corporation as part of DECnet Phase V. The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) published IS-IS in 1990, but that RFC
779-637: The end-to-end principle , was pioneered in the CYCLADES network. The idea was explored in more detail, with the intention to produce a prototype system as part of two contemporaneous programs. One was a program at Xerox PARC to explore new networking technologies, which produced the PARC Universal Packet system. Some time after early 1974, the first Xerox routers became operational. Due to corporate intellectual property concerns, it received little attention outside Xerox for years. The other
820-796: The IMPs at the University of California, Los Angeles , the Stanford Research Institute , the University of California, Santa Barbara , and the University of Utah School of Computing in the United States. All were built with the Honeywell 516 . These computers had fundamentally the same functionality as a router does today. The idea for a router (called a gateway at the time) initially came about through an international group of computer networking researchers called
861-563: The best route for data through a packet switching network. The IS-IS protocol is defined in ISO/IEC 10589:2002 as an international standard within the Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) reference design. In 2005, IS-IS was called "the de facto standard for large service provider network backbones ". IS-IS is an interior gateway protocol , designed for use within an administrative domain or network. This
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#1732779852284902-508: The default route simply sends all non-local traffic to the Internet service provider . The default route can be manually configured (as a static route); learned by dynamic routing protocols; or be obtained by DHCP . A router can run more than one routing protocol at a time, particularly if it serves as an autonomous system border router between parts of a network that run different routing protocols; if it does so, then redistribution may be used (usually selectively) to share information between
943-402: The different protocols running on the same router. Besides deciding to which interface a packet is forwarded, which is handled primarily via the routing table, a router also has to manage congestion when packets arrive at a rate higher than the router can process. Three policies commonly used are tail drop , random early detection (RED), and weighted random early detection (WRED). Tail drop
984-416: The features of edge routers. External networks must be carefully considered as part of the overall security strategy of the local network. A router may include a firewall , VPN handling, and other security functions, or they may be handled by separate devices. Routers also commonly perform network address translation which restricts connections initiated from external connections but is not recognized as
1025-613: The global Internet . A router is connected to two or more data lines from different IP networks . When a data packet comes in on a line, the router reads the network address information in the packet header to determine the ultimate destination. Then, using information in its routing table or routing policy , it directs the packet to the next network on its journey. Data packets are forwarded from one router to another through an internetwork until it reaches its destination node . The most familiar type of IP routers are home and small office routers that forward IP packets between
1066-517: The global Internet. This version of the IS-IS routing protocol was then called Integrated IS-IS . IS-IS adjacency can be either broadcast or point-to-point. IS-IS is also used as the control plane for IEEE 802.1aq Shortest Path Bridging (SPB). SPB allows for shortest-path forwarding in an Ethernet mesh network context utilizing multiple equal cost paths. This permits SPB to support large Layer 2 topologies, with fast convergence, and improved use of
1107-414: The home computers and the Internet. More sophisticated routers, such as enterprise routers, connect large business or ISP networks to powerful core routers that forward data at high speed along the optical fiber lines of the Internet backbone . Routers can be built from standard computer parts but are mostly specialized purpose-built computers . Early routers used software -based forwarding, running on
1148-401: The interconnected networks. The software that runs the router is composed of two functional processing units that operate simultaneously, called planes : A router may have interfaces for multiple types of physical layer connections, such as copper cables, fiber optic , or wireless transmission. It can also support multiple network layer transmission standards. Each network interface
1189-423: The layer-3 IP packet, specifically the destination IP address. When a router receives a packet, it searches its routing table to find the best match between the destination IP address of the packet and one of the addresses in the routing table. Once a match is found, the packet is encapsulated in the layer-2 data link frame for the outgoing interface indicated in the table entry. A router typically does not look into
1230-476: The mesh topology. Combined with this is single point provisioning for logical connectivity membership. IS-IS is therefore augmented with a small number of TLVs and sub-TLVs, and supports two Ethernet encapsulating data paths, 802.1ad Provider Bridges and 802.1ah Provider Backbone Bridges. SPB requires no state machine or other substantive changes to IS-IS, and simply requires a new Network Layer Protocol Identifier (NLPID) and set of TLVs. This extension to IS-IS
1271-505: The mid-1970s and in the 1980s, general-purpose minicomputers served as routers. Modern high-speed routers are network processors or highly specialized computers with extra hardware acceleration added to speed both common routing functions, such as packet forwarding, and specialized functions such as IPsec encryption. There is substantial use of Linux and Unix software-based machines, running open source routing code, for research and other applications. The Cisco IOS operating system
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1312-626: The network layer, regardless of their transport mechanism: Interior gateway protocols (IGPs) exchange routing information within a single routing domain . Examples of IGPs include: Exterior gateway protocols exchange routing information between autonomous systems . Examples include: Many software implementations exist for most of the common routing protocols. Examples of open-source applications are Bird Internet routing daemon , Quagga , GNU Zebra , OpenBGPD , OpenOSPFD , and XORP . Some network certification courses distinguish between routing protocols and routed protocols. A routed protocol
1353-471: The packet payload, but only at the layer-3 addresses to make a forwarding decision, plus optionally other information in the header for hints on, for example, quality of service (QoS). For pure IP forwarding, a router is designed to minimize the state information associated with individual packets. Once a packet is forwarded, the router does not retain any historical information about the packet. The routing table itself can contain information derived from
1394-439: The specific choice of route. Each router has a prior knowledge only of networks attached to it directly. A routing protocol shares this information first among immediate neighbors, and then throughout the network. This way, routers gain knowledge of the topology of the network . The ability of routing protocols to dynamically adjust to changing conditions such as disabled connections and components and route data around obstructions
1435-411: The type of traffic. Another function a router performs is traffic classification and deciding which packet should be processed first. This is managed through QoS , which is critical when Voice over IP is deployed, so as not to introduce excessive latency . Yet another function a router performs is called policy-based routing where special rules are constructed to override the rules derived from
1476-440: The types of BGP routers according to their functions: Wi-Fi routers combine the functions of a router with those of a wireless access point . They are typically devices with a small form factor, operating on the standard electric power supply for residential use. Connected to the Internet as offered by an Internet service provider , they provide Internet access through a wireless network for home or office use. The concepts of
1517-408: Was independently designed. Major router operating systems, such as Junos and NX-OS , are extensively modified versions of Unix software. The main purpose of a router is to connect multiple networks and forward packets destined either for directly attached networks or more remote networks. A router is considered a layer-3 device because its primary forwarding decision is based on the information in
1558-532: Was later retracted and marked as historic because it republished a draft rather than a final version of the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) standard, causing confusion. The protocol was standardized by ISO in 1992 as ISO 10589, for communication between network devices that are termed Intermediate Systems (as opposed to end systems or hosts) by the ISO. The purpose of IS-IS
1599-436: Was led by William Yeager and MIT's by Noel Chiappa . Virtually all networking now uses TCP/IP, but multiprotocol routers are still manufactured. They were important in the early stages of the growth of computer networking when protocols other than TCP/IP were in use. Modern routers that handle both IPv4 and IPv6 are multiprotocol but are simpler devices than ones processing AppleTalk, DECnet, IPX, and Xerox protocols. From
1640-782: Was the DARPA -initiated program, which created the TCP/IP architecture in use today. The first true IP router was developed by Ginny Travers at BBN , as part of that DARPA-initiated effort, during 1975–1976. By the end of 1976, three PDP-11 -based routers were in service in the experimental prototype Internet. Mike Brecia, Ginny Travers, and Bob Hinden received the IEEE Internet Award for early IP routers in 2008. The first multiprotocol routers were independently created by staff researchers at MIT and Stanford in 1981 and both were also based on PDP-11s. Stanford's router program
1681-572: Was to make the routing of datagrams possible using the ISO-developed OSI protocol stack called Connectionless-mode Network Service (CLNS). IS-IS was developed at roughly the same time that the Internet Engineering Task Force IETF was developing a similar protocol called OSPF . IS-IS was later extended to support routing of datagrams in the Internet Protocol (IP), the network-layer protocol of