Determining IP Routes

Introducing Distance Vector Routing

Outline
Overview
Distance Vector Route Selection
Routing Information Maintenance
Routing Inconsistencies with Distance Vector Routing
Protocols
Count to Infinity Prevention
Techniques to Eliminate Routing Loops
Implementation of Techniques to Eliminate Routing Loops
Summary

Distance Vector Routing Protocols

Routers pass periodic copies of their routing table to neighboring

routers and accumulate distance vectors.

Sources of Information and Discovering

Routes

Routers discover the best path to destinations from each neighbor.

Selecting the
Best Route with Metrics

Maintaining Routing Information

Updates proceed step by step from router to router.

Inconsistent Routing Entries

Each node maintains the distance from itself to each possible destination network.

Inconsistent Routing Entries (Cont.)

Slow convergence produces inconsistent routing.

Inconsistent Routing Entries (Cont.)

Router C concludes that the best path to network 10.4.0.0 is

through Router B.

Inconsistent Routing Entries (Cont.)

Router A updates its table to reflect the new but erroneous

hop count.

Count to Infinity

The hop count for network 10.4.0.0 counts to infinity.

Defining a Maximum

A limit is set on the number of hops to prevent infinite loops.

Routing Loops

Packets for network 10.4.0.0 bounce (loop) between

Routers B and C.

Split Horizon

It is never useful to send information about a route back in the direction from which the original
information came.

Route Poisoning

Routers advertise the distance of routes that have gone down to infinity.

Poison Reverse

Poison reverse overrides split horizon.

Holddown Timers

The router keeps an entry for the possibly down state in the
network, allowing time for other routers to recompute for this
topology change.

Triggered Updates

The router sends updates when a change in its routing table occurs.

Eliminating Routing Loops

Eliminating Routing Loops (Cont.)

Eliminating Routing Loops (Cont.)

Eliminating Routing Loops (Cont.)

Eliminating Routing Loops (Cont.)

Eliminating Routing Loops (Cont.)

Summary
Distance vector routing protocols generate periodic routing
updates addressed to directly connected routing devices.
Routers running a distance vector routing protocol send
periodic updates even if there are no changes in the network.
When a router receives an update from a neighbors router, the
router compares the update with its own routing table. The
router adds the cost of reaching the neighbors router to the
path cost reported by the neighbor to establish a new metric.
Routing inconsistencies occur if slow internetwork
convergence or a new configuration causes incorrect routing
entries.

Summary (Cont.)
Distance vector protocols define infinity as some maximum
number. The routing protocol then permits the routing table
update loop until the metric exceeds its maximum allowed
value.
There are five techniques for eliminating routing loops on
distance vector routing networks: split horizon, route
poisoning, poison reverse, holddown timers, and triggered
updates.
All five techniques can be used together to eliminate routing
loops in area networks.