So that the data is sent from the shortest and most optimal route to the destination, based on this definition, we see that routing refers to finding the ideal path to transfer packets from one network interface to another.

The above process is managed by routers which are the basic requirements of the network world. To do this, routers use routing tables and algorithms designed to manage packets’ routing and transfer to nodes within a local area network or a public network (Internet).

Routing in the world of computer networks

In the world of computer networks, routing is done in two ways, static and dynamic. Static routing is based on the IP path or the default path. In the first case, routers can use routing table entities manually configured by the network administrator to send packets or use routing information provided by dynamic routing algorithms.

 The important advantage of using a static routing model is the minimal use of bandwidth over dynamic routing.

However, this mechanism does not work well for large networks, as the network administrator must configure all settings manually, which is a time-consuming process. In contrast to static routing is dynamic routing. Dynamic routing allows the routing table to maintain these changes when the router is turned off or unavailable or a new network is added to the existing network.

In the dynamic routing process, it is possible to continuously exchange packets between nodes through routing protocols, check the status of each network router, and allow subnet nodes to use approaches such as multicast or multicast to exchange information.

And always update routing table information. In this case, the routing tables of the routers are constantly updated. The most important dynamic routing protocols are OSPF, EIGRP, IGRP, IS-IS, etc.

These protocols are classified into three groups:

Link State, distance vector, and Hybrid Routing. In the dynamic routing process, it is possible to continuously exchange packets between nodes through routing protocols, check the status of each network router, and allow subnet nodes to use approaches such as multicast or multicast to exchange information.

And always update routing table information. In this case, the routing tables of the routers are constantly updated. The most important dynamic routing protocols are OSPF, EIGRP, IGRP, IS-IS, etc.

These protocols are classified into three groups:

Link State, distance vector, and Hybrid Routing. In the dynamic routing process, it is possible to continuously exchange packets between nodes through routing protocols, check the status of each network router, and allow subnet nodes to use approaches such as multicast or multicast to exchange information.

And always update routing table information. In this case, the routing tables of the routers are constantly updated. The most important dynamic routing protocols are OSPF, EIGRP, IGRP, IS-IS, etc.

These protocols are classified into three groups:

Link State, distance vector, and Hybrid Routing. In this case, the routing tables of the routers are constantly updated. The most important dynamic routing protocols are OSPF, EIGRP, IGRP, IS-IS, etc.

These protocols are classified into three groups:

Link State, distance vector, and Hybrid Routing. In this case, the routing tables of the routers are constantly updated. The most important dynamic routing protocols are OSPF, EIGRP, IGRP, IS-IS, etc. These protocols are classified into three groups: Link State, distance vector, and Hybrid Routing.

What do routing protocols do?

Routing protocols are used to build routing tables and make decisions about choosing the best route. Today, various dynamic routing protocols are available to network experts, the most important of which are the OSPF, EIGRP, IGRP, and IS-IS protocols. In general, a routing protocol defines how nodes communicate with each other and manage the information transfer process.

A routing protocol allows nodes to choose the best route to exchange information with each other. Network nodes and routers only know about the networks to which they are connected.

A routing protocol shares the information needed by nodes and routers first between close neighbors and then across the network. In this way, routers gain the necessary knowledge in the form of routing tables.

Distance-Vector Routing Protocols

Vector-distance routing protocols use the Hop Count metric, which specifies the number of routers in their routing table. These protocols send their routing tables to all neighboring nodes directly connected to them at specified intervals and with high bandwidth. When a route becomes inaccessible, all network routers must update their routing tables based on new information.

The problem with vector-distance protocols is that each router must report new information to its neighboring nodes, which takes a long time for all routers to get accurate information about the network. Vector-distance protocols use a fixed subnet mask that lacks scalability.

The algorithm on which these protocols work and create routing tables uses simple mathematical calculations.

In general, vector-distance protocols are used for small networks with less than 16 routers. Vector-distance protocols standardize router routing tables at specified intervals. The function of vector-distance protocols is to use two measures of distance and direction to find the destination.

Routers that use vector-distance routing protocols provide their neighboring routers with information about the network topology and changes over time.

This notification is based on the Broadcast approach and is based on the IP address 255.255.255.255. Vector-distance protocols use the Bellman-Ford algorithm to find the best route to send packets to a destination.

Routers that use protocols in this family send a broadcast request to their relationships to find out the information in the routing table of neighboring routers.

In addition, they use the Broadcast technique to share routing table information.

Vector-distance algorithms Whenever a change is made to the routing table, it immediately sends the information in full distribution to all router interfaces.

In this case, the distance value of the received route increases and replaced the previous distance value. This process continues to update the routing tables of all routers. As you can see, vector-distance protocols are the simplest type of routing protocols that easily identify and troubleshoot but consume a significant amount of network bandwidth.

Link State Routing Protocols

Link-state protocols function quite differently from vector-distance protocols and have their own complexities. Routing protocols Link status is a special type of routing protocol that provides routers with a complete roadmap. Routers that use the link status protocol can route packets without any problems because they have a complete picture of the network.

Using link status protocols is to find the best route to the destination based on different patterns. Link status protocols publish routing information only whenever changes are made to use bandwidth more efficiently and accurately.

In this case, instead of the routing table, the routers emit only changes that significantly remove the extra network slag and increase the speed of data exchange.

Routers that use the link status protocol always have first-hand information from all routers because each router generates information about the routing table. The links connected to it create the status of the links and transmit the above information to it another router.

In this mechanism, each router has a copy of the information without changing the information.

Link status protocols are known by various names, such as Distributed Database Protocol or Shortest Path First. Link link status routing protocols use an algorithm called Dijkstra to determine the best path.

Routers that use link status protocols only need to unify routing tables when a new entity has been added to the routing table of one of the routers. For this reason, they consume the least traffic when unifying the routing table.

In connection routing protocols, routers provide the network with comprehensive information about themselves, including direct links to them and the status of the links.

The information is sent to all routers on the network based on the multicast approach, which is the exact opposite of the multicast approach to vector-distance protocols.

 In the connection status routing process, whenever there is a small change in the network configuration, the change is sent to all routers.

In the above architecture, each network router has a copy of the network connection and independently calculates the best routes to reach the destination networks.

Linkage status protocols based on the Shortest Path First (SFP) algorithm select the most appropriate route to reach the destination. In the above algorithm, whenever the status of a communication link changes, a path update called LSA called the Advertising Link Status Title is generated and sent to all routers.

This group’s important routing protocols include the OSPF protocol on the IP platform, the Is-IS protocol on the IP platform, CLNS, and the NLSP protocol.

The OSPF protocol is one of the most popular family protocols (IGPs) called Interior Gateway Protocol.

OSPF is used as the standard for IP routing on large networks.

When the OSPF protocol is configured on the network, it listens to nearby routers and gathers packets of data sent by the routers to create a connection map of all available routes.

When launching each router configured with OSPF, hello packets are sent to all OSPF routers connected to the network. Hello, packets have information similar to router timers, unique identifiers, routers, and subnet masks. The information stored in the databases calculates the best and shortest possible path to each subnet or core network by the SFP algorithm.

Hybrid routing protocols

Hybrid routing protocols try to use a combination of vector-distance and Link State protocols to achieve the best performance and take advantage of the potential benefits of each group of protocols.

More precisely, they use the capabilities of vector-distance protocols (due to less processing) when they need processing power and the capabilities of link status protocols when they need to exchange routing tables on the network. Given their potential benefits, hybrid protocols are used in large networks.

One of the most famous protocols in this group is EIGRP. EIGRP can route IP, IGRP, and Appletalk protocols and use hybrid metrics similar to the IGRP protocol to select the best route to the destination.