Module 3

Session 3
Network Layer: IPv4/IPv6
(Putting the Net in Internet)
Possible Addressing Schemes
 Flat
 [Link] host is identified by a 48-bit MAC address
 Router needs an entry for every host in the world
◼ Too big
◼ Too hard to maintain (hosts come and go all the time)
◼ Too slow (more later)

 Hierarchy
 Addressesbroken down into segments
 Each segment has a different level of specificity
Binary Hierarchy Example

1** Datagram, Destination

10* = 101
100
101 11*
0**
110 00*
111 000
001 01*

010
011
IP Addressing
 IPv4: 32-bit addresses
 Usually written in dotted notation, e.g. [Link]
 Each number is a byte

 Stored in Big Endian order

0 8 16 24 31
Decimal 192 168 21 76

Hex C0 A8 15 4C

Binary 11000000 10101000 00010101 01001100

IP Addressing and Forwarding
 Routing Table Requirements
 For every possible IP, give the next hop
 But for 32-bit addresses, 232 possibilities!
 Too slow: 48GE ports and 4x10GE needs 176Gbps bandwidth
DRAM: ~1-6 Gbps; TCAM is fast, but 400x cost of DRAM
 Hierarchical address scheme
 Separate the address into a network and a host
0 31
Pfx Network Host

Known by all Known by edge

routers (LAN) routers
How Do You Get IPs?
 IP address ranges controlled by IANA

 Internet Assigned Number Authority

 Roots go back to 1972, ARPANET, UCLA
 Today, part of ICANN

 IANA grants IPs to regional authorities

 ARIN (American Registry of Internet Numbers) may grant you a
range of IPs
 You may then advertise routes to your new IP range
 There are now secondary markets, auctions, …
IP Datagrams
 IP Datagrams are like a letter
 Totally self-contained
 Include all necessary addressing information

 No advanced setup of connections or circuits

0 4 8 12 16 19 24 31
Version HLen DSCP/ECN Datagram Length
Identifier Flags Offset
TTL Protocol Checksum
Source IP Address
Destination IP Address
Options (if any, usually not)
Data
IP Header Fields: Word 1
 Version: 4 for IPv4
 Header Length: Number of 32-bit words (usually 5)
 Type of Service: Priority information (unused)
 Datagram Length: Length of header + data in bytes
0 4 8 12 16 19 24 31
Version HLen DSCP/ECN Datagram Length
Identifier Flags Offset
TTL Protocol Checksum
Limits packets
Source IP Address
to 65,535
Destination IP Address
bytes
Options (if any, usually not)
Data
IP Header Fields: Word 3
 Time to Live: decremented by each router
 Used to kill looping packets
 Protocol: ID of encapsulated protocol
 6 = TCP, 17 = UDP
 Checksum
0 4 8 12 16 19 24 31
Version HLen DSCP/ECN Datagram Length
Identifier Flags Offset
TTL Protocol Checksum
Source IP Address
Used to Destination IP Address
implement Options (if any, usually not)
trace route Data
IP Header Fields: Word 4 and 5
 Source and destination address
 In theory, must be globally unique
 In practice, this is often violated

0 4 8 12 16 19 24 31
Version HLen DSCP/ECN Datagram Length
Identifier Flags Offset
TTL Protocol Checksum
Source IP Address
Destination IP Address
Options (if any, usually not)
Data
Problem: Fragmentation

MTU = 4000 MTU = 2000 MTU = 1500

Datagram Dgram1 Dgram2 1 2 3 4

 Problem: each network has its own MTU

 DARPA principles: networks allowed to be heterogeneous
 Minimum MTU may not be known for a given path

 IP Solution: fragmentation
 Split datagrams into pieces when MTU is reduced
 Reassemble original datagram at the receiver
IP Header Fields: Word 2
 Identifier: a unique number for the original datagram
 Flags: M flag, i.e. this is the last fragment
 Offset: byte position of the first byte in the fragment
 Divided by 8
0 4 8 12 16 19 24 31
Version HLen TOS Datagram Length
Identifier Flags Offset
TTL Protocol Checksum
Source IP Address
Destination IP Address
Options (if any, usually not)
Data
Fragmentation Example

MTU = 4000 MTU = 2000 MTU = 1500

Length = 2000, M = 1
Offset = 0
IP Data
Length = 3820, M = 0
20 1980
IP Hdr Data
20 3800 1980
Length = 1840, M = 0 + 1820
Offset = 1980 = 3800
IP Data
20 1820
Fragmentation Example

MTU = 2000 MTU = 1500

Length = 2000, M = 1 Length = 1500, M = 1

Offset = 0 Offset = 0
IP Data IP Data Length = 1500, M = 1
20 1980 20 1480 Offset = 1980
IP Data
Length = 520, M = 1 20 1480
1480
Length = 1840, M = 0 Offset = 1480 + 500
Offset = 1980 IP Data Length
= =1980
360, M = 0
Offset = 3460
IP Data 20 500
20 1820
IP Data
20 340
IP Fragment Reassembly
Length = 1500, M = 1, Offset = 0  Performed at destination
IP Data
20 1480
 M = 0 fragment gives us
Length = 520, M = 1, Offset = 1480
total data size
 360 – 20 + 3460 = 3800
IP Data
20 500  Challenges:
Length = 1500, M = 1, Offset = 1980  Out-of-order fragments
IP Data  Duplicate fragments
20 1480
 Missing fragments
Length = 360, M = 0, Offset = 3460
 Basically, memory
IP Data
management nightmare
20 340
Fragmentation Concepts
 Highlights many key Internet characteristics
 Decentralized and heterogeneous
◼ Each network may choose its own MTU
 Connectionless datagram protocol
◼ Eachfragment contains full routing information
◼ Fragments can travel independently, on different paths

 Best effort network

◼ Routers/receivermay silently drop fragments
◼ No requirement to alert the sender

 Most work is done at the endpoints

◼ i.e. reassembly
Fragmentation in Reality
 Fragmentation is expensive
 Memory and CPU overhead for datagram reconstruction
 Want to avoid fragmentation if possible

 MTU discovery protocol

 Send a packet with “don’t fragment” bit set
 Keep decreasing message length until one arrives
 May get “can’t fragment” error from a router, which will
explicitly state the supported MTU
 Router handling of fragments
 Fast,specialized hardware handles the common case
 Dedicated, general purpose CPU just for handling fragments
The IPv4 Address Space Crisis
 Problem: the IPv4 address space is too small
 232 = 4,294,967,296 possible addresses
 Less than one IP per person

 Parts of the world have already run out of addresses

 IANA assigned the last /8 block of addresses in 2011
Regional Internet Registry
Region (RIR) Exhaustion Date
Asia/Pacific APNIC April 19, 2011
Europe/Middle East RIPE September 14, 2012
North America ARIN 13 Jan 2015 (Projected)
South America LACNIC 13 Jan 2015 (Projected)
Africa AFRINIC 17 Jan 2022(Projected)
IPv6
 IPv6, first introduced in 1998(!)
 128-bit addresses
 4.8 * 1028 addresses per person

 Address format
8 groups of 16-bit values, separated by ‘:’
 Leading zeroes in each group may be omitted

 Groups of zeroes can be omitted using ‘::’

[Link]
[Link]
[Link]
IPv6 Header
 Double the size of IPv4 (320 bits vs. 160 bits)
0 4 8 12 16 19 24 31
Version DSCP/ECN Flow Label
Datagram Length Next Header Hop Limit
Groups packets into
Version = 6 flows, used for QoS
Source IP Address

Destination IP Address
Differences from IPv4 Header
 Several header fields are missing in IPv6
 Header length – rolled into Next Header field
 Checksum – was useless, so why keep it

 Identifier, Flags, Offset

◼ IPv6 routers do not support fragmentation
◼ Hosts are expected to use path MTU discovery

 Reflects changing Internet priorities

 Today’s networks are more homogeneous
 Instead, routing cost and complexity dominate
Performance Improvements
 No checksums to verify
 No need for routers to handle fragmentation
 Simplified routing table design
 Addressspace is huge
 No need for CIDR (but need for aggregation)

 Standard subnet size is 264 addresses

 Simplified auto-configuration
 Neighbor Discovery Protocol
 Used by hosts to determine network ID

 Host ID can be random!

Additional IPv6 Features
 Source Routing
 Host specifies the route to wants packet to take
 Mobile IP
 Hosts can take their IP with them to other networks
 Use source routing to direct packets

 Privacy Extensions
 Randomly generate host identifiers
 Make it difficult to associate one IP to a host

 Jumbograms
 Support for 4Gb datagrams