Classes of Routing Protocols
Prerequisite – Distance vector routing protocol, Link
state routing protocol
Routing is a process in which the layer 3 devices (either
router or layer 3 switches) find the optimal path to
deliver a packet from one network to another. Dynamic
routing protocols use metric, cost, and hop count to
identify the best path from the path available for the
destination network. There are mainly 3 different
classes of routing protocols:
1. Distance Vector Routing Protocol :
These protocols select the best path on the basis of hop
counts to reach a destination network in a particular
direction. Dynamic protocol like RIP is an example of a
distance vector routing protocol. Hop count is each
router that occurs in between the source and the
destination network. The path with the least hop count
will be chosen as the best path.
Features –
Updates of the network are exchanged periodically.
Updates (routing information) is not broadcasted but
shared to neighbouring nodes only.
Full routing tables are not sent in updates but only
distance vector is shared.
Routers always trust routing information received from
neighbor routers. This is also known as routing on
rumors.
Disadvantages –
As the routing information is exchanged periodically,
unnecessary traffic is generated which consumes
available bandwidth.
As full routing tables are exchanged, therefore it has
security issues. If an un-authorized person enters the
network, then the whole topology will be very easy to
understand.
Also, the broadcasting of the network periodically
creates unnecessary traffic.
2. Link State Routing Protocol :
These protocols know more about Internetwork than
any other distance vector routing protocol. These are
also known as SPF (Shortest Path First) protocol. OSPF is
an example of link-state routing protocol.
Features –
Hello, messages, also known as keep-alive messages are
used for neighbor discovery and recovery.
Concept of triggered updates is used i.e updates are
triggered only when there is a topology change.
Only that many updates are exchanged which is
requested by the neighbor router.
Link state routing protocol maintains three tables
namely:
Neighbor table- the table which contains information
about the neighbors of the router only, i.e, to which
adjacency has been formed.
Topology table- This table contains information about
the whole topology i.e contains both best and backup
routes to a particular advertised networks.
Routing table- This table contains all the best routes to
the advertised network.
Advantages –
As it maintains separate tables for both the best route
and the backup routes ( whole topology) therefore it has
more knowledge of the internetwork than any other
distance vector routing protocol.
Concept of triggered updates is used therefore no more
unnecessary bandwidth consumption is seen like in
distance vector routing protocol.
Partial updates are triggered when there is a topology
change, not a full update like distance vector routing
protocol where the whole routing table is exchanged.
3. Advanced Distance vector routing protocol :
It is also known as hybrid routing protocol which uses
the concept of both distance vector and link-state
routing protocol. Enhanced Interior Gateway Routing
Protocol (EIGRP) is an example of this class of routing
protocol. EIGRP acts as a link-state routing protocol as it
uses the concept of Hello protocol for neighbor
discovery and forming an adjacency. Also, partial
updates are triggered when a change occurs. EIGRP acts
as a distance-vector routing protocol as it learned routes
from directly connected neighbors.
