IPv6 Explained for Beginners

IPV6 has been developed to replace IPV4 which is running out of addresses. Although it has been around almost 10 years it is still not widely deployed and supported. However adoption rates are increasing rapidly and IPv6 traffic crossed the 10% threshold in February 2016 (wiki) .

Continue reading

Understanding IPv4 Addressing and Address Classes

IPv4 has been in use since the start of the Internet, and is widely deployed across the Internet, and home networks. In this tutorial we will cover the basics of IPv4 Addresses. You will Learn IPv4 address structure IPV4 Address classes Special and reserved IP addresses Broadcast Vasics

Continue reading

Understanding IP Multicasting

What is IP Multicasting? -IP multicasting allows a host to send a single packet to thousands of hosts across a routed network i.e. The Internet. It is used mainly for audio (radio) and video distribution. In Networking a packet can be sent to: A single host –Unicast = (TCP and UDP) All hosts -Broadcast – (UDP only) A group of hosts – Multicast -(UDP only)

Continue reading

Subnetting and Subnet Masks Explained

What is Subnetting ?-Subnetting is the process of diving a network into small networks and is a common task on IPV4 networks. Before we discuss how to implement it it is useful to understand why and when we need to do it and to do that we are first going to work through a simple analogy to illustrate the problem subnetting solves

Continue reading

DNS Zones and Zone Files Explained

DNS is comprised logically of Domains but physically of zones. A domain is a logical division of the DNS name space whereas a zone is physical, as the information is stored in a file called a zone file.

Continue reading

Host Name Resolution Methods Explained

On computer and home networks when you type an Internet address into a web browser the web browser needs to convert that web address into an IP address. To do that it uses the the name resolution processes provided by the host machine. There are several ways that the host machine can resolve a domain name. The main ones are:

Continue reading

DNS Lookups Explained

In this tutorial we will examine what happens when you use DNS to lookup or resolve a domain name to an IP address. We look at how DNS lookups work, and the exact process involved when looking up a domain name. We follow the client DNS query as it is processed by the various DNS servers in the response chain. Before we start it might be useful to compare DNS name resolution with a standard question and answer that takes place in everyday life.

Continue reading

TCP vs UDP -What’s The Difference?

If you are just starting with TCP/IP then you are probably wondering why there are two transport layer protocols- ( TCP and UDP ). Why don’t we just have one? After all TCP seems to be the best option anyway. The aim of this short introductory tutorial is to explain the basic differences between the two and why each protocol is needed, and when they are used.

Continue reading

Understanding The Domain Name Structure

To understand the domain name structure you really need to understand the problem the structure was meant to solve. The Domain Name Structure and Domain Name System were developed to organise and find the IP addresses of Computers on large distributed networks.

Continue reading