IP Addressing

IP Addressing

IP Addressing is designed to allow hosts on a network to communicate with another host on a different network.

There are two types of IP address:

1. IPv4

IPv4 addresses are 32-bits long. It allows maximum 4,294,967,296 (2³²) unique addresses.

• IPv6

IPv6 addresses are 128-bits long. It allows maximum 3.4 x 10³⁸  (2¹²⁸) unique addresses.

IP Terminology

Before starting of IP address, there are several important terms that you should understand about the Internet Protocol, which are:

Bit

It contains only one digit, either 1 or 0.

Byte

It contains 8 bits, depending on whether parity is set or not.

Octet

It is made up of 8 bits, or we can say an ordinary 8-bit binary number.

Network Address

It is used in routing to send packets to a remote network.

Example – A network address can be of type:

10.0.0.0, 172.16.0.0, and 192.168.10.0

Broadcast Address

It is the address used by applications and hosts to send information to all nodes on a network.

Example: A broadcast address can be of type:

255.255.255.255

The Hierarchical IP Addressing Scheme

An IP address is a 32-bit binary number. For readability, this binary number can be divided into four 8-bit octets, and then each octet (or byte) can be converted to decimal number.

There are three methods to write IP addresses.

• Dotted-decimal (172.16.30.56)
• Binary (10101100.00010000.00011110.00111000)
• Hexadecimal (AC.10.1E.38)

Private IP Addresses

The user who creates the IP addressing scheme also needs to create private IP addresses. These addresses can be used on a private network, and not routable through the Internet.

There are three classes in the Private IP Address:

     Class A   10.0.0.0-10.255.255.255

     Class B    172.16.0.0-172.31.255.255

     Class C   192.168.0.0-192.168.255.255

Unicast Address

• One-to-One Communication:

 A process where data is delivered from a sender to a receiver is called unicast.

Example: Browsing a website.

Multicast Address

• One-to-Many Communication

A process where data is delivered from a sender to multiple receivers is called multipoint communication or multicast.

Example: ARP request message.

Broadcast Address

• One-to-all Communication

In the Broadcast address, data travels from a single source to all destinations.

Example: Broadcasting an audio or video message.