UNIX and Linux System Administration Handbook, 5th Edition

15	IP Routing

More than 4.3 billion IP addresses are available world-wide, so getting packets to the right place on the Internet is no easy task. Chapter 13, TCP/IP Networking, briefly introduced IP packet forwarding. In this chapter, we examine the forwarding process in more detail and investigate several network protocols that allow routers to automatically discover efficient routes. Routing protocols not only lessen the day-to-day administrative burden of maintaining routing information, but they also allow network traffic to be redirected quickly if a router, link, or network should fail.

It’s important to distinguish between ...