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Posts tagged OSPF
OSPF Quiz
Oct 23rd
I had an interesting conversation the other day regarding OSPF. I don’t want to give too much away, so here we go. This is the topology:

Assume interfaces have correct bandwidth statements and no cost commands have been added. R1 and R2 are redistributing the 192.168.1.0/24 prefix as E2 with a cost of 100.
Which path does R4 take to the 192.168.1.0/24 network? Does it load balance? Explain.
I started a thread on Networking-Forum on this as well. Post your answer here in the comments or over there.
Update: Here’s another question. What happens if we change it to:

Everything is the same except R2 is now redistributing as E1. Which path and why?
show ip ospf rib
Mar 3rd
Another quick one. Today I’m going to cover a simple, but very useful OSPF command: “show ip ospf rib”. This command is similar to “show ip route ospf”, but goes a bit deeper.
If you’ve ever done a routing protocol migration, you know how important it can be to see each protocol’s full routing table. Much of the time AD makes this difficult. Administrative Distance (AD) is the believability of a routing protocol on a Cisco device. The default AD values are:
Route Source |
Default Distance |
| Connected Interface | 0 |
| Static Route | 1 |
| EIGRP Summary | 5 |
| eBGP | 20 |
| Internal EIGRP | 90 |
| IGRP | 100 |
| OSPF | 110 |
| IS-IS | 115 |
| RIP | 120 |
| EGP | 140 |
| ODR | 160 |
| External EIGRP | 170 |
| iBGP | 200 |
| Unknown | 255 |
IOS Macros
Aug 16th
Here’s another short (but hopefully useful) post. We’ll be going through IOS Macros.
I’ve never used IOS Macros before, but I was asked about a problem today, and a macro seems to be an ideal solution. A friend of mine is an engineer for a service provider with a very large network. He has been tasked with implementing passive interfaces as the default for OSPF across the network. Most of the devices which will be modified rely on OSPF for management connectivity. When he runs the “passive-interface default” command, he will lose connectivity before he is able to run “no passive-interface [interface]” to restore connectivity. Macros tell the router to run the predetermined commands for us, which will save us from getting locked out.
The topology is simple and not worth a diagram. R1 and R2 are connected via their FastEthernet0/0 interfaces. They are running OSPF on this interface.
OSPF Summarization
Jun 18th
This post is about OSPF Summarization. We’ll be using a familiar topology and going over two ways to summarize with OSPF.
There are two conventional ways to summarize networks in OSPF, we can use the “area range” command and the “summary-address” command. “Area range” is used on the ABR to summarize networks between areas. The “summary-address” command is used on the ASBR to summarize external networks.
Here’s the topology:

I’m not going through the basic OSPF config, so assume everything is configured as the diagram suggests. On R1 I’ve added Lo11-14 and used “ospf 100 area 0″ under the respective interfaces. On R2 I’ve added Lo15-18 and used “redistribute connected subnets”. Let’s look at the RIBs on a couple routers:
First we’ll check out “sh ip route” on R1:
R1#sh ip route
...
1.0.0.0/32 is subnetted, 1 subnets
C 1.1.1.1 is directly connected, Loopback0
2.0.0.0/32 is subnetted, 1 subnets
O E2 2.2.2.2 [110/20] via 10.1.123.2, 01:13:32, FastEthernet0/0
3.0.0.0/32 is subnetted, 1 subnets
O E2 3.3.3.3 [110/20] via 10.1.123.3, 01:12:38, FastEthernet0/0
4.0.0.0/32 is subnetted, 1 subnets
O E2 4.4.4.4 [110/20] via 10.1.123.3, 01:03:47, FastEthernet0/0
172.30.0.0/24 is subnetted, 4 subnets
O E2 172.30.6.0 [110/20] via 10.1.123.2, 00:06:11, FastEthernet0/0
O E2 172.30.7.0 [110/20] via 10.1.123.2, 00:06:11, FastEthernet0/0
O E2 172.30.5.0 [110/20] via 10.1.123.2, 00:06:11, FastEthernet0/0
O E2 172.30.8.0 [110/20] via 10.1.123.2, 00:06:11, FastEthernet0/0
C 192.168.4.0/24 is directly connected, Loopback14
10.0.0.0/24 is subnetted, 2 subnets
O IA 10.1.34.0 [110/74] via 10.1.123.3, 01:12:39, FastEthernet0/0
C 10.1.123.0 is directly connected, FastEthernet0/0
C 192.168.1.0/24 is directly connected, Loopback11
C 192.168.2.0/24 is directly connected, Loopback12
C 192.168.3.0/24 is directly connected, Loopback13 |
Lots of routes here. The ones to note are the 172s showing as External Type 2, which are R2′s loopbacks. Also notice our connected loopbacks.
OSPF Area Types: Not So Totally Stubby
Jun 18th
This is the last post in a series about OSPF Area Types. Today we’ll go over Not So Totally Stubby Areas. We’ll be using the same topology as the NSSA post, but this time we will inject a specific route (40.40.40.0/24) from the ASBR (R4) instead of a default.
Quick refresher, OSPF Not So Totally Stubby Areas have intra-area routes (Type 2 LSAs) and also external routes in the form of Type 7 LSAs, which are converted to Type 5 LSAs by the ABR. No inter-area routes (Type 3 LSAs) are permitted in a Not So Totally Stubby Area and a default route will be injected by the ABR.
(For more detailed information on LSAs and Area Types, check out this post.)
Here’s the topology:

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