CSC81001: Computer Networks Assignment 2022

MIT
Authors Name/s per 1st Affiliation (Author)
Dept. name of the organization
Name of organization, acronyms acceptable
City, Country
mail address

CSC81001 – Computer Networks
Assignment-1, 2019
Table of Contents
Task-1: Protocol comparison.......................................................................................... 5
The protocol structure................................................................................................. 5
The addressing scheme.............................................................................................. 6
Advantages and disadvantages..................................................................................6
Performance............................................................................................................. 7
Deployment figure in the last 5 years......................................................................7
Task-2: Protocol Analysis................................................................................................ 9
Task 3: Network Architecture Analysis.........................................................................14
2

CSC81001 – Computer Networks
Assignment-1, 2019
Task-1: Protocol comparison
The IP (Internet Protocol) is a set of rules used by computing devices send data from
one device to another over a packet-switched network. The main services provided by
the protocol in the packet-switched network is addressing and fragmentation. The
protocol generally has two parts, that is the Network part and the Local or the Host
part. IP protocol exists in two versions, the IPv4 and the IPv6. IPv4 is a 32-bit number
normally written in a dotted decimal notation whereas the IPv6 is a 128-bit number
normally written in Hexadecimal notation [1]. The details of the IP structure and
detailed comparison of the two versions are discussed below
The protocol structure
The following diagram shows the structural difference between and IPv4 and IPv6
Figure 1 IPv4 Vs IPv6 Structure
The IPv4 header represents a packet with some additional information which gets
transmitted from the source computing device to the destination computing devices
and uses the IPv4 version. The IPv6 header contains additional information that gets
transmitted from the source computing device to the destination using the IPv6.
It terms of simplicity, the structure of IPv4 is quite complex relative to the IPv6 as the
former has very many fields added to the header information. Such fields as the
header length, flags, identification are included in the header information. Whereas
the IPv6 has eliminated fields such as flags, identification, and length.
The IPv4 structure contains a special field for options whereas the IPv6 contains a field
named next header which is primarily used for extensions.
The IPv4 header structure has the TTL(Time To Live) which is used to show the number
of hops the packet has undergone. In sharp contrast, the IPv6 structure has a field
called the hop limit which is used to show the number of hops the packet has
undergone [2].
The IPv4 source address and the destination address is a 32-bit lengthwise while the
source and destination IPv6 address has a 128-bits lengthwise
3

CSC81001 – Computer Networks
Assignment-1, 2019
The checksum field is available in the IPv4 structure for error control purposes while
IPv6 has no checksum field
IPv4 allows for broadcast messages while the IPv6 structure doesn’t allow broadcast
messages and in place, a link-local address is used to offer the functionality of
broadcast
The addressing scheme
The IPv4 addressing scheme is normally broken down into four classes namely class A,
class B, class C and Class D. The different classes are used to denote how many hosts
that the scheme can be directly connected to the network. The chart below shows a
summary of the classes [3].
Figure 2 IPv4 Address Classes
The literal numerical values of the number of hosts in each class are as shown below
Figure 3 IPv4 Address
This system presents numerous challenges including address run out especially the
class B used by many companies. This prompted the design of the IPv6 addressing
scheme which is simply aimed at lengthening the various field that has addresses. The
IPv6 has 128 bits length making it convenient for a larger number of addresses [4].
The addressing scheme is broken into the network and host address
Figure 4 IPv6 addresses
This provides more robust benefits as discussed below
4