OSPF and IS-IS: Choosing an IGP for Large-Scale Networks (Paperback)

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Editorial Reviews

Product Description

The practical guide to large-scale networking with OSPF and IS-IS This is the definitive guide to using OSPF and IS-IS protocols in large-scale IP enterprise, carrier, and service provider networks. Well-known network designer Jeff Doyle draws on his consulting experience, offering realistic advice and straight answers on every aspect of working with link-state protocols--from scalability, reliability, and security to area design and database synchronization. This book is organized to help network engineers and architects compare OSPF and IS-IS. One feature at a time, Doyle first demonstrates how a topic or feature is implemented in OSPF, and then walks through a similar implementation using IS-IS. Professionals who are relatively new to large-scale networking will welcome his practical introduction to the concepts, goals, and history of link state protocols.Coverage includes * Understanding message types, encapsulation, architecture, LSAs, and LSPs * Optimizing addressing, neighbor discovery, adjacencies, and router designation * Improving scalability: controlling the scope of flooding, link state database size, SPF calculation efficiency, and much more * Designing and operating large-scale networks for maximum security and reliability * Hardening networks to thwart attacks against routing protocols * Comparing OSPF and IS-IS extensibility * Utilizing extensions for MPLS-based traffic engineering, IPv6, and multi-topology routing * Troubleshooting OSPF and IS-IS log entries, debug output, and LS databases Doyle's thorough explanations, end-of-chapter review questions, and many wide-ranging examples for both Cisco's IOS and Juniper's JUNOS also make this book an exceptional resource for anyone pursuing a CCIE or JNCIE certification. A(c) Copyright Pearson Education. All rights reserved.

From the Back Cover

The practical guide to large-scale networking with OSPF and IS-IS

This is the definitive guide to using OSPF and IS-IS protocols in large-scale IP enterprise, carrier, and service provider networks. Well-known network designer Jeff Doyle draws on his consulting experience, offering realistic advice and straight answers on every aspect of working with link-state protocols—from scalability, reliability, and security to area design and database synchronization.

This book is organized to help network engineers and architects compare OSPF and IS-IS. One feature at a time, Doyle first demonstrates how a topic or feature is implemented in OSPF, and then walks through a similar implementation using IS-IS. Professionals who are relatively new to large-scale networking will welcome his practical introduction to the concepts, goals, and history of link state protocols. Coverage includes

• Understanding message types, encapsulation, architecture, LSAs, and LSPs

• Optimizing addressing, neighbor discovery, adjacencies, and router designation

• Improving scalability: controlling the scope of flooding, link state database size, SPF calculation efficiency, and much more

• Designing and operating large-scale networks for maximum security and reliability

• Hardening networks to thwart attacks against routing protocols

• Comparing OSPF and IS-IS extensibility

• Utilizing extensions for MPLS-based traffic engineering, IPv6, and multi-topology routing

• Troubleshooting OSPF and IS-IS log entries, debug output, and LS databases

Doyle's thorough explanations, end-of-chapter review questions, and many wide-ranging examples for both Cisco's IOS and Juniper's JUNOS also make this book an exceptional resource for anyone pursuing a CCIE or JNCIE certification.

© Copyright Pearson Education. All rights reserved.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 480 pages
• Publisher: Addison-Wesley Professional (November 11, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0321168798
• ISBN-13: 978-0321168795
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.8 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #664,220 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent OSPF text!, August 28, 2007

By	niXster - See all my reviews

After thoroughly reading the OSPF chapter of Jeff Doyle's Cisco Press title, I scored 100% on the OSPF section of my CCNP Routing exam. This great books gives you the same great information, but presented in a different manner teaching you OSPF/IS-IS on both Cisco and JUNOS side by side. After reading this book, I am confident I could score 100% again.

If you're a hardcore OSPF fan, you will love this book.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent Comparative Reference on OSPF and IS-IS (IPv4 and IPv6), June 19, 2007

By	Eural Authement (Atlanta, GA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

OSPF and IS-IS : Choosing an IGP for Large-Scale Networks is an excellent source for understanding the similarities and differences of IS-IS and OSPF all in one book. It is the only book available with such complete coverage comparing these two IGP routing protocols.

There have been many official and unofficial debates over which protocol is better. Finally, the common problem of choosing one IGP routing protocol over the other or the second guessing of an IGP deployment choice can now be put to rest thanks to this definitive source of information on the subject. The book does a fair and deep comparison of the two protocols down to the packet structures and usage scenarios. It answers lingering questions and corrects common misconceptions about how these protocols operate. The author shows no bias towards either protocol without good justification. Jeff presents the information in such a way that the reader can draw his/her own conclusions.

Doyle's book does not assume the reader has strong knowledge of OSPF and IS-IS. It teaches the theory of each protocol in addition to comparing and contrasting in Doyle's easy to follow style. For those who are experts at IS-IS and OSPF with regards to IPv4 and understand the differences, IS-IS and OSPF for IPv6 are covered/compared in the same fashion.

Thanks for a great reference book, Jeff!

5.0 out of 5 stars A welcome addition to any networking library..., February 5, 2009

By	Stefan Fouant "Principal Engineer" (Washington, DC) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

If you consider yourself a student of routing protocols and enjoy coverage of graph theory from the perspective of its application to link-state routing protocols, this text will certainly be a welcome addition to your library. This book not only provides information regarding 'how' link-state routing protocols work, it also provides information regarding 'why' the link-state routing protocols behave as they do, and why the protocol designers made certain choices in the development of these protocols. While it might seem a daunting task especially to the novice reader to learn about two routing protocols side-by-side, it is this treatment which makes this text so worthwhile. Being able to compare these two protocols and identify their similarities and differences simultaneously will ultimately help the network designer pick the right protocol for the job in a given network environment.

This book goes beyond IGP fundamentals by giving practical advice to the network designer which can assist in the planning and implementation of a scalable IGP deployment. For example, in the chapter on Area Design, the author states that "a useful guideline when designing a network is that network control traffic should never exceed 5 percent of the available bandwidth of any link in the network, and in normal circumstances should not exceed 1 percent". The author then presents various formulas which can be used to determine the amount of bandwidth used by the protocol control traffic based on the number and type of LSAs which are expected to be present in a given network. Arguably one of the best chapters in the book is the chapter on Scaling. This chapter has some of the best coverage of the various modifications which router vendors make to their link-state protocol implementations in order to make routers perform calculations more rapidly, enhance flooding of Link-State updates, and other changes designed to make the protocols scale to support very large networks.

I am a stickler for accuracy, especially when it comes to technical textbooks. I pride myself on my ability to spot technical and grammatical errors in texts such as these, however I must say as I read this book I was very impressed that I found very little errors beyond just the simple grammatical and typographical. Jeff Doyle is an experienced writer, and it should come as no surprise that the technical content in this book is extremely well-vetted, accurate, and error-free. Ultimately, if you are a network operator, designer or architect and are interested in broadening your understand of link-state protocols coupled with the ability to more fully understand the technical distinctions between OSPF and IS-IS, this book is without a doubt one of the best options on the market today.