Tech Support Reviews

What are the Functions of Internet

Protocol?
By John Monteith

Techwalla may earn compensation through affiliate links in this story.

Functions of Internet Protocol

Internet Protocol, or IP, is the method that governs how computers share data
across the Internet. When one computer sends data, such as an email or a
web form, its message gets parsed into small packets that contain the sending
computer's Internet address, the receiving computer's address, and part of the
message. Internet Protocol serves several basic functions.

Addressing
IP packet headers contain addresses that identify the sending computer and
the receiving computer. Routers use this information to guide each packet
across communication networks and connect the sending and receiving
computers.

Reassembly
Internet Protocol keeps track of the way messages between computers are
broken into packets. Since most messages are too big to fit in one packet, and
since packets aren't sent in any organized order, they must be reassembled as
they arrive at the recipient. IP dictates how packets are reassembled into
usable messages.

Timeouts
Each IP packet contains a self-destructive counter that limits its lifetime. If a
packet's defined lifetime expires, the packet is destroyed so that the Internet
doesn't get overloaded with broken packets wandering aimlessly.

Options
IP includes optional features such as allowing the sending computer to decide
the path its packets take to get to the receiving computer, to trace the path
they take or to include added security in the packets.

Tech Support How To

How to Calculate an IP Subnet Mask

By Steven Melendez • Updated February 21, 2019

Techwalla may earn compensation through affiliate links in this story.

How to Calculate an IP Subnet Mask
Image Credit:
anyaberkut/iStock/GettyImages

Companies, universities and other organizations often have a set of Internet

protocol addresses that they can assign to computers and other devices on
their networks. For security and efficiency purposes, it often makes sense to
divide these networks into units called subnets rather than maintain one
sprawling and unified network. One way to do this is by using mathematical
tools called subnet masks, where a router can use a quick subnet mask
calculation to determine which subnet a particular IP belongs to.

How IP Addresses Work

The Internet protocol is a system for routing data between computers on the
global Internet or other networks. It divides data such as web page contents,
email messages or streaming video transmissions into small units known as
packets with a particular structure, including a header with information about
where the packets are coming from and where they're going.
Each packet includes a source IP address, identifying the device that sent
the message, and a destination IP address, identifying the device that's
intended to receive it. Most IP addresses used today are based on the rules in
version four of the Internet protocol, abbreviated IPv4. These IP addresses are
32 binary digits, or bits, long. They're often written as four decimal numbers
separated by periods, such as 192.168.0.1 or 255.255.255.255.

IP addresses are assigned to various organizations by a group called the

Internet Assigned Numbers Authority, or IANA. Generally, numerically
contiguous blocks of IP addresses are assigned to a single organization. Many
organizations also have internal IP addresses that can be accessed only
internally. Certain blocks of IP addresses are reserved for internal use within
networks.

Devices known as routers are responsible for taking IP packets and

determining where to send them, either sending them directly to a destination
machine if they are connected to one another or forwarding them to another
router on a path to that device. They store routing tables that they use to
determine where to send a packet based on its destination address.

IP Address Blocks and Classes

Traditionally, IP address blocks were divided into classes, with the class
determining how many addresses were in the block and what their format
looked like.

Class A addresses begin with a "0" bit. The next seven bits identify the
individual network block, and the subsequent 24 bits identify individual
computers within that network. Class B addresses began with a "1" bit
followed by a "0" bit, where the next 14 bits identify the network block and the
subsequent 16 bits identify individual computers. Class C addresses began
with two "1" bits followed by a "0" bit, with the next 21 bits identifying the
network block and the last 8 bits identifying specific devices within the
network.

IP address classes made it easy for routers to build tables specifying where
packets destined for particular IP addresses should be sent, since they could
store information for each network identified by the prefix of a particular IP
address.

Classless Interdomain Routing

The downside is that they are inefficient in allocating IP addresses to
networks, especially in cases where a network needs more IP addresses than
a class C network would afford but fewer than a class B would provide, or
more than a class B permits but fewer than a class A provides. That can lead
to wasted IP addresses, when organizations use a bigger IP address class
than they actually require, or routing inefficiencies if organizations have to
patch together many unrelated class C IP address blocks within a single actual
network to get the number of addresses they need.

To make things more efficient, many routers and organizations have adopted
what is called classless interdomain routing, or CIDR (often pronounced like
the word "cider.") This allows IP addresses to be divided into more flexibly-
sized IP address blocks, where a prefix of any length identifying the network
can be followed by the remainder of an IP address identifying individual
devices.

The prefix is usually written as a decimal number or set of decimal numbers

separated by periods, followed by a forward slash and the number of bits in
that prefix. For example, "017/8" is an IP address block assigned to Apple,
including all IP addresses beginning with the binary digits corresponding to
the decimal number 17. Similarly, "70.132.0.0/18" is an IP address block
allocated to Amazon, consisting of addresses where the first 18 binary digits
match the first 18 binary digits in the IP address 70.132.0.0.

Understanding Subnet Masks

One way of indicating the part of an IP address that corresponds to a network
and that part that identifies individual machines is by using what's called a
subnet mask. Simple IP calculator tools can then map an IP address into its
two parts.
A subnet mask looks like an IP address, in that it's typically written as a
dotted set of four decimal numbers, such as 255.255.254.0 or 255.128.0.0.
The chief restriction on subnet masks is that the leftmost binary digits, up to a
certain point, must all be 1, and the subsequent digits must all be 0. When an
IP address is being processed, a router takes the binary "and" of the subnet
mask and the IP address, meaning that any bit that is 1 in both the mask and
the address is 1 in the result, and any other digit is 0. The result is the network
or subnet in which the IP address belongs.

If you want to calculate the number of subnets and hosts (or devices) that
match a given subnet mask, it is relatively easy. The total number of subnets is
the possible number of variations in an IP address for the portion of the mask
that is all ones, which is two raised to the power of the number of ones in the
mask. For example, 255.255.254.0 written in binary begins with 23 ones, so
there are 2^(23) or 8,388,608 possible subnets. Each subnet contains all IP
addresses with its valid prefix, but can vary in the remaining 9 binary digits,
so there are 2^9 = 512 IP addresses available to hosts in each subnet.

You can find numerous netmask calculator tools online to do these

calculations for you and to map IP addresses and subnet masks to subnets.
Hardware and software to do these calculations quickly is built into modern
routers.

Private IP Address Ranges

Certain IP address ranges are specifically reserved for private IP addresses
within a network. These can be used by different computers in different
networks, since they can't be routed across the global Internet, so a computer
in your home network, a printer on your office network and a smart phone on
your university's network could all have the same private IP address without
creating any kind of conflict.

The private IP ranges are 10.0.0.0 to 10.255.255.255, 172.16.0.0 to

172.31.255.255 and 192.168.0.0 to 192.168.255.255. In CIDR terms, that's
10.0.0.0/8, 172.16.0.0/12 and 192.168.0.0/16.
Except in unusual circumstances, routers and computers should be configured
not to route packets addressed to private IP addresses outside their networks
and not to use private IP addresses not assigned to their networks to identify
computers within the network.

Loopback IP Addresses
Another special type of IP address is the loopback address. This is an IP
address in the range 127.0.0.1-127.255.255.255. In CIDR terms, that's the
range 127.0.0.0/8, which is also a class A IP address block.

Those IP addresses refer to the current computer on which a packet is being

processed. The loopback addresses are often used for testing and
development, when programmers and IT people want to verify that a service
works on the current computer. In some cases where programs running on a
computer are set to respond only to messages from the same machine, the
loopback addresses can be used for security purposes, since messages can
be received only with a loopback destination address from the same
computer.

The address "127.0.0.1" is by far the most commonly used IP address for
loopback and should generally be used unless there's an important reason to
use another, since users and software alike are more likely to understand it.

The special purpose domain name "localhost" is also used to refer to the
current computer.