The use of RIPng

[George Bonser]

> 
> Huh, I tend to think of a router as a system that, you know, routes.
> Call me crazy.  That may, or may not, involve a routing protocol.  And
> a
> routing protocol, which is used to share topology and routing
> information, need not be used by a system to make decisions about
> routing.  Sure, that's by far and away the most common use of routing
> protocol information, but I think going from the premise of a system
> running a routing protocol software to that system necessarily being a
> router is fraught with semantic peril.
> 
> There are any of a number of reasons that a system could run routing
> protocol software and never forward a single packet, nor even have the
> capability of forwarding a packet.  I think calling those systems
> routers will lead to no end of confusion and you'll please pardon me
if
> I think your definition of "router" leaves more than a little bit to
be
> desired.
> 
> > --bill

Actually, having systems run OSPF is the Solaris standard for interface
failover these days (OSPF-MP) which uses Quagga.

The end system has two links, each are on different layer 3 subnets.  A
host announces its loopback IPs over both links.  When an interface or
upstream switch or router fails, the network uses the remaining path.
Using ECMP, it also creates a reasonable alternative to Spanning Tree in
the net where you push layer 3 all the way down to the hosts.


Running routing protocols out to the host is becoming more common these
days.