IP

• stands for Internet Protocol. its essentially a label assigned to each and every device connected to a network. its used for communication between devices. IP addresses operate at the Network layer of the OSI model
• types:
  • IPv4:
    • its a 32 bit numeric address. its written in decimal like 192.168.0.1 where each part can range from 0 to 255
    • 1111 1111. 1111 1111. 1111 1111. 1111 1111
    • can provide around 4.3 billion unique addresses. the reason we havent completely ran out of IPv4 IP addresses is because of stuff like private IP addresses, Dynamic IP addresses etc. more on that shit later
  • IPv6:
    • its 128 bit instead of 32 and its written in hexadecimal, seperated by colons
    • example: (2001:0db8:85a3:0000:0000:8a2e:0370:7334)
    • obvious advantage being a vastly superior amount of available addresses and built in security as well. will probably need this in the future when IPv4 addresses runs out
• Static and Dynamic IP addresses:
  • Static IPs:
    • needs to be manually assigned and doesnt change. used for stuff like servers and other network devices that need to be reliably accessed
  • Dynamic IPs:
    • is automatically assigned by a DHCP (Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol) server, changes alot
• Public and Private IP addresses:
  • Public IPs:
    • accessible from around the world and is unique
  • Private IPs:
    • used within local networks. isnt accessible from around the world and isnt unique either. requires NAT (Network Address Translation) to communicate externally
• subnetting:
  • basically its dividing a network into smaller more manageable sub networks hence the name “subnetting”
  • improves routing efficiency, security and network performance