Cisco IOS Cookbook, 2nd Edition (2006)

What's in This Book

The first four chapters cover what would be considered essential system administration functions if a router were a server. Chapter 1 covers router configuration and file management issues. In Chapter 2, we turn to useful router management tricks. such as command aliases, how to use CDP and DNS, as well as how to tune buffers and create exception dumps. This chapter ends with a set of four scripts that generate various useful reports to help you manage your routers. Then Chapter 3 discusses user access and privileges on the router. Chapter 4 extends this discussion on using TACACS+ to provide centralized management of user access to your routers.

The next five chapters look at various aspects of IP routing. Chapter 5 looks at IP routing in general, including static routes and administrative distances. In Chapter 6, we focus on RIP, including both versions 1 and 2. Chapter 7 looks at EIGRP, and Chapter 8 at OSPF. And, in Chapter 9 we discuss the BGP protocol, which controls all IP routing through the backbone of the Internet.

The remaining chapters all cover separate topics. We look at the popular Frame Relay WAN protocol in Chapter 10. Chapter 11 discusses queuing and congestion. This chapter also goes into some detail on various IP Quality of Service issues. In Chapter 12, we look at IP tunnels and VPNs. This chapter includes a discussion of Cisco's IPSec implementation.

We turn to issues related to Dial Backup in Chapter 13. Then, in Chapter 14, we look at time. We include a relatively detailed discussion of the NTP protocol, which you can use to synchronize the clocks of all your routers. You can then use the synchronized routers as a time source for other equipment, including application servers on your network.

Chapter 15 is primarily concerned with configuring the DLSw protocol. It also looks SNA and SDLC protocols, which often are carried over IP networks using DLSw. In Chapter 16, we show how to configure several of the most popular interface types on a Cisco router.

Chapters 17 and 18 look at the closely related issues of network management and logging. In Chapter 17, we discuss SNMP in particular. This chapter includes several router configuration examples to use with SNMP, as well as a number of useful scripts that you can use to help manage your Cisco equipment. Chapter 18 looks at issues related to managing the router's event logs, as well how to use the syslog protocol to send these log messages to a central server.

It's impossible to do much on a Cisco router without having a good understanding of Access Lists. There are several different kinds of Access Lists, and Chapter 19 shows several useful and interesting applications of the various IP specific Access Lists.

In Chapter 20, we look at DHCP. Routers usually just act as DHCP proxy devices, but we also show how to use the router as a DHCP server, or even as a client.

Chapter 21 talks about NAT, which allows you to use private IP addresses, and even resolve conflicting address ranges between networks.

One of the best ways to build a fault-tolerant LAN is to configure two or more routers to share a single IP address using HSRP. We show several different HSRP configurations in Chapter 22. Then, in Chapter 23, we look at how to implement multicast routing functionality on a Cisco router.

The four new chapters appear at the end of the book. Chapter 24 covers IP Mobility. There also is a recipe on the related but much simpler topic of Local Area Mobility. IP Mobility is something of a fringe topic in the TCP/IP protocol suite, but we believe it is becoming more common for two reasons. First, there has been a marked increase in the number of wireless mobile devices. The second reason is increased demand for consumer access to the public Internet.

In Chapter 25, we look at another subject that is not widely deployed in Enterprise networks, but which we nonetheless think is increasingly important: IPv6. Most people today still mean IPv4 when they talk about TCP/IP. But there are some large service provider networks, particularly for third generation cell phones, in which the number of end devices demands IPv6. We expect to see the number of IPv6 installations expand rapidly over the next few years.

Then Chapter 26 turns to a protocol that has exploded in popularity since the first edition of this book: MPLS. When we wrote the first edition, just three years ago, Frame Relay and ATM still were the WAN protocols of choice in most regions. While these protocols are still present, particularly inside carrier networks, MPLS has largely replaced them as a delivery mode for IP WANs.

And finally, in Chapter 27, we look at Security. Most of the features discussed in this chapter concern the IOS Firewall feature set (also called Advanced Security). Many of these features are not new. Indeed, one of the recipes in this new chapter was in the previous edition, and has been relocated from the Access List chapter. However, we have seen such an increase in concern about network security since then that it seemed wise to include an entire chapter on the subject. We should also point out that security as a general topic is discussed in several other chapters in this book. For example, the security of the router itself is discussed in Chapters 2, 3, and 4. Another popular security topic, VPNs, is found in Chapter 12.

We also include two appendices. Appendix A discusses the various external software tools that we use throughout the book, and shows how to obtain your own copies of these packages. Appendix B gives some helpful background on IP Quality of Service, as well as various queueing algorithms that you can use on Cisco routers
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