Subject: A query on RIPv2

From: Bharat Joshi <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 25 Dec 2012 10:31:47 +0000

Hi All,

     I came across some text in RFC 2453 (RIPv2) which has confused me. It would be great if someone can clarify this for me. I searched the net and looked through the errata but could not find any reference to this.

In section 3.9.1 of RFC 2453 (http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc2453#section-3.9.1), in second para, following text is available:

<quote>

   There is one special case.  If there is exactly
   one entry in the request, and it has an address family identifier of
   zero and a metric of infinity (i.e., 16), then this is a request to
   send the entire routing table.

<unquote>

In section 4.1 of same RFC (http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc2453#section-4.1), in first para, following text is available:

<quote>

   If the Address Family Identifier of the first (and
   only the first) entry in the message is 0xFFFF, then the remainder of
   the entry contains the authentication.

<unquote>

    Now what has confused me is that if a router is configured to use authentication, how should its 'request' message for full routing table look? Should it go without authentication information or with authentication information?

    If it goes with authentication information then it is not conforming to the statement of 3.9.1. If it goes without authentication information then it is not conforming to the user configuration and also there may be security issues.

Regards,
Bharat

PS: I am currently not subscribed to RTG working group mailing list, so please reply all so that I can get your reply.

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