Subnetting/ Supernetting

and
Classless Addressing
 Address Depletion
• What is Address Deletion Problem in Classful Addressing?

Solutions:
Short term Solution
• Use of Private Addresses
• Subnetting
• Supernetting
• Use of NAT and DHCP
• Classless Addressing

Long term Solution

• IPv6

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000

 Prefix Length: Slash Notation
• In classless addressing, Prefix length need to be passed
separately.
• Prefix length is added to the address.
• Notation is informally referred as slash notation and
formally CIDR (Classless Inter-domain Routing)
• In classless addressing, we need to know one of the
addresses in the block and the prefix length to define the
block.

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000
SUBNETTING
IP addresses are designed with
two levels of hierarchy.
A network with two levels of hierarchy (not subnetted)
 Example of Multi-Level
Hierarchy

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000

A network with three levels of hierarchy (subnetted)
Addresses in a network with and without subnetting
Default mask and subnet mask
Example 1

What is the subnetwork address if the

destination address is 200.45.34.56 and the
subnet mask is 255.255.240.0?
Solution

11001000 00101101 00100010 00111000

11111111 11111111 11110000 00000000
11001000 00101101 00100000 00000000

The subnetwork address is 200.45.32.0.

Short-Cut Method
** If the byte in the mask is 255, copy the
byte in the address.
** If the byte in the mask is 0, replace the
byte in the address with 0.
** If the byte in the mask is neither 255 nor 0,
we write the mask and the address in binary
and apply the AND operation.
Example 2

What is the subnetwork address if the

destination address is 19.30.80.5 and the
mask is 255.255.192.0?
Solution
Figure 5-6
Example 2
Figure 5-7

Comparison of a default mask and

a subnet mask
The number of subnets must be
a power of 2.
Example 3

A company is granted the site address

201.70.64.0 .The company needs six
subnets. Design the subnets.
Solution

The number of 1s in the default

mask is 24 (class C).
Solution (Continued)

The company needs six subnets. This number

6 is not a power of 2. The next number that is
a power of 2 is 8 (23). We need 3 more 1s in
the subnet mask. The total number of 1s in
the subnet mask is 27 (24  3).
The total number of 0s is 5 (32  27). The
mask is
Solution (Continued)

11111111 11111111 11111111 11100000

or
255.255.255.224

The number of subnets is 8.

The number of addresses in each subnet is 25
(5 is the number of 0s) or 32.
Example 3
Example 4

A company is granted the site address

181.56.0.0. The company needs 1000
subnets. Design the subnets.
Solution

The number of 1s in the default mask is 16

(class B).
Solution (Continued)

The company needs 1000 subnets. This

number is not a power of 2. The next number
that is a power of 2 is 1024 (210). We need 10
more 1s in the subnet mask.
The total number of 1s in the subnet mask is
26 (16  10).
The total number of 0s is 6 (32  26).
Solution (Continued)

The mask is
11111111 11111111 11111111 11000000
or
255.255.255.192.
The number of subnets is 1024.
The number of addresses in each subnet is 26
(6 is the number of 0s) or 64.
See Figure 5.9
Example 4
 Example
5

Network address given to an organization is

200.50.100.0. After subnetting new Mask
is /27.
 Find number of subnets and subnet address of
each subnet.
 Find number of IP address in each subnet.

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000

 Solution
5

• Initial mask : 24
• New mask is /27
• No of bits used for subnetting = 27-24 = 3
• Total Subnets created = 23 = 8
• No. of IP Address in each subnet =
232-27 = 25 = 32

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000

 Solution
5

• Starting Address of 1st Subnet =200.50.100.0

• Starting Address of 2nd Subnet =200.50.100.32
• Starting Address of 3rd Subnet =200.50.100.64
• Starting Address of 4th Subnet =200.50.100. 96
• Starting Address of 5th Subnet =200.50.100.128
• Starting Address of 6th Subnet =200.50.100.160
• Starting Address of 7th Subnet =200.50.100. 192
• Starting Address of 8th Subnet =200.50.100.224

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000

 Example
6

IP address given to an organization is

170.50.100.70. After subnetting Number of
valid hosts in each subnet are 4094.
 Find mask of subnets created.
 Find number of subnets and subnet address of
each subnet.

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000

 Variable-length subnetting

Default Mask
255.255.255.0
CLASSLESS ADDRESSING
Figure 5-13

Variable-length blocks
Number of Addresses in a Block
There is only one condition on the number
of addresses in a block; it must be a power
of 2 (2, 4, 8, . . .).
Slash notation or CIDR notation
Slash notation is also called
CIDR
notation.
Example 11
A small organization is given a block with the beginning
address and the prefix length 205.16.37.24/29 (in slash
notation). What is the range of the block?

Solution
The beginning address is 205.16.37.24. To find the
last address we keep the first 29 bits and change
the last 3 bits to 1s.
Beginning:11001111 00010000 00100101 00011000
Ending : 11001111 00010000 00100101 00011111
There are only 8 addresses in this block.
Example 12
We can find the range of addresses in Example 11 by
another method. We can argue that the length of the
suffix is 32  29 or 3. So there are 23  8 addresses in this
block. If the first address is 205.16.37.24, the last address
is 205.16.37.31 (24  7  31).
 A block in classes A, B, and C
can easily be represented in slash
notation as
A.B.C.D/ n
where n is
either 8 (class A), 16 (class B), or
24 (class C).
Example 13
What is the network address if one of the addresses is
167.199.170.82/27?

Solution
The prefix length is 27, which means that we must
keep the first 27 bits as is and change the
remaining bits (5) to 0s. The 5 bits affect only the
last byte. The last byte is 01010010. Changing the
last 5 bits to 0s, we get 01000000 or 64. The
network address is 167.199.170.64/27.
Example 14
An organization is granted the block 130.34.12.64/26.
The organization needs to have four subnets. What are the
subnet addresses and the range of addresses for each
subnet?

Solution
The suffix length is 6. This means the total number
of addresses in the block is 64 (2 6). If we create
four subnets, each subnet will have 16 addresses.
Solution (Continued)
Let us first find the subnet prefix (subnet mask).
We need four subnets, which means we need to
add two more 1s to the site prefix. The subnet
prefix is then /28.
Subnet 1: 130.34.12.64/28 to 130.34.12.79/28.
Subnet 2 : 130.34.12.80/28 to 130.34.12.95/28.
Subnet 3: 130.34.12.96/28 to 130.34.12.111/28.
Subnet 4: 130.34.12.112/28 to 130.34.12.127/28.
See Figure 5.15
Figure 5-15
Example 14
 Example 15

• An organization is granted a block of addresses with

beginning address 14.24.74.0/24. The organization
needs to have 3 blocks of addresses to use in its
three subnets as shown below:
a. One block of 120 addresses.
b. One block of 60 addresses.
c. One block of 10 addresses.

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000

 Solution
• Total Addresses in block = 232-224 = 256
• first address = 14.24.74.0/24
• Last address = 14.24.74.255/24
a.No. of addresses in first block is not power of 2. We
allocate 128 addresses.
subnet mask =25
b.No. of addresses in first block is not power of 2. We
allocate 64 addresses.
subnet mask =26
c. No. of addresses in first block is not power of 2. We
allocate 16 addresses.
subnet mask =28

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000
 Example 16

Assume a company has three offices: Central, East, and West. The Central
office is connected to the East and West offices via private, WAN lines. The
company is granted a block of 64 addresses with the beginning address
70.12.100.128/26. The management has decided to allocate 32 addresses for
the Central office and divides the rest of addresses between the two other
offices.
1. The number of addresses are assigned as follows:

2. We can find the prefix length for each subnetwork:

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000
McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000
Example 17
An ISP is granted a block of addresses starting with
190.100.0.0/16. The ISP needs to distribute these
addresses to three groups of customers as follows:

1. The first group has 64 customers; each needs 256 addresses.

2. The second group has 128 customers; each needs 128 addresses.

3. The third group has 128 customers; each needs 64 addresses .

Design the subblocks and give the slash notation for each
subblock. Find out how many addresses are still available
after these allocations.
Solution
Group 1
For this group, there are 64 customers and each
customer needs 256 addresses.
Total addresses  64  256  16,384 = 214
new mask = 32-14=/18
First address of Group 1 : 190.100.0.0/18
Last address of Group 1 : 190.100.63.255/18
Solution (Continued)
Group 2
For this group, there are 128 customers and each
customer needs 128 addresses.
Total addresses  128  128  16,384 = 214
new mask = 32-14=/18
First address of Group 1 : 190.100.64.0/18
Last address of Group 1 : 190.100.127.255/18
Solution (Continued)

Group 3
For this group, there are 128 customers and each
customer needs 64 addresses.
Total addresses  128  64  8192 = 213
new mask = 32-13=/19
First address of Group 1 : 190.100.128.0/19
Last address of Group 1 : 190.100.159.255/19
 Step 1:

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000

Solution
Group 1
For this group, there are 64 sub blocks .
Old Subnet mask = /18
New subnet mask = 18+log(26 )=18+6=24
01: 190.100.0.0/24190.100.0.255/24
02: 190.100.1.0/24 190.100.1.255/24
…………………………………..
64: 190.100.63.0/24190.100.63.255/24
Solution (Continued)
Group 2
For this group, there are 128 sub blocks .
Old Subnet mask = /18
New subnet mask = 18+log(27 )=18+7=25
001: 190.100.64.0/25 190.100.64.127/25
002: 190.100.64.128/25 190.100.64.255/25
003: 190.100.127.128/25 190.100.127.255/25
Solution (Continued)
Group 3
For this group, there are 128 sub blocks .
Old Subnet mask = /19
New subnet mask = 19+log(27 )=19+7=26
001:190.100.128.0/26 190.100.128.63/26
002:190.100.128.64/26 190.100.128.127/26
…………………………
128:190.100.159.192/26 190.100.159.255/26
 Step 2:

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000

Solution (Continued)

Number of granted addresses: 65,536

Number of allocated addresses: 40,960
Number of available addresses: 24,576
 SUPERNETTING
(also referred as Summarization, Aggregation)

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000

 A supernetwork

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000

 What is Supernetting?
 aggregating networks together to form a larger network

Why Supernetting?
•The main purpose of supernetting is reducing the size of the
routing table on routers
•It saves memory and processing resources on routing devices.
•also helped slow down the exhaustion of IP addresses through the
use of Classless Inter-Domain Routing (CIDR).

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000

 Rules: (For Class C Addresses)
** The number of blocks must be a power of 2 (1,
2, 4, 8, 16, . . .).
** The blocks must be contiguous in the address
space (no gaps between the blocks).
** The third byte of the first address in the
superblock must be evenly divisible by the number
of blocks. In other words, if the number of blocks is
N, the third byte must be divisible by N.

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000

 Example 5

A company needs 600 addresses. Which of

the following set of class C blocks can be
used to form a supernet for this company?
•198.47.32.0 198.47.33.0 198.47.34.0
•198.47.32.0 198.47.42.0 198.47.52.0 198.47.62.0
•198.47.31.0 198.47.32.0 198.47.33.0 198.47.34.0
•198.47.32.0 198.47.33.0 198.47.34.0 198.47.35.0

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000

 Solution

1: No, there are only three blocks.

2: No, the blocks are not contiguous.
3: No, 31 in the first block is not divisible by 4.
4: Yes, all three requirements are fulfilled.

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000

 In subnetting,
we need the first address of the
subnet and the subnet mask to
define the range of addresses.

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000

 In supernetting,
we need the first address of
the supernet
and the supernet mask to
define the range of addresses.

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000

 Figure 5-12
Comparison of subnet, default,
and supernet masks

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000

 Example 6
We need to make a supernetwork out of 16
class C blocks. What is the supernet mask?
Solution
We need 16 blocks. For 16 blocks we need to
change four 1s to 0s in the default mask. So the
mask is
11111111 11111111 11110000 00000000
or
255.255.240.0
McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000
 Example 7

A supernet has a first address of 205.16.32.0 and a

supernet mask of 255.255.248.0. A router receives three
packets with the following destination addresses:
205.16.37.44
205.16.42.56
205.17.33.76
Which packet belongs to the supernet?

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000

 Solution

We apply the supernet mask to see if we can find

the beginning address.
205.16.37.44 AND 255.255.248.0205.16.32.0
205.16.42.56 AND 255.255.248.0 205.16.40.0
205.17.33.76 AND 255.255.248.0 205.17.32.0
Only the first address belongs to this supernet.

McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000

 Example 8
A supernet has a first address of 205.16.32.0 and a
supernet mask of 255.255.248.0. How many blocks are in
this supernet and what is the range of addresses?

Solution

The supernet has 21 1s. The default mask has 24

1s. Since the difference is 3, there are 2 3 or 8
blocks in this supernet. The blocks are 205.16.32.0
to 205.16.39.0. The first address is 205.16.32.0.
The last address is 205.16.39.255.
McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000