Cabletron Systems CyberSWITCH CSX150 User Manual

Also see for CyberSWITCH CSX150: User guide Quick start guide

Contents

USER’S GUIDE254 CyberSWITCHIPX O PTION B ACKGROUND INFORMATIONThe Internetwork Packet Exchange (IPX) protocol is a datagram, connectionless protocol in theNetWare environment analogous to the Internet Protocol (IP) in the TCP/IP environment. With thehelp of Routing Information Protocol (RIP) and Service Advertising Protocol (SAP), the IPX routerperforms the network layer tasks of addressing, routing and switching information packets, tomove packets from one location to another in a complex network.The CyberSWITCH supports the standard method of routing Novell® IPX datagrams over aninternetwork. The system provides bandwidth management features to make the interconnectionof IPX networks cost effective over demand type connections like ISDN. Additional securityfeatures provide data privacy for Novell networks connected by the system.Over the last few years Novell has evolved their WAN IPX routing model. Originally the NovellIPX router supported numbered WAN network interfaces only. That is, a unique IPX networknumber was assigned to each WAN port on the router.Novell then migrated to an unnumbered WAN network interface in their latest versions of theirIPX router. When two routers communicate, they will try to use the unnumbered network interfacetype. If both routers support this type of interface they will agree on this and initiate data transfer.If one router does not support the unnumbered type, the newer router will defer to the older routerand agree to use a numbered type interface. The new router will let the older router assign thenetwork number for the WAN link.IPX INTERNAL N ETWORK N UMBERCONFIGURING THE IPX I NTERNAL NETWORK NUMBERU SING CFGEDIT1. Press 2 at the IPX menu to configure the IPX internal network number.2. As prompted, enter the hexadecimal internal network number for the IPX router (theCyberSWITCH). In our example, this is 12F8.U SING M ANAGE M ODE C OMMANDSipxinetAllows you to enter the hexadecimal internal network number for the IPX router.IPX I NTERNAL NETWORK NUMBER CONFIGURATION ELEMENTIPX INTERNAL NETWORK NUMBERThis number uniquely identifies a specific IPX router in the internetwork. In the Novellenvironment, an IPX internal network number must be assigned to all IPX file servers, includingIPX routers. This number is an arbitrary value, assigned when the IPX router is configured. It maybe 1 to 8 hexadecimal digits in length (up to 4 bytes).