Adding OSPF to the Center of a RIP Network
A common first step in converting a RIP network to OSPF is to add backbone routers that run both RIP and OSPF, while the remaining network devices run RIP. These backbone routers are OSPF autonomous system boundary routers. Each autonomous system boundary router controls the flow of routing information between OSPF and RIP. In Figure 14-2, Router A is configured as the autonomous system boundary router.
Figure 14-2: RIP network with OSPF at the center.
RIP does not need to run between the backbone routers; therefore, RIP is suppressed on Router A with the following commands:
router rip passive-interface serial 0 passive-interface serial 1
The RIP routes are redistributed into OSPF by all three routers with the following commands:
router ospf 109 redistribute rip subnets
The subnets keyword tells OSPF to redistribute all subnet routes. Without the subnets keyword, only networks that are not subnetted will be redistributed by OSPF. Redistributed routes appear as external type 2 routes in OSPF. Each RIP domain receives information about networks in other RIP domains and in the OSPF backbone area from the following commands that redistribute OSPF routes into RIP:
router rip redistribute ospf 109 match internal external 1 external 2 default-metric 10
The redistribute command uses the ospf keyword to specify that OSPF routes are to be redistributed into RIP. The keyword internal indicates the OSPF intra-area and interarea routes: External 1 is the external route type 1, and external 2 is the external route type 2. Because the command in the example uses the default behavior, these keywords may not appear when you use the write terminal or show configuration commands.
Because metrics for different protocols cannot be directly compared, you must specify the default metric in order to designate the cost of the redistributed route used in RIP updates. All routes that are redistributed will use the default metric.
In Figure 14-2, there are no paths directly connecting the RIP clouds. However, in typical networks, these paths, or "back doors," frequently exist, allowing the potential for feedback loops. You can use access lists to determine the routes that are advertised and accepted by each router. For example, access list 11 in the configuration file for Router A allows OSPF to redistribute information learned from RIP only for networks 130.10.8.0 through 130.10.15.0:
router ospf 109 redistribute rip subnet distribute-list 11 out rip access-list 11 permit 130.10.8.0 0.0.7.255 access-list 11 deny 0.0.0.0 255.255.255.255
These commands prevent Router A from advertising networks in other RIP domains onto the OSPF backbone, thereby preventing other boundary routers from using false information and forming a loop.
Configuration File Examples
The full configuration for Router A follows:
interface serial 0 ip address 130.10.62.1 255.255.255.0 interface serial 1 ip address 130.10.63.1 255.255.255.0 interface ethernet 0 ip address 130.10.8.1 255.255.255.0 interface tokenring 0 ip address 130.10.9.1 255.255.255.0 ! router rip default-metric 10 network 130.10.0.0 passive-interface serial 0 passive-interface serial 1 redistribute ospf 109 match internal external 1 external 2 ! router ospf 109 network 130.10.62.0 0.0.0.255 area 0 network 130.10.63.0 0.0.0.255 area 0 redistribute rip subnets distribute-list 11 out rip ! access-list 11 permit 130.10.8.0 0.0.7.255 access-list 11 deny 0.0.0.0 255.255.255.255
The full configuration for Router B follows:
interface serial 0 ip address 130.10.62.2 255.255.255.0 interface serial 1 ip address 130.10.64.2 255.255.255.0 interface ethernet 0 ip address 130.10.17.2 255.255.255.0 interface tokenring 0 ip address 130.10.16.2 255.255.255.0 ! router rip default-metric 10 network 130.10.0.0 passive-interface serial 0 passive-interface serial 1 redistribute ospf 109 match internal external 1 external 2 ! router ospf 109 network 130.10.62.0 0.0.0.255 area 0 network 130.10.64.0 0.0.0.255 area 0 redistribute rip subnets distribute-list 11 out rip access-list 11 permit 130.10.16.0 0.0.7.255 access-list 11 deny 0.0.0.0 255.255.255.255
The full configuration for Router C follows:
interface serial 0 ip address 130.10.63.3 255.255.255.0 interface serial 1 ip address 130.10.64.3 255.255.255.0 interface ethernet 0 ip address 130.10.24.3 255.255.255.0 ! router rip default-metric 10 ! network 130.10.0.0 passive-interface serial 0 passive-interface serial 1 redistribute ospf 109 match internal external 1 external 2 ! router ospf 109 network 130.10.63.0 0.0.0.255 area 0 network 130.10.64.0 0.0.0.255 area 0 redistribute rip subnets distribute-list 11 out rip access-list 11 permit 130.10.24.0 0.0.7.255 access-list 11 deny 0.0.0.0 255.255.255.255