Routing

ALSO CALLED: Network Routing
DEFINITION: A fixed-length subnet mask (FLSM) is a sequence of numbers of unchanging length that streamlines packet routing within the subnets of a proprietary network. A subnet can be a geographically defined local area network (LAN). Alternatively, a subnet may define security boundaries, departmental boundaries, multicast zones or hardware security parameters.Once a packet has arrived at an organization's main  … 
Definition continues below.

ROUTING DEFINITION (continued): …  gateway with its network number, that packet is routed to its ultimate destination using a subnet number. The FLSM is usually a string of binary digits shown over the subnet number, telling the router which parts of the subnet number to look at. A binary "1" over a particular digit in the subnet number says "Pay attention to this digit." A "0" says "Ignore this digit."The use of an FLSM saves a router the task of having to handle an entire IP address because the router deals only with the digits selected by the mask. Nevertheless, this method of subnet masking … 
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