cancel
Showing results for 
Search instead for 
Did you mean: 
cancel
585
Views
19
Helpful
4
Replies

Area 0 in OSPF

cisco
Level 1
Level 1

Hi,

is there any way by which two Area for eg area 1 & area 2 can communicate without area 0 . I mean to say OSPF can work without Area 0 .AFIK area 0 is must in OSPF.

regards

Ab

4 Replies 4

Richard Burts
Hall of Fame
Hall of Fame

Ab

If OSPF has only a single area it can have any area number that you choose (area 0 is not required). But if OSPF has more than one area then OSPF must have area 0 to allow the other areas to communicate with each other.

I have done an experiement with OSPF where I configured an area 1 and an area 2 and configured one router with interfaces in both area 1 and in area 2. What I found was that router with interfaces in both areas knew about the subnets in both areas. But no other router in area 1 knew any subnets in area 2. And no other router in area 2 knew any subnets from area 1.

So in a general sense you can say that OSPF requires an area 0 whenever there is more than one area in OSPF.

HTH

Rick

HTH

Rick

Hi,

This is an interesting question and as far as Cisco routers go, the behaviour described by Rick is perfectly correct. However, it is important to note that Cisco does not quite follow RFC2328 (the authoritative source on OSPF) as far as this behaviour goes. If OSPF has been implemented according to RFC2328, you will find that you do not need Area 0 in your case. The routers that connect the two non-backbone areas will be considered to be ABRs and will generate summary-LSAs into each area, which would mean that each area would be accessible from the other. This is because RFC2328 stipulates that any router that connects multiple areas is an ABR, regardless of whether or not it has connectivity to Area 0.

However, Cisco uses an alternative interpretation of ABR, whereby a router is only considered an ABR if it has a connection to the backbone area in addition to connections to other areas. This behaviour is described in RFC3509.

Hope that helps - pls rate the post if it does.

Paresh

Hi ,

Intersting answer Paresh.Now i have to go through both RFCs :) .What i understood is that in non-cisco routers you can communicate between area 1 and area 2 without using area0.

regards

Ab

Interesting answer to an interesting question :-)

There may be other vendors that implement Cisco behaviour - you need to find that out for yourself, though.

Hope that helps - pls rate the post if it does.

Paresh

Getting Started

Find answers to your questions by entering keywords or phrases in the Search bar above. New here? Use these resources to familiarize yourself with the community: