Report Number: CS-TR-88-1214
Institution: Stanford University, Department of Computer Science
Title: Multicast Routing in Internetworks and Extended LANs
Author: Deering, Stephen E.
Date: June 1988
Abstract: Multicasting is used within local-area networks to make
distributed applications more robust and more efficient. The
growing need to distribute applications across multiple,
interconnected networks, and the increasing availability of
high-performance, high-capacity switching nodes and networks,
lead us to consider providing LAN-style multicasting across
an internetwork. In this paper, we propose extensions to two
common internetwork routing algorithms -- distance-vector
routing and link-state routing -- to support low-delay
datagram multicasting. We also suggest modifications to the
single-spanning-tree routing algorithm, commonly used by
link-layer bridges, to reduce the costs of multicasting in
large extended LANs. Finally, we show how different
link-layer and network-layer multicast routing algorithms can
be combined hierarchically to support multicasting across
large, heterogeneous internetworks.
http://i.stanford.edu/pub/cstr/reports/cs/tr/88/1214/CS-TR-88-1214.pdf