An IP address serves two principal functions: it identifies the host, or more specifically, its network interface, and it provides the location of the host in the network, and thus, the capability of establishing a path … See more

An IPv4 address has a size of 32 bits, which limits the address space to 4294967296 (2 ) addresses. Of this number, some addresses are reserved for special purposes such as private networks (≈18 million addresses) and multicast addressing See more

IP addresses are assigned to a host either dynamically as they join the network, or persistently by configuration of the host hardware or software. Persistent configuration is also … See more

Two versions of the Internet Protocol are in common use on the Internet today. The original version of the Internet Protocol that was first deployed in 1983 in the ARPANET, the predecessor of the Internet, is Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4). See more

IP networks may be divided into subnetworks in both IPv4 and IPv6. For this purpose, an IP address is recognized as consisting of two parts: the network prefix in the high-order bits and the remaining bits called the rest field, host identifier, or interface … See more

In IPv6, the address size was increased from 32 bits in IPv4 to 128 bits, thus providing up to 2 (approximately 3.403×10 ) addresses. This is deemed sufficient for the foreseeable future.
The intent of the new design was not to provide just a … See more

IP addresses are classified into several classes of operational characteristics: unicast, multicast, anycast and broadcast addressing.
Unicast addressing See more