In the architecture of DHCP, the DHCP server is responsible for maintaining the IP address pool and other network parameters, such as
subnet mask and default DNS.
Firstly, comparing to RIP, OSPF is a classless protocol which allows utilization of different
subnet masks, which essentially gives network administrators more flexibility with IP addresses and less wastage.
Next we prepare the network devices, which need two pieces of information to communicate: an Internet protocol (IP) address on the network (four sets of numbers) and a
subnet mask. Some network devices are configured automatically, but doing it manually is not difficult, although, as you'll see, it involves many steps.
* The destination prefix (an IP address plus
subnet mask; for instance 23.154.56.0/24, which represents 256 IP addresses).
The range 0-63 cannot be used with that
subnet mask, since in that case the subnet field would consist of all zeroes.
To determine whether the destination device is on the local subnet or on a remote one, i.e., whether the message may be sent to the destination device directly or must be sent to the IP gateway, the originating device uses a configuration parameter called the "
subnet mask," AND's it with the source and destination IP addresses, and compares the results.
In TCP/IP, a
subnet mask separates the network ID from the host ID.
It also automatically configures itself, including selecting an appropriate IP address and
subnet mask, which allows me to have a `virtual presence' anywhere on the network.