Class A Network:

Part of the Internet Protocol hierarchical addressing scheme. Class A networks have only 8 bits for defining networks and 24 bits for defining hosts on each networks. [TOC]

Class B Network:

Part of the Internet Protocol hierarchical addressing scheme. ClassB networks have 16 bits for defining networks and 16 bits for defining hosts on each networks. [TOC]

Class C Network:

Part of the Internet Protocol hierarchical addressing scheme. Class A networks have 24 bits for defining networks and 8 bits for defining hosts on each networks. [TOC]

host address:

Logical address configured by an administrator or server on a device. Logically identifies this device on an internetwork. [TOC]

IP address:

Often called an Internet address, this is an address uniquely identifying any device (host) on the Internet ( or any TCP/IP network ). Each address consists of four octets (32 bits), represented as decimal numbers seperated by periods ( a format known as "dotted-decimal"). Every address is made up of a network number, an optional subnetwork number, and a host number. The network and subnetwork numbers togehter are used for routing, while the host number addresses an individual host within the network or subnetwork. The network and subnetwork information is extracted from IP address using the subnet mask. There are five classes of IP addresses (A-E), which allocate different numbers of bits to the network, subnetwork, and host portions of the address. [TOC]

network address:

Used with logical network addresses to identify the network segment in an internetwork. Logical addresses are hierarchical in nature and have at least two parts: network and host. An example of a hierarchical address is 172.16.10.5, where 172.16 is the network and 10.5 is the host address. [TOC]

node address:

Used to identify a specific device in an internetwork. Can be a hardware address, which is burned into the network interface card or a logical network address, which an administrator or server assigns to the node. [TOC]

octet:

Base-8 numbering system used to identify a section of a dotted-decimal IP address. Also referred to as a byte. [TOC]

subnet mask:

Also simply known as mask, a 32-bit address mask used in IP to identify the bits of an IP address that are used for the subnet address. Using a mask, the router does not need to examine all 32 bits, onlt those selected by the mask. [TOC]