Internet protocol address

IP address is the address is given to the devices that are connected over the internet.......

An Internet Protocol address (IP address) is a numerical label assigned to each device (e.g., computer, printer) participating in a computer network that uses the Internet Protocol for communication. An IP address serves two principal functions: host or network interface identification and location addressing

The designers of the Internet Protocol defined an IP address as a 32-bit number^[1] and this system, known as Internet Protocol Version 4 (IPv4), is still in use today. However, due to the enormous growth of the Internet and the predicteddepletion of available addresses, a new version of IP (IPv6), using 128 bits for the address, was developed in 1995.^[3] IPv6 in 1998,^[4] and its deployment has been ongoing since the mid-2000s.

IP addresses are binary numbers, but they are usually stored in text files and displayed in human-readable notations, such as172.16.254.1 (for IPv4), and 2001:db8:0:1234:0:567:8:1 (for IPv6).

Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) is the fourth version in the development of the Internet Protocol (IP) Internet, and routes most traffic on the Internet.^[1] However, a successor protocol, IPv6, has been defined and is in various stages of production deployment

IPv4 addresses

Main article: IPv4 § Addressing

Decomposition of an IPv4 address from dot-decimal notation to its binary value.

In IPv4 an address consists of 32 bits which limits the address space to4294967296 (2³²) possible unique addresses. IPv4 reserves some addresses for special purposes such as private networks (~18 million addresses) ormulticast addresses (~270 million addresses).

IPv4 addresses are canonically represented in dot-decimal notation, which consists of four decimal numbers, each ranging from 0 to 255, separated by dots, e.g., 172.16.254.1. Each part represents a group of 8 bits (octet) of the address. In some cases of technical writing, IPv4 addresses may be presented in various hexadecimal, octal, or binary representations.

IPv4 subnetting

In the early stages of development of the Internet Protocol,^[1] network administrators interpreted an IP address in two parts: network number portion and host number portion. The highest order octet (most significant eight bits) in an address was designated as the network number and the remaining bits were called the rest field or host identifier and were used for host numbering within a network.