OSPF Distribute-List Filtering

Hi Shannon,

It doesn’t matter much which of the two you pick, both will work. The network command basically checks the IP addresses that you have on your interfaces and if it falls within the range of your network command, it will activate OSPF on it.

If you use 1.1.1.0 0.0.0.255 as the network command then any interfaces that have IP address 1.1.1.X on it will run OSPF. If I have a loopback with IP address 1.1.1.1/32 then this will do the job. The problem is that a loopback with 1.1.1.2/32 will also be automatically advertised in OSPF since it matches the network command.

Because of this, it’s best to be as precise as possible with network commands to avoid running OSPF on interfaces that you don’t want. The network 1.1.1.1 0.0.0.0 command is a good choice.

If I’m doing labs where I don’t care about routing then I sometimes use network command 0.0.0.0 255.255.255.255. It’s the “shotgun approach” that enables OSPF on any interface.

Hope this helps!

Rene