RIP Justification

[fred at cisco.com (Fred Baker)]

On Sep 29, 2010, at 1:20 PM, Jesse Loggins wrote:

> A group of engineers and I were having a design discussion about routing
> protocols including RIP and static routing and the justifications of use for
> each protocol. One very interesting discussion was surrounding RIP and its
> use versus a protocol like OSPF. It seems that many Network Engineers
> consider RIP an old antiquated protocol that should be thrown in back of a
> closet "never to be seen or heard from again". Some even preferred using a
> more complex protocol like OSPF instead of RIP. I am of the opinion that
> every protocol has its place, which seems to be contrary to some engineers
> way of thinking. This leads to my question. What are your views of when and
> where the RIP protocol is useful? Please excuse me if this is the incorrect
> forum for such questions.

For RIP, the attraction is simplicity, and the down-side is count-to-infinity. If you have a network in which count-to-infinity is a non-issue - often true of residential networks, for example - the simplicity of RIP can be very attractive.

If you have anything resembling complexity in your network, protocols like OSPF are far more appropriate.