Testing Ipv6 Routers with the Neighbour Discovery Protocol

The Neighbor Discovery Protocol (NDP) is a fundamental component of Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) networks. An IPv6 network is made up of a collection of nodes, each of which is either a router or a host, connected via a physical network. NDP serves as the foundation that allows IPv6 to run transparently over any physical network. On a given network node, NDP functions as a mechanism for discovering the existence and identity of neighboring hosts and routers, for determining a neighbor's data link layer address given its IPv6 address, and for producing a unique IPv6 address based on the node's data link layer address. Because of the importance of the role NDP plays in IPv6 networks, testers of IPv6 routers should include the verification of NDP in their test plan. This report discusses the steps a tester needs to perform in order to verify the operation of NDP on an IPv6 router. In addition, this report also outlines the ways in which NDP can be used to facilitate the configuration of both testers and routers in setting up test scenarios, such as traffic generation and real-time measurements, which are not focused on NDP.