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compnetworking.about.com/od/workingwithipaddresses/a/subnetmask.htm

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Posted by crouse

A mask that is used in the IP protocol to separate the subnet address from the local IP address. The IP protocol performs a bit-wise AND on the IP address and the subnet mask. Each address segment represents one byte, where 255 converts to FF hex. For example, if the IP address is 192.009.

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Posted by waqasahmad

A subnet Mask classifies which class of network it is.
How many subnetworks are there and how many hosts can be used.

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Posted by waqqas1

A subnet mask is used to determine the number of networks and the number of host computers. Every class of the IP address uses the different range of the subnet mask. Subnet masks allow the IP based networks to be divided into the sub networks for performance and security purposes.

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Posted by suresh123

A good Definition and well explained by CISCO is:

A subnet (short for "subnetwork") is an identifiably separate part of an organization's network. Typically, a subnet may represent all the machines at one geographic location, in one building, or on the same local area network (LAN). Having an organization's network divided into subnets allows it to be connected to the Internet with a single shared network address. Without subnets, an organization could get multiple connections to the Internet, one for each of its physically separate subnetworks, but this would require an unnecessary use of the limited number of network numbers the Internet has to assign. It would also require that Internet routing tables on gateways outside the organization would need to know about and have to manage routing that could and should be handled within an organization.

The Internet is a collection of networks whose users communicate with each other. Each communication carries the address of the source and destination networks and the particular machine within the network associated with the user or host computer at each end. This address is called the IP address (Internet Protocol address). This 32-bit IP address has two parts: one part identifies the network (with the network number) and the other part identifies the specific machine or host within the network (with the host number). An organization can use some of the bits in the machine or host part of the address to identify a specific subnet. Effectively, the IP address then contains three parts: the network number, the subnet number, and the machine number.

The standard procedure for creating and identifying subnets is provided in Internet Request for Comments 950.

The 32-bit IP address is often depicted as a dot address (also called dotted quad notation) - that is, four groups (or quads) of decimal numbers separated by periods. Here's an example:

130.5.5.25

Each of the decimal numbers represents a string of eight binary digits. Thus, the above IP address really is this string of 0s and 1s:

10000010.00000101.00000101.00011001

As you can see, we inserted periods between each eight-digit sequence just as we did for the decimal version of the IP address. Obviously, the decimal version of the IP address is easier to read and that's the form most commonly used.

Some portion of the IP address represents the network number or address and some portion represents the local machine address (also known as the host number or address). IP addresses can be one of several classes, each determining how many bits represent the network number and how many represent the host number. The most common class used by large organizations (Class B) allows 16 bits for the network number and 16 for the host number. Using the above example, here's how the IP address is divided:

<--Network address--><--Host address-->
130.5 . 5.25

If you wanted to add subnetting to this address, then some portion (in this example, eight bits) of the host address could be used for a subnet address. Thus:

<--Network address--><--Subnet address--><--Host address-->
130.5 . 5 . 25

To simplify this explanation, we've divided the subnet into a neat eight bits but an organization could choose some other scheme using only part of the third quad or even part of the fourth quad.

Once a packet has arrived at an organization's gateway or connection point with its unique network number, it can be routed within the organization's internal gateways using the subnet number. The router knows which bits to look at (and which not to look at) by looking at a subnet mask, which is a screen of numbers that tells you which numbers to look at underneath. In a binary mask, a "1" over a number says "Look at the number underneath"; a "0" says "Don't look." Using a mask saves the router having to handle the entire 32 bit address; it can simply look at the bits selected by the mask.

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Posted by HamidAliKhan

The Definition of subnet mask is described before here i just want to add the brief explained sheet that explain it well.
As well as more complex subnet used called VLSM.
Subnet Cheat Sheet
Hosts Netmask Amount of a Class C
/30 4 255.255.255.252 1/64
/29 8 255.255.255.248 1/32
/28 16 255.255.255.240 1/16
/27 32 255.255.255.224 1/8
/26 64 255.255.255.192 1/4
/24 256 255.255.255.0 1
/23 512 255.255.254.0 2
/22 1024 255.255.252.0 4
/21 2048 255.255.248.0 8
/20 4096 255.255.240.0 16
/19 8192 255.255.224.0 32
/18 16384 255.255.192.0 64
/17 32768 255.255.128.0 128
/16 65536 255.255.0.0 256



/26 -- 4 Subnets -- 62 Hosts/Subnet
Network # IP Range Broadcast
.0 .1-.62 .63
.64 .65-.126 .127
.128 .129-.190 .191
.192 .193-.254 .255

/29 -- 32 Subnets -- 6 Hosts/Subnet
Network # IP Range Broadcast
.0 .1-.6 .7
.8 .9-.14 .15
.16 .17-.22 .23
.24 .25-.30 .31
.32 .33-.38 .39
.40 .41-.46 .47
.48 .49-.54 .55
.56 .57-.62 .63
.64 .65-.70 .71
.72 .73-.78 .79
.80 .81-.86 .87
.88 .89-.94 .95
.96 .97-.102 .103
.104 .105-.110 .111
.112 .113-.118 .119
.120 .121-.126 .127
.128 .129-.134 .135
.136 .137-.142 .143
.144 .145-.150 .151
.152 .153-.158 .159
.160 .161-.166 .167
.168 .169-.174 .175
.176 .177-.182 .183
.184 .185-.190 .191
.192 .193-.198 .199
.200 .201-.206 .207
.208 .209-.214 .215
.216 .217-.222 .223
.224 .225-.230 .231
.232 .233-.238 .239
.240 .241-.246 .247
.248 .249-.254 .255

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Posted by HamidAliKhan

Subnet mask is basically determine that how ip address is interpreted and about its detail see link below
http://compnetworking.about.com/od/workingwithipaddresses/a/subnetmask.htm

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Posted by Hash007

A mask used to determine what subnet an IP address belongs to. An IP address has two components, the network address and the host address. For example, consider the IP address 150.215.017.009. Assuming this is part of a Class B network, the first two numbers (150.215) represent the Class B network address, and the second two numbers (017.009) identify a particular host on this network.

Subnetting enables the network administrator to further divide the host part of the address into two or more subnets. In this case, a part of the host address is reserved to identify the particular subnet. This is easier to see if we show the IP address in binary format. The full address is:

10010110.11010111.00010001.00001001

The Class B network part is:

10010110.11010111

and the host address is

00010001.00001001

If this network is divided into 14 subnets, however, then the first 4 bits of the host address (0001) are reserved for identifying the subnet.

The subnet mask is the network address plus the bits reserved for identifying the subnetwork. (By convention, the bits for the network address are all set to 1, though it would also work if the bits were set exactly as in the network address.) In this case, therefore, the subnet mask would be 11111111.11111111.11110000.00000000. It's called a mask because it can be used to identify the subnet to which an IP address belongs by performing a bitwise AND operation on the mask and the IP address.

From more detail please visit:
http://www.webopedia.com/TERM/S/subnet_mask.html

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Posted by sagitraz