Review Algorithms of Automatic Physical Topology Discovery

This paper will describe some algorithms of physical topology discovery in Ethernet and wireless networks.

Local networks nowadays are still growing and gaining knowledge about their topology is needful. There are a lot of algorithms, which allow obtaining complete information about layer-3 topology, but for some kind of network management tasks (such as network diagnostics and resource management) it is necessary to maintain accurate knowledge about layer-2 topology. Unfortunately, there are no complete tools and algorithms to discover physical topology – all of them have its limitations, issues and fields of application. Our aim is to explore and review existing algorithms, methods and protocols.