Multihoming: A Comprehensive Review

Abstract IP multihoming is a networking concept with a deceptively simple definition in theory. In practice, however, multihoming has proved difficult to implement and optimize for. Moreover, it is a concept, which, once adopted in the core Internet architecture, has significant impact on operation and maintenance. A trivial definition of multihoming would state that an end-node or an end-site has multiple first-hop connections to the network. In this chapter, we survey and summarize in a comprehensive manner recent developments in IP multihoming. After introducing the fundamentals, we present the architectural goals and system design principles for multihoming, and review different approaches. We survey multihoming support at the application, session, transport, and network layers, covering all recent proposals based on a locator-identifier split approach. We critically evaluate multihoming support in these proposals and detail recent developments with respect to multihoming and mobility management.