Which NetWare protocol provides link-state routing?

Q. Which NetWare protocol provides link-state routing?
A. NLSP
B. RIP
C. SAP
D. NCP

Answer: NLSP

NetWare Link Services Protocol (NLSP) is a routing protocol for Internetwork Packet Exchange based on the Intermediate-System-to-Intermediate-System (IS-IS) protocol developed by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). NLSP enables NetWare servers to exchange routing and service information without the high broadcast overhead generated by Routing Information Protocol and Service Advertising Protocol. Instead of periodically retransmitting its information every few minutes like RIP and SAP, NLSP only transmits every two hours, or when there is a change in a route or service, making it much more suitable for use over a Wide Area Network.

The Routing Information Protocol (RIP) is one of the oldest distance-vector routing protocols which employ the hop count as a routing metric. RIP prevents routing loops by implementing a limit on the number of hops allowed in a path from source to destination. The maximum number of hops allowed for RIP is 15, which limits the size of networks that RIP can support. A hop count of 16 is considered an infinite distance and the route is considered unreachable. RIP implements the split horizon, route poisoning and hold-down mechanisms to prevent incorrect routing information from being propagated.

The Service Advertising Protocol (SAP) is included in the Internetwork Packet Exchange (IPX) protocol. SAP makes the process of adding and removing services on an IPX internetwork dynamic. SAP is maintained by Novell.

The Network Control Program (NCP) provided the middle layers of the protocol stack running on host computers of the ARPANET, the predecessor to the modern Internet. NCP preceded the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) as a transport layer protocol used during the early ARPANET.