ABSTRACT
A router running a link-state routing protocol develops a complete map of the network topology by exchanging link-state information with all other routers in the network through a processed called flooding. All the routers then use the link-state information they have gathered (in databases called Link-State Databases [LSDBs] or Topology Tables) to construct identical topology maps of the entire network, and from which they calculate the best paths to all known network destinations. Using the same topology map, each router is able to independently calculate the shortest path to every destination in the network.
