Pros and cons
In: Technology
When a computer doesn’t know where the server that it needs is, it screams for help, and the first qualified server to hear the cry for help answers. This is called a “Broadcast”. A broadcast message + a loop = broadcast storm. Where the broadcast message loops recursively. It doubles and doubles and doubles till the entire network is brought to a grinding halt.
If you have a simple ethernet switch. and you plug one end of a cable into a port, and the other end of that same cable into another port on the same switch, that is a loop.
Often times it is never THAT simple. loops can be created in many ways.
Someone could route the traffic between two ports improperly.
That lawyer on the 12th floor could plug both the in and out of his IP phone phone into the wall.
You could have a whole family trees worth of network devices only to have a spot of incest in the 4th generation.
Loop prevention allows for human error while keeping the network relatively stable. You still want to track down and remove loops whenever possible.
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