PRINTABLE FIELD NOTES
Networking acronyms
Use this before an interview or during a focused review.
Networking acronyms
Explain what each mechanism changes and what it leaves unsolved.
| IP / CIDR | Internet Protocol addressing; classless prefixes describe networks. /24 means 24 network bits for IPv4, leaving 256 address values before usage reservations. |
|---|---|
| TCP / UDP / QUIC | TCP is a reliable ordered byte stream. UDP is datagram transport. QUIC adds secure streams, congestion control and recovery over UDP. |
| BGP / ASN | Border Gateway Protocol exchanges reachability between autonomous systems. Policy and available paths influence routing; it is not a latency oracle. |
| NAT / MTU | Network Address Translation rewrites address/port mappings. Maximum Transmission Unit limits packet size on a link; encapsulation consumes overhead. |
| VPN / MPLS | A virtual private network connects through logical tunnels. Multiprotocol Label Switching forwards using labels; private connectivity does not inherently encrypt payloads. |
| SD-WAN / SASE | Software-defined WAN controls paths over transports. Secure Access Service Edge combines networking and cloud-delivered security capabilities. |
| LAN / WAN / RTT | Local versus wide area network. Round-trip time measures a request-response path, not application execution alone. |
Sources and context
- Networking acronyms — further reading
- RFC 4632: CIDR
- Cloudflare subnet explanation
- RFC 4271: BGP-4
- RFC 4786: Anycast
- Cloudflare Load Balancing
- RFC 3022: Traditional NAT
- Cloudflare MPLS explanation
- Cloudflare SASE explanation
- Cloudflare One
- RFC 1191: Path MTU Discovery
- Cloudflare Tunnel
- RFC 9000: QUIC
- RFC 9293: TCP