Address Resolution Protocol
We call networks ‘environments,’ because that’s what they are —
digital ecosystems, biomes of ones and not-ones, growing
digital algae, reefs of encrusted traffic forming around
switches and routers which once were there
but got moved years ago.
I found a switch mired in the muck
of ancient packets and broken octets,
a 3COM, from back when there was a 3COM,
still connected to a switch, that itself was connected
to the backbone, referring traffic from seven lonely ports
out of the forty-eight this switch boasted when new.
100 Megabit, which sounds impressive
so long as you know nothing of switches or bit rates
or speed… long since obsolete —
but clearly whatever was on the other end
of those seven interfaces didn’t care
that all the cool kids were 10 Gig these days,
and even the squares were Gigabit.
100 Megabit was clearly enough.
Printers that rarely saw use. Workstations
for guests to check the web, never touched now
that people have faster access
from their crappy old phone — I need to upgrade!
How did anyone ever survive below LTE?
The answer is “just fine,” from back in the days
when the internet didn’t have flourishes like
pictures or colors other than amber or green.
But we forget these things —
like I forgot this switch was even there.
We have ways of knowing which switches
are live, of course. They report in, respond
to pings, tell us their stories in six packet bursts.
Like crickets in the swamp, reporting
virtual temperature all through the night,
or electronic frogs just trying to get laid.
But this one had slipped by unnoticed
for at least eight years. Which is like saying
forever.
I found out why and how, of course.
That’s why they pay me — to not just find
the colonies that grew in the fetid waters
far from the picturesque view but figure out
how they managed to grow so thick.
It had been configured to report to a router
that we hadn’t used in years and years.
I dug a bit, and found it calling for home,
like a lost dog looking for the pack,
barking “ARP ARP ARP” at the world.
That stands for Address Resolution Protocol —
it’s how hardware knows what streets
IP traffic should take to get to the mall.
And it still sent the traffic down the lane
but it couldn’t find its own home to report.
In arp who-has 10.1.1.5 tell 10.1.1.92
sent like literal clockwork, every three seconds.
In arp who-has 10.1.1.5 tell 10.1.1.92
In arp who-has 10.1.1.5 tell 10.1.1.92
No one has 10.1.1.5, that’s who.
Not since 2006, or maybe 2002.
Every three seconds for a decade or more,
asking softly where it can find the door
to step through and report in, and say
that it still has seven residents living
in its part of the swamp, and they seem okay.
I gently told the switch where it could find
the router that replaced the router
that replaced the router
that replaced 10.1.1.5, and checked in
on the switch’s status.
All fans still spinning, no reds or ambers.
Year after year abandoned to its fate,
doing its job, getting packets to and from
the seven residents that made up its world,
and asking again and again
“who has 10.1.1.5?”
Well, we can’t leave it there.
It’s a drag on the network, killing speeds
and not really set up for relocation
to another part of the ecosystem.
I think about it, of course. It only seems fair.
Reliability is sometimes tragically rare —
some days it feels like it left with 3COM.
Of those seven devices, four should move
to the wireless network, passing through the air
and our bodies, carrying messages,
Instagram and porn through our walls and flesh
from Access Point to Node. Two others
have closer switches they should use instead.
The last needs to be replaced. It barely works.
Should have happened years ago.
So the switch that has 10.1.1.92 finally comes home,
and reports in, going far beyond the call of duty
and running much longer than most of its successors.
No burnouts, no fan noise.
And for its troubles? Decommissioning.
Sent to a center that will crack it open
and pull out the copper and rare earths,
melt other bits for processing and dispose of the rest.
Long overdue. Kind of embarrassing, really.
So it needs doing.
But not tonight.
I’m middle aged now, having been the one
who ordered those 3COMs in the first place,
and I’m sentimental about silly things sometimes
but I don’t see a reason to take time
out of a late night at the office to begin with
and shut down a switch
that’s literally never given us trouble.
I have too much in common with that switch,
and I’m not always sure where to report,
and I’m far more given to complain
than the switch that has 10.1.1.92.
Let it have one night where it’s back
working alongside its successors,
reporting in and passing packets,
secure in its place in the biome.
We can clean out the swamp tomorrow.
