NAME

Net::IPAddress - Functions used to manipulate IP addresses, masks and FQDN's.

SYNOPSIS

use Net::IPAddress;

@ISA = qw(Net::IPAddress);

DESCRIPTION

"Net::IPAddr" is a collection of helpful functions used to convert IP addresses to/from 32-bit integers, applying subnet masks to IP addresses, validating IP address strings, and splitting a FQDN into its host and domain parts.

No rocket science here, but I have found these functions to very, very handy. For example, have you ever tried to sort a list of IP addresses only to find out that they don't sort the way you expected? Here is the solution! If you convert the IP addresses to 32-bit integer addresses, they will sort in correct order.

ip2num( STRING )

Returns the 32-bit integer of the passed IP address string.

"$ipnum = ip2num("10.1.1.1");" $ipnum is 167837953.

num2ip( INTEGER )

Returns the IP address string of the passed 32-bit IP address.

"$IP = num2ip(167837953);" $IP is "10.1.1.1".

validaddr( STRING )

Returns true (1) if the IP address string is a valid and properly formatted IP address, and false (0) otherwise.

"$valid = validaddr("10.1.2.1");" # returns true

"$valid = validaddr("10.1.2.");" # returns false!

If you have your own IP address validator, try the last one. Most will incorrectly compute that as a valid address.

mask( IPADDRESS, MASK )

Returns the result of binary (IPADDRESS & MASK). IPADDRESS can be either an IP address string or a 32-bit integer address. MASK can be either an IP address string, or the number of bits in the mask. The returned value will be in the same format as the passed IP address. If you pass an IP address string, then an IP address string is returned, if you pass a 32-bit integer address then a 32-bit integer address is returned.

Examples

"$subnet = mask("10.96.3.2",16);" # $subnet = "10.96.0.0"

"$subnet = mask("10.21.4.22","255.240.0.0");" # $subnet = "10.16.0.0"

"$subnet = mask(167837953,"255.255.255.0");" # $subnet = 167837952>

This function, when used with the others, is very useful for computing IP addresses. For example, you need to add another server to a subnet that an existing server is on. You want the new server to be the ".17" address of a /24 subnet. This is done easily in the following example:

"use Net::IPAddress"

"$server = "10.8.9.12";" "$newserver = num2ip(ip2num(mask($server,24)) + 17);" "print "New server IP is $newserver\n";"

"New server IP is 10.8.9.17"

The following code does exactly the same thing:

"use Net::IPAddress;"

"$server = "10.8.9.12";" "$newserver = num2ip(mask(ip2num($server),24) + 17);" "print "New server IP is $newserver\n";"

fqdn( FQDN ): This function returns the host and domain of the passed FQDN (fully qualified domain name).
"($host,$domain) = fqdn("www.cpan.perl.org");" # $host = "www", $domain = "cpan.perl.org"

EXPORTS

"Net::IPAddress" exports five functions "ip2num", "num2ip", "validaddr", "mask", and "fqdn".

AUTHOR

Scott Renner <srenner@mandtbank.com>, <srenner@comcast.net>

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