Novell Uses the IPX protocol. IPX is routable and can be configured on the LAN/WAN and if necessary be routed or tunneled to its destination.

In the situation of the Royal Palm School, IPX is necessary for security and is not the primary protocol. The routers must be configured to accept the IPX protocol as well as SAP to announce servers on the network.

It is estimated that the impact of the IPX protocol on the network will not be significant enough to seriously affect the overall performance of the network since its application is for security only and limited to use by administration.

TCP/IP is the primary protocol and will be play a more significant role on the network than the IPX/SPX protocol.

Routers do not forward SAP Broadcasts. Instead, all servers and Routers build tables and the tables are forwarded to other routers. SAP advertisements by default announce themselves every 60 seconds. Depending on the size of the network, number of routers and servers, the network traffic can become an issue.

In the situation of Royal Palm, only 2 routers must be configured greatly reducing network traffic.