ROUTE(8)

NAME
route - manipulate the IP routing table

SYNOPSIS
route
route add target interface [gw gateway] [metric number]
route del target

DESCRIPTION
Route manipulates the kernel's IP routing table. Its primary use is to set up static routes to an interface after the interface has been configured with the ifconfig(8) program.

OPTIONS

add target interface
    Tell the routing table that a new route has to be set up. The target IP address is target , which may be either an IP address in dotted decimal, or it may be the domain name of a network or host. In the latter two cases, the name will be resolved to an IP address using the system name resolver.

    The special routing target called default means that this will be the default route to use. This is usually nice for systems that have one or more local networks, with only one gateway to the rest of the world (i.e. a SLIP line or a leased line).

    The interface parameter tells the router which network interface the packets must be sent to. Note that the interface must be up and configured to before the router can use it.

    The gw gateway parameter tells the router that all packats for this route must be sent to a specific gateway, rather than broadcasting them on the network attached to that interface. The name of that gateway may either be a dotted-decimal IP address or a domain name.

    The metric number parameter is a means to specify to the router how good the route is. It is the number of hops (i.e. gateways) that packats go through before arriving at the ultimate destination. If multiple routes to a given target exist, the router will use the one with the smallest "metric" value.

del target
    This removed target target from the routing table. The value of target may either be a dotted-decimal IP address, or it may be a domain name.

If no arguments are given, the entire IP routing table is displayed.

FILES
/proc/net/route

BUGS
None so far.

AUTHOR
Fred N. van Kempen, <waltje@uwalt.nl.mugnet.org>