SKNK Field Notes · Start with a problem
As a sponsoring LIR, we answer one question every day: "Do I need an ASN?" This page turns the problems people actually bring us into signposts. Find yours, follow the path, and grab a read-only tool when you need to check something.
Everyone enters from a different place: deciding whether to get an ASN, checking one prefix, or weighing two network models. Do not read from the top — take the path that matches your problem.
Start with this question
You do not need the whole protocol stack for this. Two questions decide it: does your network make its own routing decisions, or does your upstream make them for you?
Start hereStart with this question
Announcements, upstreams, peers, filters — it is easy to drown on the first read. Start with one picture: who talks to whom, and what gets said.
Start hereStart with this question
Run a read-only lookup. One rule to remember: which source the answer comes from, and when it was collected, decides how much it is worth.
Start hereStart with this question
Compare responsibility and resource ownership before you compare price. Three guides separate the things people usually mix up.
Start hereFour learning paths
Each path has the same shape: one core concept, then how to judge, where to check data, and what to do next. The links connect the ideas; the path is yours to take.
Identity and resources
What an application asks for, and who owns what once a sponsoring relationship is in place — the path from request to a running resource.
What Is an ASN?
One page on what an ASN actually is in routing.
How to Get Your Own ASN
What to prepare — and decide — before you apply.
ASN Application Questions
Eligibility, documents, review — the questions we hear most.
RIPE NCC vs LIR Sponsorship
Where a direct membership and a sponsorship really differ.
Inter-domain routing
BGP is how one network tells the others: "I can reach this." Read this path before you decide who configures, filters, and watches your external routes.
BGP Basics
The terms you need before reading any routing policy.
Transit vs Peering
A paid upstream service and a direct interchange are not the same thing.
BGP Multihoming
What changes when a network gets a second external connection.
Announce an IPv6 /48 via BGP
Get the concepts in place before you announce anything.
Address planning
IPv6 rarely trips people on the protocol; it trips them on planning — /48 vs /64, how subnets split, who owns the space. This path follows that order.
What Is IPv6?
Start with prefixes, subnets, and the resource relationship.
How to Get an IPv6 /48
The questions to settle before you request one.
IPv6 Subnetting Explained
Turn a prefix into a subnet plan you can actually use.
IPv6 Subnet Calculator
Calculate prefix relationships in the browser.
Validation and authorisation
RPKI/ROA, IRR, and BGP observations are three separate signals answering three separate questions. Mixing them up is how most routing incidents start.
What Is RPKI?
The validation system behind route-origin authorisation.
What Is a ROA?
How a prefix, origin ASN, and maximum length fit into one authorisation.
IRR Route Object Lookup
A registered object is not a live route.
Routing Consistency Audit
Put public observations next to registration data and compare.
When you get to resources and applications
Still deciding whether you need an ASN? Take the ASN or BGP path. Already have resources? Check their public state with the tools. For a specific service, price, or resource relationship, use the formal pages or talk to the team.
Service boundaries
We handle resource applications and sponsoring-LIR administration. Routing operations — BGP configuration, upstream selection, incident handling — stay with you. The exact boundary lives in the public pages and the signed agreement.
Review resource lifecycle