Cisco Discovery Protocol
Switched networks get very complex very quickly. When you have an office with switches in several different locations and wires running every which way, you can easily lose track of which switch is plugged into which port. Cisco Discovery Protocol (CDP) lets the admin identify which Cisco devices are attached to which port on a switch. While CDP does not replace the need to document how your network is wired together, it does replace having to go fetch the documentation when you're logged in to the switch.
To see where your switches are attached, log into your switch and run show cdp neighbors.
Switch4>sho cdp ne Capability Codes: R - Router, T - Trans Bridge, B - Source Route Bridge S - Switch, H - Host, I - IGMP, r - Repeater, ...Get Cisco Routers for the Desperate, 2nd Edition now with the O’Reilly learning platform.
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