Important RFCs

No, you don't have to memorize RFCs to be a good network engineer or to pass Cisco certification tests, but you should be familiar with a core set of RFCs. If you read (or at least scan) the following RFCs and learn the concepts in them, you will be on your way to becoming a "real" network engineer.

• RFC 760: DoD Standard Internet Protocol (IP) [Obsoleted by RFC 791, but still worth reading]
• RFC 768: User Datagram Protocol (UDP)
• RFC 791: Internet Protocol (IP)
• RFC 792: Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP)
• RFC 793: Transmission Control Protocol (TCP)
• RFC 826: Ethernet Address Resolution Protocol (ARP)
• RFC 854: Telnet Protocol Specification
• RFC 950: Internet Standard Subnetting Procedure
• RFC 959: File Transfer Protocol (FTP)
• RFC 1001: Protocol Standard for a NetBIOS Service on TCP/UDP Transport: Concepts and Facilities
• RFC 1002: Protocol Standard for a NetBIOS Service on a TCP/UDP Transport: Detailed Specifications
• RFC 1034: Domain Names-Concepts and Facilities
• RFC 1035: Domain Names-Implementation and Specification
• RFC 1058. Routing Information Protocol (RIP)
• RFC 1122: Requirements for Internet Hosts-Communication Layers
• RFC 1517: Applicability Statement for the Implementation of Classless Inter-Domain Routing (CIDR)
• RFC 1518: An Architecture for IP Address Allocation with CIDR
• RFC 1520: Exchanging Routing Information Across Provider Boundaries in the CIDR Environment
• RFC 1661: The Point-to-Point Protocol (PPP)
• RFC 1700: Assigned Numbers [Obsoleted by IANA Number Resources but still worth a peruse]
• RFC 1752: The Recommendation for the IP Next Generation Protocol
• RFC 1812: Requirements for IP Version 4 Routers
• RFC 1878: Variable Length Subnet Table For IPv4
• RFC 1918: Address Allocation for Private Internets
• RFC 1939: Post Office Protocol (POP), Version 3
• RFC 2072: Router Renumbering Guide
• RFC 2281: Cisco Hot Standby Router Protocol (HSRP)
• RFC 2328: Open Shortest Path First (OSPF), Version 2
• RFC 2390: Inverse Address Resolution Protocol (Inverse ARP)
• RFC 2453: Routing Information Protocol (RIP), Version 2
• RFC 2460: Internet Protocol, Version 6 (IPv6) Specification
• RFC 2474: Definition of the Differentiated Services Field (DS Field) in the IPv4 and IPv6 Headers
• RFC 2475: An Architecture for Differentiated Service
• RFC 2516: A Method for Transmitting PPP over Ethernet (PPPoE)
• RFC 2608: Service Location Protocol (SLP), Version 2
• RFC 2616: Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP), Version 1.1
• RFC 2650: Using Routing Policy Specification Language (RPSL) in Practice
• RFC 2819: Remote Network Monitoring (RMON) Management Information Base (MIB)
• RFC 3022: Traditional IP Network Address Translator (Traditional NAT)
• RFC 3376: Internet Group Management Protocol (IGMP), Version 3
• RFC 3416: Protocol Operations for Version 2 of the Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMPv2)
• RFC 3501: Internet Message Access Protocol (IMAP), Version 4rev1
• RFC 3768: Virtual Router Redundancy Protocol
• RFC 4271: A Border Gateway Protocol 4 (BGP4)
• RFC 4301: Security Architecture for the Internet Protocol
• RFC 4502: Remote Network Monitoring Management Information Base Version 2 using SMIv2 (RMONv2)
• RFC 4632: Classless Inter-domain Routing (CIDR): The Internet Address Assignment and Aggregation Plan
• RFC 4862: IPv6 Stateless Address Autoconfiguration
• RFC 5321: Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP)

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