Assigning IP to a small office network

I need to assign static ip address to a network with the following specification:

• There are 6 set(12 nos.) of sub-networks.
• Each set has a Primary and a Redundant network loops with Server having Win-2003 server and clients with Win-XP

Now I need the best ip config for a connection that makes the communication in-between all 6 network clients and servers. Also I need to learn regarding what the 4 fields in ip are for, the best practice to use all the 4 fields and how modifying a fields affects communication. Please suggest a link for a beginner where I can learn these.

From serverfault Vicky

• For how the network address is constructed I'd suggest you read up on CIDR and routing. I'd also suggest you talk to whoever designed your network about IP addressing in case their primary/redundant design has some particular requirements. I'd also suggest that if you are inexperienced then you're not a good choice for implementing what seems to be a very complex design.

  That all said, I'd suggest you construct the addresses as follows:

  10.a.b.x/24
  

  For each of your 6 networks take 2 numbers as the a field to represent the primary and redundant IP ranges (for example, 100 and 200) and 6 consecutive numbers (for example, 100 to 106) as the b field to represent the sub-networks.

  This should make it easy to expand the design if required in the future, and easy to identify what network a particular IP belongs to.

  ---

  How, or if, the communication works depends on how routing is configured. That's entirely in control of whoever configures the routers.

  Oh, and multicast is not a kind of router or switch ;)

  Vicky : Thanks for the idea. I need to know if the ip 10.100.106.12 can communicate with 10.100.105.13? Also if a primary's ip can communicate with the redundant?
  From Cry Havok