Which RPVST+ port state is excluded from all STP operations?

D

The correct answer is D. disabled.

RPVST+ (Rapid Per-VLAN Spanning Tree Plus) is a Cisco proprietary protocol that provides rapid convergence and load balancing in a VLAN-based network environment. It builds a separate spanning tree for each VLAN and provides a faster convergence time than the standard IEEE 802.1D STP (Spanning Tree Protocol).

RPVST+ uses the same port states as STP, which are:

• Blocking: The port does not participate in frame forwarding but listens to BPDU frames to learn about the network topology. This state is also known as the discarding state.
• Learning: The port listens to BPDU frames to learn about the network topology and starts populating the MAC address table, but does not forward frames yet.
• Forwarding: The port participates in frame forwarding and actively sends and receives frames.
• Disabled: The port is administratively shut down and does not participate in STP operations.

In RPVST+, the disabled port state is excluded from all STP operations. This means that the port is completely ignored by the RPVST+ protocol, and it does not send or receive BPDU frames, nor does it participate in the calculation of the spanning tree topology. Therefore, the disabled port state does not affect the network's convergence time or its load-balancing capabilities.

In summary, the correct answer is D. disabled, as it is the only port state that is excluded from all RPVST+ operations.