Label switching

Imagine you have a bunch of jars, and each jar has a label on it that says what's inside. Now imagine that someone comes along and switches the labels on all the jars - so the jar of peanut butter says "jelly" and the jar of jelly says "peanut butter". This is sort of like "label switching" in computer networks.

In computer networks, we use something called "Multiprotocol Label Switching" (MPLS) to help make our data go where it needs to go. It's like putting a label on a jar.

But sometimes, the labels can get mixed up - this is what we call "label switching". So instead of the data going where it needs to go, it might get sent to the wrong place. Just like if you accidentally put the jelly on your peanut butter sandwich instead of the peanut butter, your sandwich wouldn't taste very good!

When label switching happens in a computer network, it can cause a lot of problems - like slowing down the data or making it harder to find what we're looking for. So we have to be careful to make sure our labels are correct and don't get mixed up.