The document discusses classful and classless IP addressing. With classful addressing, IP addresses are divided into classes based on the first octet, but this led to inefficient address usage. Classless Inter-Domain Routing (CIDR) was introduced to allow Variable Length Subnet Masking (VLSM) for more flexible subnetting. This allows networks to be divided into subnets of various sizes to better match addressing needs and allows routing to be summarized to reduce routing table sizes.