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U.S. DoD Commits To IPv6

babaloo writes "According to this article the U.S. Defense Department wants to move it's entire network to IPv6 by the year 2008. Will this be what pushes at least U.S. based companies and providers to actually convert over?" It's definitely a shot in the arm that IPv6 needs. This seemed to be more of a priority back when NAT was much less prevalent, but it seems we'll eventually find ourselves on IPv6, even if we drag our feet there.

61 of 318 comments (clear)

  1. dupe? by zoloto · · Score: 4, Informative

    Wasn't this covered here:
    http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=03/06/13 /194120 6&mode=thread

    oh wait, this is /.
    any news is good news!

    1. Re:dupe? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

      I hear that with IPv6, there will be a mind-boggling amount of available IP addresses... like, one IP address for every slashdot dupe. Amazing!

    2. Re:dupe? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

      At least it's a genuine dupe and not a SCO update....

  2. Sigh... by Andorion · · Score: 3, Redundant

    A simple search for "ipv6" before posting the article would have been nice =)

    Karma-seekers, just go to the original post and repost all insightful comments! :)

    ~Berj

  3. An IP address for.... by ciroknight · · Score: 4, Funny

    .....every second until the day IPv8 goes into effect, not to mention every person alive, every toaster making toast, every toilet still flushing, and every bullet fired. Maybe this is why the DoD wants IPv6... No not for toilets, internet enabled bullets!!

    --
    "Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the President to explain to us what the exit strategy is." G.W.Bush
    1. Re:An IP address for.... by Soko · · Score: 4, Funny

      Clippy: It looks like you're trying to kill Saddam Hussien. Do you want an IP address assigned to each of your bullets so we can track the kill?

      [yes] [no] [sod off before I shoot you, ya nosy paperclip!]

      Soko

      --
      "Depression is merely anger without enthusiasm." - Anonymous
    2. Re:An IP address for.... by istartedi · · Score: 2, Funny

      internet enabled bullets

      Sorry. You can't kill. The network is down.

      --
      For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
    3. Re:An IP address for.... by commodoresloat · · Score: 2, Funny
      internet enabled bullets

      Great. I can't wait until these become the subject of hacks and viruses. Imagine getting shot in the head by a bullet with the following message attached:

      Hi! How are you?

      I send you this bullet in order to have your advice.

      See you later. Thanks

  4. Standard by RobPiano · · Score: 5, Funny

    Its pretty much a fact that most internet innovations are due to military and pornography pushing early use. IPv6 is definitly going to happen now.

    See history of the internet and streaming media...

    Rob :)

    1. Re:Standard by TopShelf · · Score: 2, Funny

      And just wait until the development of military pornography kicks into high gear - we'll be at IPv8 in no time...

      --
      Stop by my site where I write about ERP systems & more
  5. New category icon ... by slagdogg · · Score: 2, Funny
    --
    (Score:-1, Wrong)
  6. IPv6.... by jabbadabbadoo · · Score: 2, Funny

    What are they going to do with all those IP addresses? Oh wait, I know. A trillion nano-machines flying around the Iraqi country side, injecting anthrax into Saddamic supporters...

    1. Re:IPv6.... by JoeBuck · · Score: 4, Interesting

      You want to have vastly more addresses than can ever be used; this will kill scanning attacks by black hats and spammers who just try every network address looking for a victim. Anyone scanning thousands of bogus addresses for every real one will trigger all kinds of alarms.

    2. Re:IPv6.... by FatherBash · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I don't think so. As machines get more and more powerful and bandwidth availability increases at some forms of scanning will reemerge. I realize the magnitude of IPv6 (or at least I think I do) but how long will it take Moore's Law and whatever lays beyond gigabit ethernet to catch up? and remember we're talking a protocol that will probably be in use for hundreds of years. This will only stop scanning as we currently know it.

  7. Circular definition, AH! by zapp · · Score: 3, Funny

    IPv6 has enough IP's to identify each unique second until IPv8 is released.
    IPv8 won't be released until all IPv6 addresses are used.
    The longer it takes for IPv8 to be released, the sooner it will happen!

    --
    no comment
  8. Chicken and egg by caluml · · Score: 3, Insightful
    Will this be what pushes at least U.S. based companies and providers to actually convert over?"

    Why would it be? I assume most US based companies and providers don't have many connections to the DOD network :)
    When a: there is a decent amount of IPv6 only content, and b: when the most widely used OS in the world ships with it enabled by default, (ipv6 install doesn't count here) then it might start taking hold. But it's a chicken and egg situation at the moment. That autopr0n guy should switch his site to IPv6 only, and force his viewers to start using IPv6 (or IPv6-over-IPv4) ;)
    Sign yourself up to an IPv6 tunnelbroker today, and get your own n * 2^64 addresses to play with.

    In fact, why isn't Slashdot an IPv6 enabled site?

    1. Re:Chicken and egg by JoeBuck · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Ah, but if you're shipping networking gear, the telecom industry is broke, so the only major source of customers is the military. You're going to design to fit the requirements of the paying customers, and as keeping two designs going is more expensive, there will be more and more ipv6-capable gear sold to everyone if the military demands it.

      People forget that as late as the early 80s, the US military bought 50% or more of all electronics purchased in the US.

    2. Re:Chicken and egg by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

      In fact, why isn't Slashdot an IPv6 enabled site?

      Because we are all hypocrits.

  9. Re:Only if it fits as standard by valisk · · Score: 2, Informative
    It is standard in all the key *nix distros.

    In solaris frex. you simply have to say yes to enable when asked during install and hey presto your machine is instantly IPv6 aware.

    --

    Economic Left/Right: -0.62
    Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -3.69
  10. Heavy Sigh by mofochickamo · · Score: 4, Funny
    IPv6 will allow an expansion from the Internet's current limitation of 4 billion addresses (to a new limit of 380,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,00 0, which is a number so great it could supply each person living today with more than 4 billion addresses each).

    Too bad I have to type http://132.122.21.123.155.135.132.152.132.122.221. 123.15.23.32.52 to get to my computer that I don't have a domain name for.

    --
    Honk if you're horny.
    1. Re:Heavy Sigh by caluml · · Score: 4, Informative
      Er, no.

      From ifconfig:
      inet6 addr: fe80::240:93fa:fe43:6f50/64 Scope:Link

      And you're right - DNS will become more invaluable.
      Although you only have to remember your subnet - eg 2001:618:15, and the address you use on that subnet, which is usually something like ::1, or ::2, etc.

    2. Re:Heavy Sigh by KentoNET · · Score: 2, Informative

      The subnet is the easy part. Unfortunately, your end IP fields will rarely equate to a single digit, like ::1 or ::2. More often than not, an automatic configuration scheme will give you something like :203:6dff:fe1d:85c4 at the end (my PC under a /64 prefix, as an example). That value is calculated via the MAC address. Preset IP's are usually only given to routers and servers.

      --
      "You tried your best and failed miserably. The lesson is...never try. Heh!" -Homer
  11. Re:10$ says... by caluml · · Score: 2, Funny

    DELETE FROM comments WHERE comment LIKE "%repost%" OR comment LIKE "%dupe%" in a crontab would be easier :)

  12. IPV6 Costs.... by wo1verin3 · · Score: 3, Funny

    >> U.S. DoD Commits To IPv6

    Washington, DC - June 26, 2003 - Dept. Of Defense in charge of security and defense for the United States Of America will be going over budget on an IPV6 upgrade. The majority of costs will be involved in training staff to count to the number 6. Previous training to count up to 5 was thought to be years ahead of its time since the DOD believes IPV5 would come after IPV4.

  13. Heh by egg+troll · · Score: 4, Funny

    IPV6 is the Hurd of networking protocols!

    --

    C - A language that combines the speed of assembly with the ease of use of assembly.
    1. Re:Heh by eht · · Score: 4, Funny

      Not really, IPv6 is actually useful.

  14. IPv6 May becomre much MORE needed by zapp · · Score: 3, Interesting

    This seemed to be more of a priority back when NAT was much less prevalent

    Since several states have already banned NAT, and several more are moving in that direction... perhapse IPv6 will be necessary much sooner than we think.

    --
    no comment
    1. Re:IPv6 May becomre much MORE needed by H0NGK0NGPH00EY · · Score: 2, Informative

      It's not that they've specifically banned NAT, I don't think, but rather that NAT falls under the blanket of "evils" that are being outlawed to keep those darn users from sharing files. I think. Read: http://www.freedom-to-tinker.com/archives/000336.h tml

      --
      Do not read this sig.
  15. Re:Only if it fits as standard by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    Windows XP already supports IPv6 out of the box and it's a very small, downloadable, and free upgrade for 2000.

    Also, pretty much every single *-nix I can think of supports IPv6 natively. I know for a fact that OpenBSD supports it and I cna't imagine Linux doesn't. Heck, it'd be a fun challenge to find a Unix that doesn't support IPv6.

    So that's *-nix, MacOS X, and all future versions of Windows. What else would an 'average home user' be using?

  16. Time to learn... by krray · · Score: 3, Interesting

    You know, call me weird or something, but I happen to like NAT and, well, pretty much fully understand IPv4.

    Yeah -- I know how to use a Linux box as a decent router and setup Firewall's as needed, etc.

    The fact that I'm not doing anything SERIOUSLY complex helps:
    - Web servers (port 80 and 443)
    - imaps (port 993)
    - ssh2 (private port with honey-pots all over :)
    - other misc needed ports and tunnels as well.

    ONLY ports I specifically opened up and re-directed are available to the general Internet. Firewalls run internally as well, but many more services (lpr, smb, hell IPX is stilled used/preferred for accounting work)...

    With IPv6 I'm probably going to go the route of:
    1) Ok -- I *basically* understand it, but honestly haven't wrapped my brain around it ... learn it.

    2) Try and get a few IPv6 addresses as needed
    3) Update front end router to use it work with it.
    4) Tunnel it back into my IPv4 network per port as needed. IPv6 NAT if you will...

    I really don't want anything/everything directly connected to the Internet. At anytime. Except the Internet network router. These ISP's selling "Windows DSL modems" where it plugs directly into USB or the Ethernet is NUTS, IMHO. :)

    Once in a blue moon I'll come across a Linux box that has ftp (for example) enabled and there really isn't the want/need for it. Oops, not Firewalled either... Glad it wasn't directly on the 'Net (!)

    Even when the need _has_ arisen to put a box completely on the Internet directly it's been easy enough to setup a 1:1 map on the router... While the video feed was going on I personally would be nmap'ing the box to double check the firewall settings...

    Of course the problem exists because, well, it is TOO easy to get on the Internet. Too many have no clue what they are doing, but they get email (!) Yeah. Those are the ones spreading virus' and not knowing it or have a hacked box spewing spam around the world. Some problems could also become moot with IPv6 in regards to security and accountability...

    !fp

    1. Re:Time to learn... by caluml · · Score: 3, Insightful

      NAT is the spawn of SATAN. Really it is. Get two hosts behind NAT, and they are unable to establish connections between themselves. It's truely horrible. At the moment, I am using a tunnel broker to give my lab IPv6 connectivity ( tunnelled over IPv4, but you wouldn't know it.)
      Because my workstation is behind NAT on IPv4, I have to either VPN in, or SSH to the firewall, and then onto my workstation. With IPv6 however, because I can address my workstation directly, and because I've allowed SSH to it, I can ssh right in through the firewall. It's just better. Abolish NAT.

    2. Re:Time to learn... by asdfghjklqwertyuiop · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Get two hosts behind NAT, and they are unable to establish connections between themselves.

      This is sometimes true, and is usually considered a benefit. Put servers on the public Internet, put client workstations behind NAT.


      The differences between the two aren't so cut and dry. Workstations may run services on it. Game servers are file sharing services being two popular ones. There's also File servers, remote display servers, SSH servers... plenty of server type things that need inbound connections but run on a workstation.


      Because my workstation is behind NAT on IPv4, I have to either VPN in, or SSH to the firewall, and then onto my workstation.

      Have you ever heard of port forwarding? Basically, you can take a high port (say, 60125) and forward any connections to a IP/Port on your internal network.


      And what if you have a number of machines that run the same services? Now from the outside you have to have all kinds of different ports forwarded and you have to remember what port number corresponds to what machine.

      And then there are IP protocols that don't work very well with NAT, like PPTP and IPsec.

    3. Re:Time to learn... by Alioth · · Score: 2, Informative

      Your argument is a bit of a red herring. Firstly, security is a host problem more than a network problem, but let's ignore that for now.

      Your IPv6 router can *still* be used to firewall off your internal IPv6 network even though it has globally addressable IP addresses. The added benefit (you might not think this is a benefit, but many firms do) is if everyone has globally unique address space, and say, for example, two companies become partners, they don't have to renumber vast amounts of machines so the two networks can interoperate properly.

  17. Damnit! (In the spirit of dupes) by teamhasnoi · · Score: 5, Funny
    I was promised flying cars, why aren't they working on the flying cars?

    IPv6 sounds great but I see that we will need more TLDs and a domain name will be absolutely necessary.

    Frickin' Rainman will be the only one able to remember xxxx.xxxx.xxxx.xxxx.xxxx.xxxx.

    At least the giant corporations that are our new overlords will have to spend some serious $$$ to cover all the new 'name.new tld'. Perhaps after all this is done, they can work on flying cars. 'cause we are like 50+ years behind the times here, people.

    But all that has to take a back seat to hard-to-remember IPv6.

    Here's a plan, why don't we just take the internet away from all the AOLers, the Flash greeting card senders, the 'Great Story! Read this LOLRFLOLRLOL!!!!'ers, Zone Bejewled players and the cheaters at Counter Strike and we'll have enough IPs for all of the elitist bastards that are going to make my toaster talk to me.

    Tell you what. I will trade all my IPs (192.168.x.x) for a friggin' flying car.

    Let's make it happen. I'll even have a bumper sticker, "IPv6, but my doctor says I'll be fine!" with a smiley!

    Gimme my flying car.

  18. make sense, the issue is security by e40 · · Score: 2, Informative

    if it were not for the increased awareness of security, this would never had happened.

  19. Re:Recap by jared_hanson · · Score: 5, Informative

    Won't we need IPv7 by then?

    No, we will not. The current IPv4 has approximately 4,300,000,000 (4.3 x 10^9) total addresses in its address space. IPv6, however, has 3.4 x 10^38 available addresses.

    To quote from the WIDE FAQ: "If the address space of IPv4 is compared to 1 millimeter, the address space of IPv6 would be 80 times the diameter of the galactic system."

    It is simply not feasible that we will ever need anything more than IPv6.

    --
    -- Fighting mediocrity one bad post at a time.
  20. More than one benefit. by davidu · · Score: 4, Informative

    http://www.faqs.org/rfcs/rfc2460.html
    IPv6 has many improvements over IPv4 other than just more address space.
    • Expanded Addressing Capabilities (multicast, anycast, etc)
    • Header Format Simplification
    • Flow Labeling Capability
    • Authentication and Privacy Capabilities
    There is no address space shortage as reported...everywhere. -davidu
    --

    # Hack the planet, it's important.
  21. By 2008 by Kludge · · Score: 2, Funny

    I hope to be 5 years older.

    How slow is that?

  22. Re:Oh wait, here's one by PD · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Metric time is based on divisions of 10. And so is the metric calendar.

  23. Excellent example! by Mike+Schiraldi · · Score: 3, Funny
    From the recent Slashdot IRC chat:

    reefer asks: Is there any system in place or a plan on developing some system to prevent duplicate posts?

    CmdrTaco: Whatever. Next.


    Great attitude there, Rob.
    1. Re:Excellent example! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Yeah, you're right. No system should be needed because the editors, who are paid to do their jobs, should take all of ten minutes a day to read the headlines.

      Sheesh, and they expect us to subscribe for this shitty service and shitty "customer is always stupid" attitude.

      Check out the FAQ: "Why don't you do this simple thing to make the Slashdot experience better?" "I'm too busy." "Well, what about this one?" "Busy." "This?" "Busy."

      What the fuck are the Slashdot editors so busy doing? They don't read their own site and they don't fix its problems.

    2. Re:Excellent example! by Chester+K · · Score: 2, Funny

      reefer asks: Is there any system in place or a plan on developing some system to prevent duplicate posts?

      CmdrTaco: Whatever. Next.

      Great attitude there, Rob.


      And they want people to pay for this?

      The next dupe will be posted soon, but subscribers can see it early!

      --

      NO CARRIER
  24. Last time with ISO protocols. by dfries · · Score: 5, Interesting
    In 1998 the National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST) mandated that equipment must support the ISO protocols (rather than TCP/IP) or demonstrate how their systems could support them. It was expected the commercial sector would adopt the ISO standards. It didn't happen, computers were shipped with ISO-compliant code, but people kept using TCP/IP. The requirement was dropped in 1994.

    It is definitely a good thing, but the US isn't going to shift to IPv6 just because one government department has decided to use it. It will happen by people getting involved with IPv6. Jump on the 6-bone today.

    www.freenet6.net, it's free.

  25. Re:Oh wait, here's one by zoloto · · Score: 2, Interesting

    because much like a greater part of history, time and period of days etc have religious backgrounds/history to them. 7 is the number of God , 12 and 24 represent a priesthood if I'm not mistaken. The methods we use for time were developed long before the metric system was a twinkel in it's daddy's eye.

    just me 0.02c

  26. For anyone still in the dark... by H0NGK0NGPH00EY · · Score: 2, Informative
    --
    Do not read this sig.
  27. How to defeat NAT with IPv6 by sbwoodside · · Score: 2, Insightful

    [note, it really should be NAPT (network address and port translation), NAT alone is pretty harmless]

    Let's say I'm the author of a voice over IP application on a platform that supports IPv6, like, say, Mac OS X. I get myself a NAPT-replacement box that I stick on the edge of my home network. It assigns an IPv6 address to each of the inner systems using 6to4. Then, when my caller wants to try to phone me, I give her my IPv6 address. She connects to that address and her magic box sets up an IPv6 tunnel to my magic box automatically. Then my magic box forwards the packets to the right machine in my network.

    Add a firewall to that, and you've got something that replaces NAPT.

    You could keep IPv4 NAPT as a legacy feature for inside hosts and applications that don't support IPv6 yet. But apps that do support IPv6, would not have to do any work to traverse the NAPT.

    simon

  28. Re:Big numbers... by caluml · · Score: 4, Informative

    It's hierarchical. Someone owns "all" the IP addresses. Big ISP 1 asks for a chunk of space, and gets, oh, I don't know, a /30. ISP 2 gets a /36. Company 3 (me :O) ) gets a /48, which is 65536 subnets, each of 2^64 addresses, which is more than enough for me.
    Hierarchical is good, as it means that the world doesn't need to know about routes for each company. It just says: Oh, that address is in the range belonging to Big ISP 1, so I'll pass it on. Big ISP 1 knows that it belongs to ISP 2, and ISP 2 passes it on to Company 3.

  29. Coming faster and faster by anticypher · · Score: 4, Interesting

    IPv6 is picking up steam, another push like this is going to make it appear in all new computers a little bit sooner.

    In every installation I've rolled out in the last few years, I've specced IPv6 support. Every network, router, interconnect, carrier and transit has had IPv6 working. Not always working very well, but enough that people didn't notice whether their traffic went over IPv6 or v4.

    Solaris has had IPv6 for several years, and the current release its on by default, plug it into a network with an IPv6 router and it works. M$ is playing catch up by including it natively in XP, but it still takes some tweaking. The linux distros will have to start making it enabled by default (no more kernel recompiles), but that may be happening as I type this. More and more applications are being written as fully IPv6 aware, and most of the traditional apps like ping, FTP, traceroute and SSH are now re-written to use IPv6 when a AAAA record is returned from a DNS lookup. There still is a lot of work to be done, like fully working dynamic DNS updates, and DHCPng, route servers, and a free (as in everything) certificate system for IPSec. Every new release of every browser should check for IPv6 and use it whenever possible, M$ claims that will happen starting with their next desktop releases.

    Where I've seen the most far-sighted development is in the newest generation of GSM mobile phones. All the big players are including IPv6 in their current handset designs, and the carriers are now developing value added services to sell. So its not just each phone is individually addressable, but can roam onto competing carriers networks and still have a globally accessible address. Internally, every carrier in Europe with 2.5G/3G services is running IPv6 for everything (except for a few dinosaurs about to be extinct). The other big area is giving each credit card with a smart chip (anti-fraud and verification chip) a range of IPv6 addresses. When the card is put into a reader or used for an online purchase, the chip will actively participate in the verification step by being uniquely addressable and requesting end-to-end encryption. There were several card manufacturers showing off their tiny IPv6 stacks at a recent smartcard trade show.

    As I've pointed out in a post months ago, many ISPs here in Europe are making IPv6 available for early adopters, in the hopes of riding the next wave to some higher margins. I've had clients ask me for advice on getting onto the "new internet", because they didn't want to get left behind on the "old and obsolete internet". Then I point out how they are already on it, and my installations use the "new internet" whenever possible.

    IPv6 is here, it works, and soon consumers will make it a "must-have" item when buying a new computer. When that starts happening, then techies with a few years of solid IPv6 experience will be sought after for their skills.

    the AC
    working with IPng/IPv6 since 1994

    --
    Hemos is like...sci-fi fans;he thinks technology is cool, but he hasn't bothered to understand the science it's based on
    1. Re:Coming faster and faster by Cato · · Score: 2, Interesting

      "Internally, every carrier in Europe with 2.5G/3G services is running IPv6 for everything (except for a few dinosaurs about to be extinct)"

      This might be true for a few carriers you know, but it is absolutely not true for the wireless networks I've been working with (and they aren't dinosaurs, they include the market leaders) - they are all IPv4 and are running routers with IOS/JUNOS versions that don't even support IPv6. Since Cisco IOS 12.3 is the first non-T train IOS to support IPv6 and it came out in May 2003, this is not that surprising.

      The new GSM smartphones (e.g. SonyEricsson P800) do have built-in IPv6, and GPRS/UMTS support IPv6, but this is something that will be turned on in the next few years. UMTS (3G) Release 3 is the version that most operators are deploying, and not until UMTS R5's IP Multimedia Subsystem is IPv6 mandated, so this isn't too surprising.

  30. Re:Oh wait, here's one by ZeroZen · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Oh wait. This essay about how metric sucks is really about how metric lacks names for things in convenient sizes. In the rulebooks.

    But language allows us to use the old imperial names for our old convenient sizes. I know running around school buming change for a "pint" is much more convenient than saying "5683 milliliters".

    Try doing anything complicated with the old measurements. You need to remember fairly complicated names and values for each measurement to do math with them.

    Take a look at the tables on http://convert.french-property.co.uk/ who knew a cubic foot of water was 1728in3, which would weigh..... um. you get the picture.

    1 milliliter of water weighs 1 gram. a liter weighs a kilogram. a cubic meter weighs a tonne. or 1000 kilograms. or 1,000,000 grams. easy.

    We can go and buy pints at the store, and they sell bottles of 0.57l bottles. We call them pints, and that's just fine.

  31. Re:Recap by geekoid · · Score: 3, Interesting

    "It is simply not feasible that we will ever need anything more than IPv6."

    baring an artificial scarcity. Like somebody buys 300 trillion trillion of them. You think thats unlikly, but if some company offered everybody on te board of "whoever will hand these out" 10 million dollars, do you honestly think they would run into a problem getting them?
    Hell, if I had the money to do so, I would the resale on these would be huge.

    --
    The Kruger Dunning explains most post on /. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect
  32. I can't wait by theCat · · Score: 4, Insightful

    OK, this is very funny. IP addys for every bullet. But listen gang, the ISPs have been tight fisted with IP addresses for so long that most of you young-uns don't even remember the day when anyone with a router could count on a Class-C or even B to themselves. Those days are LONG gone; now you get DSL and you pay for ONE frigging static IP address, and if you want anything like a big chunk of a Class-C you have to pay serious cash. Monthly. And upgrade? You want more? Well all the IPs on either side of your teeny tiny block were sold to other shmoes already, so if you want more you get a whole new block. So you better get more than you think you will need...ever...or else everytime you run over your public IP space you will need to reconfig your entire public facing Internet presence to a new block.

    But you know what, that's not really a technology limit, that's a BUSINESS MODEL.

    Watch this. When they finally go over to IPv6 and later install your new DSL, know what the knee-biting bastards will do? First, they will charge you MORE for a basic DSL with dynamic IP because now it is the new-fangled IPv6 (new=$$$). Then they will assign you a SINGLE IP addy from their store of 128 trillion. And they will assign IP addresses this way in SEQUENCE to all subscribers so that as soon as you get yours you are boxed in by other subscribers just getting theirs. You know they will, it will be a strategic decision to completely undermine the freedom you SHOULD have when there are about 1 billion IP addresses for every human alive on earth.

    The only way around this would be to issue IP blocks to physical locations on the earth, so no matter where you are you have all the IP addresses reservered for that square meter of dirt, and if you have a large home/office/company then you have a big block indeed. ISPs would be forced to backbone their entire geographic area, including the whole planet if they are big enough.

    As a business model it sucks big wind. But I like it as an end user.

    Wire the planet. Freedom to connect! No more IP address space tyranny!!

    --
    =^..^= all your rodent are belong to us
    1. Re:I can't wait by El · · Score: 3, Funny
      The only way around this would be to issue IP blocks to physical locations on the earth, so no matter where you are you have all the IP addresses reservered for that square meter of dirt...

      Well, wouldn't that make mobile computing a pain... "uh oh, by car has moved twenty feet, better change my IP address!" as you're going down the freeway.

      --

      "Freedom means freedom for everybody" -- Dick Cheney

  33. Advantages of IPV6 by 42forty-two42 · · Score: 3, Informative

    For those not in the know, here is a brief article Explaining the benefits of IPV6.

  34. IPv6 more likely to succeed than GOSIP OSI by billstewart · · Score: 2, Informative
    (1998? I assume you mean 1988?) I remember those days, having to deal with conflicting requirements that computers for NASA and DoD had to be Certified C2-secure, POSIX-compliant, use the GOSIP Government OSI Protocol stack, run Ada, and often comply with POSIX standards that weren't finalized yet, like Posix 2.x Real-Time, and still be Commercial-Off-The-Shelf.

    One of the big differences between the GOSIP OSI stack (which failed in the market) and IPv6 (which might succeed) was that GOSIP was big, clumsy, generally didn't work, and didn't have lots of applications, while TCP/IP was much lighter weight and had lots of commercial support by vendors and lots of people really developing useful applications (like FTP and SMTP as opposed to X.400.) It's possible that the same thing will happen to IPv6, but if Microsoft and Cisco support it and the DoD's DNS servers support it, it's got a chance of working.

    --

    Bill Stewart
    New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
  35. Re:Big numbers... by billstewart · · Score: 2, Interesting
    (I'll flip the coin and decide you're not trolling, because there _is_ something generally useful to say here...)

    It isn't actually that every computer has one IP address - it's really that every _network_interface_ has one IP address, but if you've only got one network card that's close enough to the same thing. The IP address has two parts, a network part for the network you're connected to and a host part for your machine itself. On the current IPv4 the address is 32 bits, which was plenty back in 1980 but is looking a bit tight now, while the newer IPv6 stuff that almost nobody uses yet has 128 bits, which really _is_ enough for everybody. The actual storage it takes up isn't very big - the 8 bytes of IP address is a lot smaller than the 4KB of email message you were sending or the 64KB JPG or 4MB MP3 you're downloading.

    So your computer knows its IP address, and the space of IP addresses for the local network it's on, and usually the IP address of a router or other host that's smart enough to figure out how to route packets to the rest of the world. There's a protocol called DHCP (Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol) that lets machines that don't know their IP addresses broadcast a request for somebody to tell them who and where they are. There are simple routing protocols like ARP for finding the ethernet addresses of other machines on your LAN, so your machine can talk to the local machines, and a wide range of routing protocols for finding how to get packets to the rest of the world and how to tell the rest of the world that you're there. Usually, though certainly not always, an end-user computer or a server machine isn't running the routing protocols itself - it usually has the address of a router, and sends any traffic that's not for local machines out over to the router to take care of.

    A router might or might not have to run routing protocols. In a typical home or small business, there's just one LAN connection and one WAN connection, and any traffic that's not local gets sent out the WAN connection to the ISP. But if you've got more than one connection (e.g. if you're an ISP), then you need to know about the topology of the outside world. Usually this is done with BGP, and what really matters isn't so much how big the addresses are that a router keeping track of, but how many ranges of addresses it's keeping track of, e.g. how many ISPs or big businesses it knows how to get to, and how many outgoing connections it has to get there on.

    IPv6 was supposed to do lots more than give us bigger addresses and make IPSEC-like security standard. One of the things it was supposed to do was provide better ways to aggregate information about networks and connectivity to make routing protocols easier to use. I'm not convinced that it really succeeded.

    --

    Bill Stewart
    New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
  36. Just shy of two weeks ago we saw: by mrBoB · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Maybe you read it the first time when it was called Pentagon Wants IPv6 by 2008. I know that Yahoo! isn't exactly known for their great reporting skills but come on folks... sheesh. And its dupes like this that keep my crummy news suggestions from getting accepted.

  37. One good rant deserves another by p3d0 · · Score: 5, Interesting
    First of all, when you say "everything we know about number theory", I presume that's the theory that lots of things divide 12 and 60 evenly. Well so what? That's only one small advantage to an otherwise baroque, arcane system.

    Second, that essay sucks. For instance, a pint is not 250ml, but 568ml. The reason people order pints of beer instead of 568ml (or even a half-litre) is mostly historical, but it's also because it's handy to have a nice short name for a measure you use often. If they had used metric for beer all along, then people would have needed a short nickname for a half-litre, and perhaps they would have called it a pint. It's the same way we call kilometres "clicks", and it has nothing to do with base 10, or fractions, or "number theory" as you say.

    This guy goes on to say:

    We change everything into metric, then people find it more useful to use fractions, and then they give names to these fractions, and before you know it, we're back where we started from!

    No, we are most certainly not back where we started from. If you like to give a name to 3/7 of a metre, that's your business, but I like the fact that I can do mental math in metric, and convert units just by sliding the decimal point.

    For example, if I'm travelling at 31km/h, what is that in metres per second? It turns out the hardest part of that calculation is converting hours into seconds, which involves dividing by 3.6. As far as mental arithmetic goes, it doesn't get much harder than that. There's your precious number threory for you. And it only gets worse if you try to turn 31mph into feet per second.

    In contrast, if my car uses 7.3 litres of fuel per 100km, what is that in millilitres per km? It's 73. It's so simple you can do it in your head, and get your answer with as much precision as you want, so long as you are capable of sliding the decimal point properly for each unit conversion.

    Later, we find this demented little nugget:

    So then I go to my mother-in-law-to-be, and I say, "Hey, these recipes call for cup of something, how much is that exactly?" And she pulls out her cup that she drinks coffee from to show me, and I say,"Yeah, but aren't different cups sometimes different sizes?"

    And then she said, "Ja zeker!" And she took me to her china cabinet and showed me all the different cups she has and all the different sizes there are. And then I said, "Yeah but Francine, doesn't this like, ever become a problem in knowing exactly how much to use?" and she shrugged her shoulders and nodded!

    So that means the European kitchens are less precise than American and English. They just take any old cup, any old spoon! So where is the advantage of being metric?

    The problem here, if you'll take a moment to think about it, is that the authors of these cookbooks are not using the metric system. If they were, the problem would disappear. (In fact, if they would use any consistent system, the problem would disappear.)

    How the author manages to blame this on the metric system is beyond my comprehension.

    The best part comes next. I think my whole attitude on this "essay" can be focused on this one small quote:

    So we have this friend who is a carpenter, and I see him, and I say, "Hey, Freddie, when you have a board a meter long, how do you divide it into 3?" And he sortof gives me a funny look, and says why would he want to do that. And I say, well, How does that work? Because in the metric system, a third of a meter isn't marked on your ruler so what do you do? don't you ever have a board of one meter that you have to divide by three? And he says No.

    You don't need to read anything else in this essay---even the rest of this paragraph, where he goes on to say that people buy wood in 120cm lengths---because it's all here. Nobody cares if you can't divide a metre into 3, just like nobody cares if you can'

    --
    Patrick Doyle
    I mod down every jackass who puts his moderation policy in his sig. Oh, wait a sec....
  38. Small/independant ISPs? by qtp · · Score: 3, Insightful

    What is to prevent the independant ISPs from switching thier systems over?

    I believe that cisco already supports IPv6 on most (all?) of thier equipment. There are IPv6 packages for most OS, and you can support IPv6 and IPv4 simultaneously if neccessary.

    Is it neccessary for the smaller guys to wait?

    If .mil is going IPv6 in 2008, does that mean the rest of the net waits until then?

    That seems a little ass backwards to me.

    --
    Read, L
  39. This may be the only un-funny comment here, but... by ToadMan8 · · Score: 2

    I was wondering if anybody had a good link to a plain understandable real world little theory as necessary document on IPv6. I found a tunnel broker, don't know how to use it, can't find reasonable documentation, (no, the IPv6 howto doesn't tell me what I'm looking for). I just want to assign my currently external IPv4 gentoo server at work a IPv6 addy. How do I do that, and, perhaps moreover, why would I want to (besides, heh, cool, I can ping this big blob of stuff I can't remember). And how will it eventually be implemented. Who will hand out IPv6 blocks? Like with IPv4 now?

    --
    I haven't posted in so long, my sig is out of date.
  40. An IBM Rep. at some conference once.. by Radix42 · · Score: 4, Funny

    ...was telling the audience (mostly non-technical) about IPv6.

    He mentioned how many addresses, and then asked if anyone knew what that meant.

    He said that it would mean there would be enough for every frickin appliance, and it could run Java on it, and did anyone know what THAT meant?

    Of course no one was supposed to have any answers, it was almost all PHBs there (I got dragged along to man a cursed booth).

    So I raised my hand and said "So you can get up in the morning and reboot your toaster?"

    EVERYONE burst out laughing!