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US Shrugs Off World's IP Address Shortage
Clifton Griffin writes "C|Net has an article stating that the U.S. isn't making the push for IPv6 like others are even though the networking appliances and operating systems are ready for it. It goes on to explain that North America has 70% of the Internet address space and that there is a total of 1 billion IPs left, which may sound like a lot but considering we now have Internet-enabled cellphones and VoIP, it really isn't."
As 70% of the allocated space is in that specific region, as you can guess, it will cost 70% more (considering time spent on infrastructure such as router, switches etc upgrades).
;)
Of course, beeing a very technically forward place this should not be a problem, but some kind of a push is really needed. Especially for low-budget companies, instutions etc that make out a big part of the IP customers - they simply don't always have the "cash" for the migration. And "why migrate when this works fine for us" is another big catch.
Make the consumers start migrating and the rest will follow more quickly, the business will go where the consumers are... Now just how do we get the consumers to where there is no business?
(Please consider that this is from a very narrow point of view on the whole thing, it's just to put things in one perspective of many)
I think this is a good thing. Hopefully the use of DNS and Reverse-DNS will become much more prevalent, and we can forget all about using IP's.
Btw, you can get on the IPv6 network now. Join the 6bone. You don't even need a native IPv6 provider, you can use 6over4 to connect to the network over an IPv4 only network.
They only need dedicated static IP addresses if they are going to accept incoming IP connections from other networks without some kind of port forwarding. I do kind of like accepting incoming calls on my cell phone and I would kind of like the Internet protocols to be at least as flexible as the phone network. We should not rely on the wirleless telcoms to say who we can connect to and for what services. They will find ways to make it expensive. It is better that they provide the pipes and get the hell out of the way.
I work for an ISP. One of my responsibilites is to manage our IP space (~/16). I am tired of dealing with IP justification, ARIN and customers who want to have public IPs on their office printer farm. Double and yes, sometimes triple NAT in order to get customer networks to talk to monitoring infrastructure. The sooner IP6 gets here the better.
IP4 done that way would require routing files of several billion lines.
IP4 done the way that it is done requires routing files of several thousand lines, but you don't get 4billion available addresses. You get several hunded million (MIT get a few dozen million IP's all to itself).
Ergo, you're wrong.
Ta.
IPv6 isn't all about greater address space. It also brings improvements on routing and network autoconfiguration. The packets can also be classified into different categories, etc.
Enable your box with IPv6 today, Freenet6 provides free IPv6 connectivity over IPv4. Get some IPv6-enabled apps and use some IPv6-enabled servers/services, FTP and IRC being among the available ones.
Because the way IPs where shared out earlier (class-based, remember good 'ole a/b/c) alot of people got 16,000 IPs just becase they need 257 IPs...
The planning didn't really hold water when TCP/IP became mainstream...
Look at the low-end of the IP-range (where most of the big assignements are), IBM are assigned 9.0.0.0/8, leaving them with 255^3 (- unusuables) 16 million addresses. That's enough for a small country. Ironically they don't even use them for their own website which is hosted on 129.42.0.0/16 which is a different subnet also owned by IBM so add another 16,000 addresses to those 16 million and probably countless other subnets held by IBM or IBM subsiduaries in different parts of the world...
Get the picture now?
Having a static public IP can be extremely handy though. Whenever I have a cool graphic or whatnot I want my friends to see, I just stick it up on the webserver and send the email in a link.
Funny, I have this with a dynamic IP right now.. in fact they can change my IP address every hour and it will still work...
www.dyndns.org is your friend.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
I'll comment on gaming and direct P2P. I'm behind a NAT box currently and it turns gaming into something of a mild disaster. It would be nice to host on one box and play on another, but with a NAT router, if the other computers aren't on your network, it can be an extreme hassle, especially if you're introducing third-party servers for the connection.
Yes, direct P2P is a hassle as well. I have trouble getting and sending AIM file transfers, which is the source of infinite consternation on the behalf of people who like to send and get things from me. Also, Direct Connect and a few other such programs are severely hampered by being behind a NAT firewall, cutting the amount of files accessible by half or more.
IPv6 would increase the feasibility of individual, permenant IP's by several orders of magnitude, and I eagerly await it's adoption. The possibilities so wide, it really could change the paradigm of networking (which, after all, is the point). It's going to be interesting to see what it takes to thrust it into the mainstream.
Most routers and computers have built in support for IPv6, but its seems that nobody is willing to ditch the old numbers and just use their IPv6 equivalents.
Actually no. A lot of users out there are still running Windows 98/ME or 2000. The only releases from Microsoft so far that offer built in IPv6 support are XP and Win2003. There is software from Microsoft Research that will let you run it on earlier versions of Windows but it is not officially supported by MS.
Another problem is the lack of application support. There are a lot of applications out there that still need to be rewritten to support IPv6. Not all routers are able to handle native IPv6 packets either. Most of the consumer and low-end gateway routers from Cisco and Linksys do not support IPv6 yet. Version 12.1+ of IOS from Cisco supports it, but not all service providers have it running on their core routers.
The last problem is the DNS system still needs to be upgraded. It is true that most DNS servers can return AAAA records (ipv6 addresses), but not many of the registrars allow you to register glue records of authorative DNS servers with IPv6 addresses.
I thought the "new standards" were resolved and it is called IPv6.
Why force companies to spend money implementing "more complex" solutions that would amount to nothing more than a stop gap.
The big problem is IP address space is a finite resource, and with all finite resources companies will continue to use the resource until it is gone before seriously looking for a replacement.
Even after they run out, companies will not simply throw away their IPv4 assignments to convert to IPv6 because after the pool is empty, the address the company holds will be worth a lot more. IPv6 can connect to an IPv4 network so they will still receive users who have IPv6.
it is only after a long journey that you know the strength of the horse.
Class-A 10.0.0.0/8
Class-B 172.16.0.0/12
Class-C 192.168.0.0/16
Other blocks of interest:
Multicast 224.0.0.0/4
IPV4<->IPV6 Anycast 192.88.0.0/15
Loopback 127.0.0.1/8
"This Net" 0.0.0.0/8
It's RFC 2373
All I want is a secure system where it's easy to do anything I want. Is that too much to ask ~~ Randall Munroe
In typical Slashdot style, replying to a joke with a technical correction:
/8, or Class A as it used to be known as.) I think it's VERY rare for people to find reason to give more that 255 'localhost' IPs to their box, but if you don't believe me... ping 127.2.3.4 (using whatever values for 2, 3, and 4).
It's 127/8. (It's a
Now 127.0.0.1/24 SHOULD be the way it's done, IMHO. I can't even come up with any oddball reasons for having more than 255 localhost IPs.
________________________________________________
suwain_2
You are still tying up a public IP for your web/ftp/mail server. It just happens to be assigned to your cable router/fw box instead of the server. Your NAT configuration is just forwarding traffic to for IP to your internal web server. That doesn't free up any IPv4 addresses.
If your ISP used NAT, they could potentially serve a few thousand customers with a single public IP. But, if that were to happen, you would NOT be able to run your own web, FTP or mail server.
You can only forward a one port to one IP address, so don't count on an ISP setting up forwarding for web or FTP to your server and not any other user. (Not to mention the management issues.)
The funny thing is that most ISPs have a user agreement that specifically says you can't run a server anyhow. If they used correctly configured NAT, there are very few things that typical web users couldn't do. I'm not advocating this for ISPs... I would never use an ISP that gave me a non-public address, however, I'm probably not a typical web user.
I think that NAT is a good thing. I also think it's a good and responsible practice for companies or individuals to use NAT when appropriate instead of getting additional IP addys. It's just not a cure-all and probably not a good long-term fix for IPv4 address shortage as more and more individuals go online.
PS.. for all of those posting who think that NAT = Firewall... BZZZ, wrong! While it is common for firewalling and NAT to be done by the same box/software, they are two seperate things. One does not require the other.
Sorry, just have to say that the iMac remark is incorrect... MacOS X supports IPV6 :).
I know, I'm a pedantic loser. It's been a bad day in user support land and I have to take it out somewhere!
-- "...I'm a bad guy because I, well, I sing some rock-and-roll songs." M. Manson
His question was somewhat off. The loss of addresses is not due to NAT not working, its due to dynamic IP addresses causing difficulties for *everything* you cited.
When your IP changes, your server (whatever the type) is disconnected. You need to use a service like dynDNS or some such, which works but is a hack.
Also, try having 2-3 people behind a NAT and playing those same games online, possible but not as easy.
I still dont think the IP addy space is running out. Seems like another Y2K scam if you ask me. Maybe I should buy stock in cisco...
Yes, I do all of the above minus VOIP behind NAT.
/. readers employed.
Klite/Kazaa and my VPN works fine, as does serving a battlefield, counter-strike, web and ftp server. The only things I can't seem to run are Microsoft's video conference software and old MSN gaming zone games.
NAT is a hack itself. IIRC, the fellow who came up with the concept called it a waste of time for anyone who wasn't totally hard up for IP space.
A billion IPs are available. None of your appliances are going to connect via a 'real' IP address, either. I don't know why this gets brought up in the topic of every article associated with NAT and a lack of public IPs. The future of home networking will likely remain on a single IP driven by a soho router device that provides service to appliances and devices in your home via NAT for at least several years to come.
Cell phones and other handheld devices are not directly connected to the Internet. They are typically on private IP space behind a proxy as they aren't designed for general web traffic, just very specific protocols w/ low traffic.
NAT is 'just fine' if you are a consumer who would like to keep their Internet bills under $50/mo during the sunset of the IPV4 years.
The argument that NAT doesn't work 'if you don't do much with your computer' doesn't fly with me. I have supported a 3,000+ user network's firewalls where 99% of the traffic was processed by NAT or by proxy (I'm just making up that 1% was workstation to workstation traffic!). All these things 'you can't do' can be encapsulated and shipped from one office to another via a VPN, meanwhile your public facing servers can have individual IPs or be under NAT as well with some fickle fwd rules on the firewall. Don't bring up security here, you just because you NAT doesn't mean one interface and no subnets.
My point is, you can do a lot more with NAT than people would have you think. Just because they couldn't get their Windows box to do some silly feat from behind NAT doesn't mean it's impossible. Regardless, making this stuff work is what keeps many
I'm not defending NAT, I've just had no problems with it in a demanding corporate enviroment. It seems like a viable alternative for a few more years to come.
Someone who works for IBM told me that their internal network is called the '9.' network.
So called because all the dotted ip addresses beginng with 9, (i.e.
9.0.0.1 through 9.255.255.254 belong to them).
Thats 0.4% of the ENTIRE IPV4 address space, assigned to one company. IRC, MIT has a similar allocation...
It's been in there since 1999.
Gregory Casamento
## Chief Maintainer for GNUstep