Interop Returns 16 Million IPv4 Addresses

klapaucjusz writes "Every discussion about IPv4 address exhaustion prompts comments about whether Apple (or MIT, or UCB, or whoever) needs all of those addresses. Interop has set the example by returning 16 million IPv4 addresses to the ARIN pool, extending the IPv4 address exhaustion deadline by a whole month."

Comments

Re:Probably awhile

[GIL_Dude]

On the smaller scale (home) end of that router thing - even my recently purchased Linksys wireless access point / router doesn't do IPv6. I needed (wanted) a dual radio model so I could segregate my 802.11n devices onto 5 GHz from the 802.11g only devices (which I left on 2.4 GHz). Doing so gets better throughput for the n devices. But I was unable to find an affordable model which both had two radios AND supported IPv6. I imagine I'll have to be upgrading this device way before it is well used just to get the IPv6 support. You'd think devices you buy now would all support IPv6 out of the box - but you do still have to be careful and check into it first.

Re:Not necessiarly

[Drew M.]

Why aren't the leases on internet addresses high enough to convince people to give them back? Price them at a buck a month, and if someone truly can afford to spend $16m a month on a class A, let them. Otherwise they will give them back really fast. What's wrong with a little capitalism?

We need a hybrid system maybe ipv6 outside ipv4 in

[Joe The Dragon]

We need a hybrid system maybe ipv6 outside ipv4 inside to make it easier to move over and less the cost of having to buy new printers, wifi AP's, home media stuff , and more.

Do you real want a printer to have a global IP? do you want buy a newer printer / copiers just for IPv6? the high end ones cost alot.

Back in April I did the same thing ...

[hedronist]

Admittedly it was only a /24 (called a C-net by us geezers), but I had had it since about 1992. That was back in the days you could get a C-net for the asking, and a B-net (a /16 to you youngsters) could be had without too much whining.

I got a nice note back from ARIN saying:

As the popular quote says, a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. 199.201.131.0/24 has been returned to the pool of available addresses - thanks!

Wasteful allocation is nearly as bad.

[ZorinLynx]

I have ONE static IP from Comcast Business. This is great; I don't really need more than one, right? Well the problem is they've given me a routed subnet. So for me to get my one IP, they also have to waste these additional IPs:

1. The IP on the WAN side of the router, provided to it by DHCP.
2. Internal network subnet address.
3. The router's internal network address.
4. Internal network broadcast address.

Yes, that means for my ONE static IP, Comcast is wasting four more. I can't help wondering why they built their network this way, rather than simply assigning me the WAN side IP and making sure it doesn't change. But hey, that's Comcast for you.

Who knows how many millions of IPs are wasted through inefficient allocation this way. If I have a block of six IPs it would make administrative sense to do it this way but for one? Come on. :)

Re:Wasteful allocation is nearly as bad.

[Agent Green]

There are actually reasons behind this. I've got a /29 from Charter Business myself, but this is why it is the way it is, based on my experience as a former Charter engineer.

In the days of old, customers were assigned their statics in WAN-side way as you describe. My parents used to have a static assigned to them from a WAN block on their CMTS. This was great because whatever allocation assigned was very efficiently used. Granted, this was back when nodes were combined 4:1 or greater on the small CMTS that was being used. A uBR7246 with 1x6 cards in the day could easily route traffic for over 48 cable nodes, at 2:1 combining on the upstreams, and 12:1 on the downstreams. (A whopping 150mbps for 48 nodes ... laugable today).

It wasn't all that long ago I remember some towns sharing a single downstream port. Now, enter node splits, and combining gets down to 1:1 in many cases. Even with a much larger CMTS (uBR10012 vs. uBR7246), it can't handle the same number of nodes. With redundancy failover switchboxes, there are only 35 downstreams per box (assuming 5x20 cards).

Now a problem exists as soon as the box's capacity is reached. If I need to split your node and move it to another CMTS to increase your available bandwidth, I need to coordinate with everyone who is moving who has a WAN side IP and tell them that their IP address is going to change on whatever date. This turns into an incredible shitstorm when one person stammers their feet and cries up the escalation chain and then delays necessary work because they bitch. Then capacity continues to be in hell until the move is finally approved. Then, there are the customers who ignore your voicemail and phone calls and then cry for a credit because they didn't pay attention until the move date.

So now what everyone is doing in order to make this easier is to assign you a /30 or /29 or whatever which you get from your modem. The modem sends that assignemnt up via RIP and it gets redistributed into the network. Now, it doesn't matter what town you're in or what CMTS you're on. Note splits and changes can essentially happen without you ever having to renumber your side. With the growing demands on bandwidth, it's not unheard of that you could move a couple of times per year, depending on the scope of the engineering changes.

Seems wasteful, but that's the sense behind it.

Re:We need a hybrid system maybe ipv6 outside ipv4

[Sycraft-fu]

There is some stuff like that. That is the basic idea of 6to4. Allows IPv6 to be routed over IPv4.

In the case of printers what you might do is use print servers. If you have new desktops that are IPv6 only, due to lack of IPv4 addresses, you have your servers run IPv6 and IPv4 and your old printers run IPv4 only. Desktops communicate to the server, server to the printers, nobody ever notices a difference.

I suspect IPv4 will be around for a very long time, even after most things are IPv6.

There are more organizations that should

[Technomancer]

return their 16M IPv4 addresses, just look at the map
http://xkcd.com/195/
HP, DEC, Ford, Xerox, Bell Labs, Apple, MIT, USPS, DuPont, IBM, General Electric, Boeing, Prudential, Eli Lily, Halliburton.
Why does plane, car, drug or chemical manufacturer or an insurance company need 16M publicly routable IP addresses?
I guess HP has now all the DEC IPs, so they have 32M, WTF!

Re:There are more organizations that should

[Nelson]

So if you're a large business, what's the best way to make sure any two devices on your network can easily talk to each other if they need to? Keep in mind that companies like HP and IBM buy other companies on a very regular basis and there are constant collisions with private space when that happens. What's the solution?

The very best solution is to give all the machines unique public IPs that are routable and do your own routing inside your network. A lot more companies than those use that practice.

I plan to skip IPV6

[snsh]

IPV6 never caught on, like Windows Vista caught on. Better to wait for IPV7.