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The Internet News Slashdot.org

Slashdot over IPv6 248

Posted by chrisd from the links-you-can't-follow dept.
fuzzel writes "Even though Slashdot has run a number of articles about IPv6 (1|2|3) it apparently isn't reachable over IPv6 directly. But for the people that do already have IPv6 they can use http://slashdot.org.sixxs.org and they will be automaticaly gatewayed. This trick works for most sites by simply appending .sixxs.org to the domain part of a url, eg http://www.google.com.sixxs.org, the gateway will the rewrite url's to have it appended automatically so that everything goes over IPv6. Full information is available on http://ipv6gate.sixxs.net. Oh and yes if you don't have IPv6, those domains under sixxs.org won't work :)"
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Slashdot over IPv6 More

Slashdot over IPv6

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  • I have IPv6 (I know this because I'm chatting on an IPv6 IRC server), but the link doesn't work..
    • We call the Slashdot Effect [techtarget.com].

      You learn something new every day.
    • This happens occaisnaly. U see IpV6 has A.I. Embedded Logic cone addressing data pump. Today its not in a good mood dues to slashdotting.

      Question: But are their enough /. users on Ipv6 to /. the network.
      Answer: Dosentmatter buddy, even though I dont have v6, I tried clicking on it twice just to see what happens.

      Tomorow is a weekend. So the network will be in a good mood.

      • Question: But are their enough /. users on Ipv6 to /. the network.
        Answer: Dosentmatter buddy, even though I dont have v6, I tried clicking on it twice just to see what happens.

        Dont underestimate the power of a stubborn slashdotter, if i have learned anything from time here, it's that you must click every link several times to try and sneak a lucky page load in.

        I probably clicked the slashdot and google V6 links 3 or 4 times a piece thinking there was no possible way slashdot or google had been /.'d ;)
        • I probably clicked the slashdot and google V6 links 3 or 4 times a piece thinking there was no possible way slashdot or google had been /.'d ;)

          Even so, it's not Google or Slashdot being Slashdotted, it's the sixxs.org gateway that has to facilitate the transfer. As of right now, they probably didn't foresee or get ready to handle a good Slashdotting, as the intersection of people using IPv6 and people who know about the sixxs.org rerouting would be a lot slimmer, at least for the moment.

  • either I don't have IPv6, or.. (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    uh.. or it could just be slashdotted :P uhm, wait..
    I don't know.

  • Oh great... (Score:5, Funny)

    by magickalhack ( 648733 ) on Thursday February 13, 2003 @04:20AM (#5293150) Homepage
    "And in other news, Slashdot managed to bring down the entire IPv6 network today..."
  • I'm not entirely clear on why IPv6 such a cool/neccesary thing. As far as I, in my limited knowledge, know, IPv6 will allow for more IP address, but is that it? I'm not questioning its usefullness, but am simply curious if there are any other benefits that come along with IPv6.

    • Re:I'll guess I'll admit it.. (Score:5, Informative)

      by Aussie ( 10167 ) on Thursday February 13, 2003 @04:27AM (#5293172) Journal
      try this link [ipv6forum.com]

    • Re:I'll guess I'll admit it.. (Score:5, Informative)

      by Jugalator ( 259273 ) on Thursday February 13, 2003 @04:49AM (#5293224) Journal
      There are several other benefits to IPv6 IETF [ietf.org] is implementing while they are updating the protocol. They don't wish to do it too often for obvious reasons and will try to get as much useful stuff in the new version while they're at it.

      IPv6...

      - ... will support IPSec intrinsically to provide end-to-end security on protocol level.

      - ... eliminates the need of NAT with special "local" addresses.

      - ... supports QoS features.

      - ... supports multihomed devices and load balancing, since an IPv6 address specifies a network interface, not a computer as in IPv4.

      - ... uses "modularized" headers where only the necessary fields are used. This essentially makes IPv6 more optimized than IPv4. For example, if the payload of a packet is larger than 64KB, IPv6 will attach another field for "jumbo payloads" and set the 16-bit value to 0.

      - ... contains improved multicast support (as an extension header), support for an authentication header (also an optional extension header), and an encryption header (also an optional extension header).

      - ... provides enhancements for DNS.

      - ... provides automatic neighbor discovery which is especially useful for ad hoc networks and wireless devices.

      - ... has a completely rewritten adress autoconfiguration.

      See also:
      IPv6: The Promise, The Problems, The Protocol [extremetech.com]
      RDC 2373 [rfc-editor.org]
      • - ... uses "modularized" headers where only the necessary fields are used. This essentially makes IPv6 more optimized than IPv4. For example, if the payload of a packet is larger than 64KB, IPv6 will attach another field for "jumbo payloads" and set the 16-bit value to 0.

        Now, the first thing I thought of when I read that was: "What happens when someone finds out a that a major vendor can't handle it when the 16-bit length is 0 but there is no "jumbo payload" in the packet?"

        Okay, perhaps not the best example, but are they looking to try to avoid (as much as possible) spots in the protocol that might in the future be exploited? 'Cause I'm sure lots of people here know better than I many ways to abuse IPv4...

      • Re:I'll guess I'll admit it.. (Score:5, Interesting)

        by boaworm ( 180781 ) <boaworm@gmail.com> on Thursday February 13, 2003 @09:17AM (#5293735) Homepage Journal

        - ... eliminates the need of NAT with special "local" addresses.


        Just a question on this one. I do agree that there will be enough IP addresses that there is no need to use special local addresses. Bit i actually find it very useful. It makes it easy to see where I am located, is it behind NAT, behind a firewall or just through a proxy ?. Currenty I can figure some of this out just by looking at my IP address, but without local IP subnets, things will get more confusing.

        And furthermore, i'd say the "end of NAT" is a bit too much. I find it very useful to use a NAT gateway/firewall and put insecure clients behind that. It reduces the need to think secure on the local network. I can for instance export my fileserver data rw onto 192.168 without much consern. Wouldn't wanna do that if they were all "real" IP's.

        IPv6 is great and it will allow those who DONT want to be behind NAT to get a "real" IP address, but its not the end of NAT.

        • But why wouldn't you want each PC on your network to have a "real" IP address. With a firewall in place, you can still block traffic that you don't want in/out. And it'll be much easier if you ever have to open something up, you'll have much less headaches if all the internal machines have "real" IP addresses already.

          If you really want to hide the internal structure of your network, you could still do NAT to translate the internal addresses to one external gateway address. But you don't neccesarily have to use the same local subnet as everyone else.

          IMHO, the benefit of being able to see if you are behind NAT by looking at your IP address is rather small. It's not the only indicator anyway. I've got a "real" IP address here at work. But, for http, anyway, I go through a transparent proxy. So, to the outside world, it looks like I'm visiting from one of several proxy servers.

      • The dark lining (Score:3, Insightful)

        by 0x0d0a ( 568518 )
        - ... supports QoS features.

        So does IPv4 -- it's just that no one actually *uses* them.

        The main thing that I *really* don't like about IPv6 is that, while it isn't a mandated part of the protocol, it seems that the overwhelming direction being pushed is to make the last 48 bits of your address your MAC address. Which *really* has nasty privacy implications -- 'slike a universal cookie, visible to everyone, that anyone can see (not just http servers).
    • IPv6 will allow for more IP address, but is that it? I'm not questioning its usefullness, but am simply curious if there are any other benefits that come along with IPv6.

      For one thing I've understood that IPv6 will make routing possible without keeping track crazy amounts of addresses in huge routing tables. IPv& addresses are hierachical, and in a simplified sense work something like this:

      country.state.city.area.house.etc.etc...

      NOTE: this is not the actual layout... I don't remember the details. But the point is a backbone router only needs to look at the start of the address, and then send the packet "in the right direction" so to speak. The same thing applies longer down the chain.

      Would someone who is more enlightened care to explain this in an official manner? ;)

      • Re:I'll guess I'll admit it.. (Score:5, Informative)

        by Screaming Lunatic ( 526975 ) on Thursday February 13, 2003 @06:26AM (#5293436) Homepage
        country.state.city.area.house.etc.etc... NOTE: this is not the actual layout... I don't remember the details. But the point is a backbone router only needs to look at the start of the address, and then send the packet "in the right direction" so to speak. The same thing applies longer down the chain. Would someone who is more enlightened care to explain this in an official manner? ;)

        Actually, this is done with IPv4 now as well. Originally, IPv4 was split into Class A,B, and C networks. Class A networks were larger blocks of addresses than Class B and C. Class A networks were allocated pretty quickly. So all there are left are Class C network blocks.

        If an organization gets a Class C network block, they have to use stuff like NAT and subnetting to uniquley identify each machine in there network and make routing manageable.

        These Class C network blocks are dished out geographically now. But the Class A network blocks that were dished out earlier are not being utilized well, because organizations don't have enough machines to fill them out.

        That's a pretty shitty explanation. Partly because I forget the number of bits in an IPv4 address that identifies the network and the number that identifies a host. So I can't come up with a good example. But my IPv4 address looks like so: 142.179.xxx.xxx (I'm not gonna give you my exact address)

        And my subnet mask: 255.255.248.0

        So my (Class C) network is (probably) identified by the first 21 bits. (If my conversion is correct).

        • You are right and wrong. There isn't really such a thing as a Class C address these days... nowadays we use CIDR.

          Check out this link:
          http://www.telusplanet.net/public/sparkman/ netcalc .htm

          They have a bunch of network calculators which will make it alot clearer than I can.

        • Stop the madness! (Score:5, Informative)

          by Pii ( 1955 ) <<gro.rebasthgil> <ta> <idej>> on Thursday February 13, 2003 @11:57AM (#5294677) Journal
          You're right about a 21-bits part, but you're butchering the rest of it.

          For starters, classful routing on the Internet has gone the way of the Dinosaurs, and good riddance. CIDR saw to that (Classless Inter-Domain Routing), and when BGPv4 became the standard, all was right in the world (Because it implemented CIDR, by carrying Netmask along with the route entries).

          In casual conversation today, we still use terms like Class B, or Class C address space, but they don't refer to the actual Classful network boundaries of yore. Today, when someone refers to a Class C address space, they simply mean a 24-bit address space. Likewise, a Class B means a 16-bit (/16) address space.

          You say your netmask is 255.255.248.0. This represents a larger address space than a Class C, which has a mask of 255.255.255.0 (or /24).

          Your address space is the aggregate of 8 Class C networks. Your network is configured to utilize the first and second octets, and the first 5 bits of the third octet as the network address, leaving the remaining 3 bits of the third octet, and the entire fourth octet as the host address.

          That represents a network segment consisting of up to 2048 hosts (Ok... 2046 since you toss the first and last as the network address and the broadcast address.).

          In short, your network engineering staff ought to be shot, because damn, that's a really big subnet. There's just no good reason to have that many hosts on a segment.

          It's possible that you guys don't have anywhere near that many hosts, but if you do, without even looking, I can tell you that your network is a bit of a show. I hope you have your highly-loaded servers on their own segment, because the number of broadcasts must be tremendous. Even in a switched environment, those broadcasts must be propegated everywhere, and every machine in the network has to stop briefly to examine each and every one.

          Your organization should look at some Layer-3 segmentation...

    • Re:I'll guess I'll admit it.. (Score:5, Informative)

      by BigJim.fr ( 40893 ) <jim@liotier.org> on Thursday February 13, 2003 @05:16AM (#5293287) Homepage

      The only solution available to provide Internet access to the hosts on the LAN was to use a private non routable subnet and to masquerade it behind the edge router. NAT also allowed some of these hosts to expose services to the outside world. But this solution has a major drawback : it breaks end to end connectivity and thus complicates the offering of many services that the Internet was meant for. Used like that, NAT is an evil kludge.

      IPv6 provides a way out. There certainly are many other advantages in the use of IPv6, but end to end connectivity for the masses is what could have the deepest impact. Think about is : when every single workstation has a routable IPv6 address, everyone will have the potential to serve. This is is what the Internet was meant to be, and actually was in the early days.

      • Yeah, the need to use NAT due to a shrinking IPv4 pool would be eliminated...but what about the people that use NAT for home networks running over a common cable/DSL connection?

        If you wanted to eliminate NAT, the ISP would have to provide an IPv6 address for every network interface in your house, and I'm going to assume they would tack on some sort of surcharge for each additional address. So I doubt NAT would go away, b/c if the majority of the home users can buy a single Internet connection and split it between multiple machines, what would be their incentive to fork out the cash for multiple addresses?

        Also, what about the logicistics of bringing multiple static IPv6 addresses into a house? How would that work...a router in each home? I've never had that one explained to me.

        • If you wanted to eliminate NAT, the ISP would have to provide an IPv6 address for every network interface in your house, and I'm going to assume they would tack on some sort of surcharge for each additional address.

          Why would they have to? They could hand everybody on their network 16 (or 24) bits of subnet and still have untold billions of addresses left over.

          You need to get your head around that with IPv6 there will never again be a shortage of IP addresses (with the assumption that mere stupidity rather than insanity prevails in handing them out). 128 bits is rather a lot :)

  • Slashdotting... (Score:3, Informative)

    by Jugalator ( 259273 ) on Thursday February 13, 2003 @04:22AM (#5293157) Journal
    I think sixxs.org just found out the ultimate solution to prevent a site from becoming slashdotted. :-)

  • IPv6 Slashdotting? (Score:4, Funny)

    by mikeophile ( 647318 ) on Thursday February 13, 2003 @04:23AM (#5293159)
    Are there enough /.'ers using IPv6 to /. sixxs.org?

    If not, then shame on us.

  • the ironies (Score:5, Funny)

    by lingqi ( 577227 ) on Thursday February 13, 2003 @04:37AM (#5293198) Journal
    I get a feeling in my gut that says sixxs.org is not as impervious to slashdotting as slashdot itself,

    so maybe we will finally be able to slashdot slashdot, or at least the IPv6 gateway,

    BUT maybe there are not enough slashdotters using IPv6 to be able to connect to the IPv6 slashdot in order to slashdot slashdot's IPv6 gateway,

    and... [head explodes]

  • the rewrite url's what? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by tamnir ( 230394 ) on Thursday February 13, 2003 @04:39AM (#5293203)
    the gateway will the rewrite url's to have it appended automatically so that everything goes over IPv6.


    I think I get the general idea, but it took me some time. Funny how a couple of spelling mistakes can lead to a quite obfuscated sentence. Anyway, here is what I now think (after checking the site: boggled at that sentence in vain! :) ) that it meant:

    the gateway will then rewrite URLs on the pages sent back to your browser, appending automatically the ".sixxs.org". This way, all the links will still go through the IPv6 gateway, letting you transparently surf the web over IPv6!

    • Dyslexia can help on ./

      I read it right the first time. I couldn't understand your complaint until I read it out loud.

      the gateway will rewrite the url's to have it [.sixxs.org] appended automatically so that everything goes over IPv6.

      No problem. Obviously you don't work with enough Engrish speakers.
  • My OS supports IPv6, but my router doesn't. Doubt that my ISP does either. Apparently this will only be truly possible for people with direct pipes (T1, etc.) Or does anyone know of ways around these problems other than nagging my ISP and router manufacturer?

    • Re:Damn. (Score:5, Informative)

      by fo0bar ( 261207 ) on Thursday February 13, 2003 @05:01AM (#5293249)
      My OS supports IPv6, but my router doesn't. Doubt that my ISP does either. Apparently this will only be truly possible for people with direct pipes (T1, etc.) Or does anyone know of ways around these problems other than nagging my ISP and router manufacturer?

      Use a tunnel broker. It lets you tunnel ipv6 connections over ipv4 to another endpoint. Two of the most popular are Freenet6 [freenet6.net] and Hurricane Electric [he.net]. Hurricane Electric requires a static ipv4 IP, but Freenet6 works with dynamic IPs.

      • Tunnelling doesn't allow us to deploy proper IP multicast however, which I think is one of the biggest advantages.

        Having a proper, working multicast system well supported by the backbone routers would rewrite the rules of the net. Radio stations wouldn't be limited by needing constant donations of bandwidth, large file downloads could be put on a carousel saving more bandwidth, even websites if you were clever enough.

        Using tunnelling doesn't give ISPs any incentive to move to IPv6 natively though, so we don't get the benefits of that.

    • How does your router not support it? all it has to do is pass the protocol 41 which is the IPv6 gif tunnel, and the vast majority of routers do this fine. No ports need forwarding, and infact on my home router and a number of other routers ive set ipv6 up on, needed no configuring at all to get the tunnel working.

      Disclaimer: i help run ipng.org.uk, a UK tunnel broker

    • My ISPs that support IPv6, like mine (Visi [visi.com]) have tunnel endpoints right there. This is a much better solution than using some tunnel broker way off on some far flung corner of the network. It gets your tunnelled IPv4 packets turned back into IPv6 as close to you as possible.

      Tunneling this way essentially works by sending IPv4 packets between tunnel endpoints who's content type field says they contain IPv6 packets.

    • Don't use a tunnel; check out 6to4. A little Googling should turn up instructions for your OS.

  • IPv6 - Chicken and egg ? - no! (Score:3, Insightful)

    by SilverSun ( 114725 ) on Thursday February 13, 2003 @04:49AM (#5293225) Homepage
    This whole discussion and the support of IPv6 is completely pointless. There are 101 ways to bridge your IPv6 to IPv4 and the other way round. There is no chicke and egg problem. The real reason why IPv6 is not widely deployed is that nobody really needs it.

    This is just like HDTV, yes, it's better, cooler, has nifty features, but the old thing does most of the job for much less money/effort.

    With IP this situation 'might' (not necessarily 'will') change with the vanishing IP address space, but I am convinved it's perfectly safe to wait till we get there.

    If any ISP really thinks he needs v6 he will just install it. Why should I (as a user) try to convince any ISP to use v6. It's just nothing that matters to me. (Multicast?? ha!) I can tell you, that I (as an ISP) don't even know why I should convince anybody. This whole discussion is probably sponsored by cisco's PR department.

    Cheers.

    • Re:IPv6 - Chicken and egg ? - no! (Score:5, Informative)

      by TheSunborn ( 68004 ) <mtilstedNO@SPAMgmail.com> on Thursday February 13, 2003 @05:21AM (#5293300)
      This is not true, there are real problems getting ip address from Ripe The result is that where I live we got 500 Computers behind a single nat gateway because we can't get an ip to each use. The result is a lousy network.
      • I can second this. Getting IP adresses from RIPE is a major pain. their current policy forbids (!) to assign unique IP adresses to virtual web-servers, so you have to resort to name-based virtual hosts, which creates a whole lot of problems ... (SSL, etc ..)
      • That doesn't contradict my point.

        I say: If you can live with a lousy network, you don't need v6. (You can live with lousY NTSC, you don't need HDTV).

        If you think, you could be more costeffective with v6, because you can maybe fire sysadmins, because you don't need NAT anymore, why don't you just do it? There are ISPs providing v6, change ISP, what prevents you?

        Cheers.
      • I don't mean this as a slam, really I don't.

        However, if you need to host 500 servers and can't figure out how to set up a NAT gateway to support them, maybe you need to hire some competent help.

        If you can't figure out how to negotiate a contract with your Internet provider to get the bandwidth that you need, maybe you need to hire some competent help.

        If you can't figure out that when you are talking about 500 computers to hide behind a NAT you should be talking to an ISP/bandwidth provider who knows how to sell commercial class services, maybe you need to hire some competent help.

        If you are the help, then God help the organization that you work for. In the meantime, I strongly suggest spending a lot of time polishing your skillset, because your next boss won't be as willing to put up with this kind of mess.

    • Re:IPv6 - Chicken and egg ? - no! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by TheRaven64 ( 641858 ) on Thursday February 13, 2003 @07:04AM (#5293492) Journal
      but I am convinved it's perfectly safe to wait till we get there.
      Good point. Also, I see no reason why we should bother researching renewable forms of energy until we actually run out of oil. After all, the perfect time to solve a problem is when our infrastructure depends on the solution - solving a problem before it's a catastrophe is just wasted effort.
      • I didn't say we should stop researching! Rersearch is necessary. But actively pushing for it is nonsense. An ISP will nerver provide v6 because think it is 'cool' to use v6. He will switch is big corps decide that it is more cost effective to change the ISP from a cheap v4 one to a more expensive one that provides v6. It's as simple as that. This is called 'free market' and it works.

        Now, fossile/renewable energies is a completely different issue. Bringing it up in this context is plainly stupid.

        Cheers
  • hey Taco. dont you have sense. In this oil scarce world you are going on V6s!!. guys dont listen to these nerds, stay on V4 and save the earth.

  • Tunnel Brokers (Score:5, Informative)

    by Richard_at_work ( 517087 ) on Thursday February 13, 2003 @05:01AM (#5293250)
    The best way currently to use IPv6 is via tunnel brokers, who give you a range of ips (/64 or /48, both of which will vastly outnumber any number of electrical components in your house).

    These work by creating a ipv6 GIF tunnel over ipv4, to a server which has either further tunnels to the 6bone or native connectivity. Once you have this setup (and its preety easy to do on Linux, Windows, and very easy to do on the BSDs) then any ipv6 traffic can be routed automatically. This way you dopnt need to use a gateway, and you can use pretty much any app over ipv6, including ftp, ssh, www, email etc.

    Disclaimer: I help run ipng.org.uk, which is a UK tunnel broker, who gives you a /64 (thats 18,446,744,073,709,551,616 distinct ips :) ) and delegates full forward and reverse DNS to you for this range.
    • Want an idea of how big a /64 IP range is? Imagine giving an IP address to every cell in your body, plus 180,000 or so other people.

    • Re: Tunnel Brokers (Score:5, Funny)

      by iangoldby ( 552781 ) on Thursday February 13, 2003 @05:23AM (#5293311) Homepage
      These work by creating a ipv6 GIF tunnel over ipv4...

      That is just so stupid and typical. Why oh why do we have to put up with this recyling of old and broken technologies, and patent issues to boot? You would have thought that if they are making a fresh start with a new so-called modern protocol, they would at least use a new and modern specification such as, let's say, PNG? Duh!!!!
      • You would have thought that if they are making a fresh start with a new so-called modern protocol, they would at least use a new and modern specification such as, let's say, PNG? Duh!!!!

        Right, so this is exactly what they are doing, at least in the Netherlands: IPng (IP Next Generation) [www.ipng.nl]

        Happy now? :P

    • US Alternative Tunnel Broker (Score:5, Informative)

      by fv ( 95460 ) <fyodor@insecure.org> on Thursday February 13, 2003 @05:28AM (#5293323) Homepage
      >Disclaimer: I help run ipng.org.uk, which is a UK tunnel broker,
      >who gives you a /64 ... and delegates full forward and reverse DNS to you

      Great! And for those of us in the States (especially California), Hurricane Electric offers a free tunnel broker [tunnelbroker.net] with these characteristics that I would recommend [slashdot.org].I have been using it for more than 6 months, and find it quite stable. You do lose your /64 if HE can't ping you for 24 hours, but a new one is only a mouse click away. And what kind of geek would leave their computer inaccessible for that long anyway? ;). Initial activation does take a day or so.

      -Fyodor
      Concerned about your network security? Try the free Nmap Security Scanner [insecure.org]

      • I used to host with HE, but then one day my credit card company got bought up by another (my # and exp stayed the same) and that caused some code to be generated that their billing software didn't understand. So, instead of calling or e-mailing me about it, they deleted my account and all of my files, and had to launch an 'investigation' to get me reactivated. Not having the time to wait for their 'investigation', I switched.
    • thats 18,446,744,073,709,551,616 distinct ips

      Great. Every goddamn atom in your computer has its own bloody IP address. Tell me again why this is important?

      • Re:Tunnel Brokers (Score:5, Funny)

        by mikeophile ( 647318 ) on Thursday February 13, 2003 @06:52AM (#5293479)
        Suppose you wanted to replace each cell of your body with a nanodevice.

        You're going to need a way to address them aren't you?

      • Re:Tunnel Brokers (Score:2, Informative)

        by grolim13 ( 110441 )
        It makes configuration easier - like DHCP, only without needing DHCP :) Once your router/firewall/gateway machine has an IPv6 address, it broadcasts it the prefix (first 64 bits, IIRC) to the local network. Other machines on the network will configure their own IP address to be the prefix, with their MAC address tacked on the end, and likely set their default gateway to the router.
      • I think, to some degree, this is an important point. No one (no individual) needs 18 quintillion addresses. Giving people way more addresses than they need is what lead to earlier problems with the address space of IPv4. Now there's still more (lots more) /64 blocks of IPv6 than total addresses in IPv4, but do we really want to risk repeating the mistakes of the past?

      • thats 18,446,744,073,709,551,616 distinct ips

        Great. Every goddamn atom in your computer has its own bloody IP address. Tell me again why this is important?

        It means that every subnetwork in your site can have the same size network. By convention, end customers ("subscribers" is the ipv6 term) are assigned a /48, meaning you get 128-48=80 bits of address space to do with as you please. By convention, the first 16 of those bits are used for your subnet addresses, and the remaining 64 are individual host addresses on those subnets.

        To put it in more familiar IPv4 terms, imagine if there were so many IP addresses available that even the smallest sites could be given a class B. Now instead of having to subnet your network into efficiently sized CIDR blocks (eg, the lab upstairs gets 10.123.5.224/28, the billing dept gets 10.123.5.128/27, tech supports dept gets 10.123.5.32/29), you can just say everyone gets a class C (eg, the lab upstairs gets 10.123.5.x, the billing dept gets 10.123.6.x, tech supports dept gets 10.123.7.x). Much easier for humans to work with that way.

        To put in in IPv6 terms again, every site gets assigned a /48 (say, 2002:6f2d:9ffe) because the address space really is that big now. By convention, the next 16 bits are for your subnets (eg, the lab upstairs gets 2002:6f2d:9ffe:0001:x:x:x:x, the billing dept gets 2002:6f2d:9ffe:0002:x:x:x:x, tech supports dept gets 2002:6f2d:9ffe:0003:x:x:x:x). When assigning subnets within your site, you only have to keep track of 4th group of bits in the address. See how much easier this makes your life as a network administrator? You can still used small CIDR blocks if you wanted to, but you don't need to. Just giving everyone the same sized subnet is easier for you to work with,

        There's also the autoconfiguration thing (host addresses can be assigned based on their NIC hardware addresses, since the IPv6 subnet space is bigger than ethernet address space)...

    • Tunnel brokers are obsolete; 6to4 is simpler and more efficient.

  • Why the Weird Gateway? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by ewhac ( 5844 ) on Thursday February 13, 2003 @05:13AM (#5293280) Homepage Journal

    My limited understanding of IPv6 is that you can deploy v6 addresses locally, and advertise them globally via DNS using AAAA records. You can then talk over the larger Internet using a 6-over-4 tunnel.

    Assuming this is correct, why doesn't Slashdot simply advertise an AAAA record, then accept connections through a 6-over-4 tunnel (or natively, if their bandwidth provider can speak it)? What are the technical considerations preventing this from working?

    Schwab

  • 'Have' IPv6??? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by jez9999 ( 618189 ) on Thursday February 13, 2003 @05:41AM (#5293342) Homepage Journal
    But for the people that do already have IPv6 they can use

    What exactly does it take to 'have' IPv6? What stuff neds to be upgraded? Application software? OS? Router? Does your ISP need to 'have' or 'support' it? It also seems a hell of a lot more complex to type in an IPv6 address than an IPv4 one, but I guess that only matters if you're not using a domain. Then again, with so many IP addresses available with IPv6 this may be the case, as there won't be nearly enough domains to hold everyone's IP!

    I'm sorry that this will sound ignorant, but if I'm asking the question and I'm not exactly dumb, it's no wonder all the AOLers aren't using IPv6! I don't even know how you use it, and there are barely any servers using it either, no?

    • Re:'Have' IPv6??? (Score:5, Informative)

      by WWWWolf ( 2428 ) <wwwwolf@iki.fi> on Thursday February 13, 2003 @07:58AM (#5293593) Homepage
      What exactly does it take to 'have' IPv6? What stuff neds to be upgraded? Application software? OS? Router? Does your ISP need to 'have' or 'support' it?

      OS and applications. Many operating systems already do support IPv6, as do many applications (Mozilla does, at least, as does many IRC clients because there's distinct benefits.)

      Router/ISP level support is Nice To Have, but there are tunneling servers [freenet6.net] that enable IPv4 sites to talk IPv6.

      As far as setup woes go, my setup was as easy as 'apt-get install freenet6' =)

    • Re:'Have' IPv6??? (Score:2, Informative)

      by JayJay.br ( 206867 )
      For an IPv6 network to work, all hosts need to be aware of IPv6. That would be "native IPv6" (not sure about the term, but you get the picture!). That is, you need your ISP/OS/Routers/whatever is in the middle to know IPv6.

      You could also tunnel IPv6 over IPv4, so two ends could communicate using IPv6 in a v4 network.

      Or, you could use a gateway, like sixxs.org. There is some info in the link [sixxs.net] supplied in the article, but if you want the big stuff, please RTFRFC [rfc-editor.org] 2460!

      HTH!

  • Ipv6 is great (Score:5, Informative)

    by johnburton ( 21870 ) <johnb@jbmail.com> on Thursday February 13, 2003 @05:47AM (#5293355) Homepage
    I have a few machines at home and things like a tivo and a Zaurus that need IP addresses. Ideally they all should have proper routable IP addresses so the internet can be used as it is intended. Luckily my ISP (Andrews & Arnold) provide as many IP adresses for my ADSL as I want for no extra cost. But I'm still limited to 5 usable addresses. But they also provide Ipv6 access to the internet and give you a range of addresses. But instead of five addresses I get a whole /64 range which is 2^64 usable addresses. Anyway, if anyone in the UK wants ADSL and to use IPV6 I can recomment A&A as an ISP for this
    • So how do you get IPv6 working on the Tivo? I spend enough time on the forums explaining how to set up a reverse proxy, I don't even want to get started with IPv6 ;)

      I guess I still don't see why I should upgrade. As I see it, my setup works just fine now using NAT, and if I upgraded I'd get loads of grief, not least having to make sure all my IP apps support IPv6 - I bet most don't.

      Can anyone convince me why I need it?
  • How come slashdot don't have an IPv6 address. Even I can manage it. I have an ipv6 website at http://ipv6.jb99.co.uk/ (not that there is anything interesting on there)

  • IPv6 is like the Chicken and Egg story (Score:3, Interesting)

    by lemmen ( 48986 ) on Thursday February 13, 2003 @08:06AM (#5293602) Homepage
    Everyone knows the Chicken and the Egg story (which came first), with IPv6 it's the same:

    *) IPv6 is ready to deploy, however not much ISP's are supporting IPv6.
    *) ISP's are not supporting IPv6 because there are no customers who uses it.
    *) Customers aren't using IPv6 because there are no applications who uses it.
    *) Software developers aren't creating software because nobody uses it.

    As you can see there's a loop. The main thing is to break this loop and this project is a step in the good direction.

    I'd like to encourage all ISP's to actively implement and promote IPv6. And you as 'consumer' can also promote IPv6, play with it even when you ISP doesn't support IPv6 yet (with IPv6 Tunnels for example).

    Just my 2 cents.
    • You see, ipv6 is being seeded at the moment. Vendors and application developers are being ushered to use the new standard ANSI library calls/definitions like getaddrinfo() and PF_UNSPEC.

      You see, if you use the new calls, your app will work just as fine with ipv4, and it will automagically also support ipv6. Heck, the host OS doesn't even need to support ip6, as long as it supports the newer ANSI standard calls. At least, when you recompile the app on a ipv6-capable box it will support ipv6 automatically.

      Developers need to stop using the old stuffy gethostbyaddr()/gethostbyname() calls and (struct hostent *) structures and switch to (struct addrinfo *) for their resolving and socket binding needs as soon as possible.

      So no, no chicken and egg. ipv6 is being sneakily seeded into the apps. When the OS switches over, presto, it works. Yay.

  • Lets face it , unless you've got a Phd in networking chances are that some facet of IP4 routing , setup etc still confuses you. This goes for network admins too. Now multiply the complexity of ip4 by 10 and you get the nightmare that is IP6. I've tried to set up a home ip6 network that linked out to the internet but , oh my god , what kind of idiots invented this system? I'm sorry , but even computer admins are human (yes its true) and we REALLy don't want to have to mess around with 128 bit meaningless entries in routing tables that were complex enough with 32 bits! Yes ip6 does some autocofiguration but someone has to set up the system so that some host does the autoconfig. Ever tried it? Don't , not unless you want to end up in a padded cell. Even networking protocols should be designed for people to be able to use and I'm afraid with ip6 that simply hasn't happened. Back to the dsrawing board guys!
    • Yeah, I've tried the autoconfig. I've got a bunch of computers at home on IPv6, on two subnets (802.3/3u and 802.11b) with an IPv6 router/firewall with three interfaces. Here's my config (subnets changed to protect the innocent):

      default:\
      :raflags#0:rltime#3600:\
      :pinfoflags#64:vltime#360000:pltime#360000:mtu#150 0: ether:\
      :mtu#1280:tc=default:

      # interfaces.
      ex0:\
      :addrs#1:\
      :addr="3ffe:0b80:xxxx::":prefixlen#64:tc=ether:

      tlp0:\
      :addrs#1:\
      :addr="3ffe:0b80:xxxx:1::":prefixlen#64:tc=ether:

      Behind that sits a variety of MacOS X, NetBSD, FreeBSD, Solaris, etc... systems. All of which are working fine.
  • I just setup IPv6 last night on my main box after reading the previous article. I was able to ping and irc, tho I didn't think Mozilla supported IPv6. Guess I was wrong :)

    Tis very cool! Everyone give it a go! If all those who read Slashdot got onto the IPv6 network then that would be a huge boost! And we need IPv6 to be successful!

    Oh, and Slashdot should consider setting up ipv6.slashdot.org - it's not that difficult!

  • MacOS X and IPv6 and other OSs (Score:5, Informative)

    by Midnight Thunder ( 17205 ) on Thursday February 13, 2003 @09:34AM (#5293797) Homepage Journal
    Even if your local network infrastructure does not support IPv6, all installations of MacOSX 10.2 have and IPv6 stack. The following is taken from doing an 'ifconfig' at the command line:

    en0: flags=8863<UP,BROADCAST,SMART,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULT ICAST> mtu 1500
    inet6 fe80::230:65ff:fed6:b164%en0 prefixlen 64 scopeid 0x4
    inet 192.168.1.100 netmask 0xffffff00 broadcast 192.168.1.255
    ether 00:30:64:d6:b2:64
    media: autoselect (100baseTX <full-duplex>) status: active

    From what I can tell MS-Windows is still a little behind, as can be seen from this page [microsoft.com]. As for other OSs I am not aware of their support status. If you do know, a reply to this post would be handy to most.
    • I have just noticed that the IPv6 web site lists implementations [ipv6.org] of IPv6 for various platforms. Hopefully this should be useful to those of you wanting to test out IPv6 on your system.
      • Unfortunately, like most of the net, that site is at least 6 months out of date. All currently shipping copies of Windows XP contain a PRODUCTION quality IPv6 stack, and all Windows XP installs with SP1 installed also have it. Not the tech preview stack as they indicate "Windows XP" has.

        Why does anyone (not you I know) bother to maintain a list like that if they aren't going to keep it up to date? Old information (that is not dated as old information) is less than worthless.

    • Actually, it looks like Windows XP comes with some sort of IPv6 Support: A quote from Microsoft Research [microsoft.com]

      Windows XP - In October 2001, the latest desktop edition of Windows was released, bringing the reliability and performance of the Windows NT kernel to a much wider audience. Every copy of Windows XP, Home Edition and Professional, has an IPv6 stack based on the research that we started, released as a Developer Preview primarily for application porting. The stack is very easily manually installed from a command line just by typing "ipv6 install".

    • From what I can tell MS-Windows is still a little behind, as can be seen from this page.

      There is an experimental IPv6 stack for Windows 2000 Service Pack 1 (which will not install on 2 or 3), but there will never ever ever in a million billion years be a production-quality stack for Windows 2000, because of issues with people not spending $200 on XP.

      XP comes with a development IPv6 stack included on the CD, and Service Pack 1 comes with a production-quality IPv6 stack. Windows 2003 will include a production-quality stack as well, as will CE XP and .NET and any of their other newer OSen.

      As much as I disapprove of MS for not bothering to support IPv6 in 2k, and despite knowing why they did it, I still encourage people to upgrade if the choice arises, if for no other reason than you won't have to upgrade again later to support IPv6.

      Oh, and write your ISPs.

      --Dan

  • Modified URL format (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Midnight Thunder ( 17205 ) on Thursday February 13, 2003 @09:53AM (#5293878) Homepage Journal
    Because IPv6 numeric addresses use colons as opposed as part separators, the URL [ietf.org] syntax has had to be ammended [ietf.org]. The following is now a legal URL (the squared bracket isolates the numbered IP addresss, so the port number is not confused with the IP addresss):
    http://[66.35.250.150]:80/
    Last time I checked this worked with Mozilla but failed will MS Internet Explorer 6.0 on Windows.
  • OK, My geek quotient is so low, it's ridiculous. Can someone point me to an English explanation of what IPv6 is? I looked on Sixx.org and googled for FAQs and got language like this:

    "Where do I get my own 6bone handle?"

    I looked whatis.com and got a semi-English explanation.

    So now I understand that IPv6 lengthens IPs from 32 to 128 bits and packets can be prioritized. Is that the heart of the matter?

    Anybody have a good FAQ?

    Do I need a 6bone handle?

    Is that some kind of raunchy joke?

  • Gateways/caches should _NOT_ change the user agent (Score:5, Insightful)

    by ClarkEvans ( 102211 ) on Thursday February 13, 2003 @12:54PM (#5295135) Homepage

    SixXS-IPv6Gate/1.0 (IPv6 Gateway; http://ipv6gate.sixxs.net; info@sixxs.net)

    Bad! Many sites go through painstaking effort to be compable with all sorts of user agents, giving plain HTML when one is not recognized. By re-writing the user agent these people prevent this magic. Not good. Instead it should add it's own key/value pair, much like SQUID or other cache/gateway.

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