11 ms·

IPv4 is almost gone (in Europe anyway)

78 points by mstevens 14y ago

indiecore 14y ago
Yep and nothing will be done by ISPs until they are all completely gone (and maybe not even then, scarcity is good for business).
- oasisbob 14y ago
  This isn't true. Comcast, Verizon, and T-Mobile are a few of the big eyeball networks who are making large infrastructure investments in IPv6. ISPs are far ahead of most content and hosting providers in this area, as they bear the pain of IPv4 scarcity when providing addresses to their subscribers. Transit providers are on the whole prepared for v6 as well. As an ISP, you don't want to wake up one day and see analysis that your network numbering is at odds with your growth plans.
  - zaphoyd 14y ago
    Not only are they making large infrastructure investments, a many of their customers (including myself) can get IPv6 service from all three of those companies today and have been able to for some time.
andyking 14y ago
This seems to have been rumbling on for some time now - at least for the past five years or so. My OS supports IPv6, my home router supports IPv6, but at no point have any of the home ISPs I've used (three in the past five years - BT Internet, Be and Origin Broadband) made any mention of any sort of IPv6 support. I'm not au fait with the workings of such huge operations, so is there any reason for ISP adoption of IPv6 to be so sluggish? It's not like it's been an overnight thing. I'm aware it's unlikely to be a simple case of flipping a switch, or installing a new software package - but we do appear to be approaching an IP crunch. Are there any consumer ISPs that do offer customers a block of IPv6 addresses for use, rather than (or as well as) a single IPv4 address?
- daurnimator 14y ago
  I'm in the opposite situation. My ISP and wifi router support IPv6; but my modem does not. And without this modem failing, I probably won't shell out $150 for a new one.
- michaelt 14y ago
  According to [1] there are a few - no big names, though. As [2] says, running IPv6 is fairly boring; you get access to the same web as everyone else. [1] http://www.sixxs.net/faq/connectivity/?faq=native&country=gb http://www.sixxs.net/faq/connectivity/?faq=native&countr... [2] http://bens.me.uk/2011/adventures-in-ipv6 http://bens.me.uk/2011/adventures-in-ipv6
  - X-Istence 14y ago
    I'm running on IPv6 on Comcast in the US, and yes while I get access to the same web, I have noticed that I was having issues with IPv4 that I don't have on IPv6. Such as limits per IP/account tuple logged into certain servers. So my iPad, iPhone, and MacBook Pro being logged into the same Google account over IMAP would sometimes cause issues because of too many connections for that specific account, now with IPv6 that isn't an issue because all of my devices now have their own unique IPv6 address. Perfect.
  - kiallmacinnes 14y ago
    [2]'s comment "you get access to the same web as everyone else" really only applies to consumers of "the web". And - more importantly - soon no longer applies even to that. IPv4 is essentially gone, and when it is, not having IPv6 will mean your web is smaller. IPv6 gives you much more freedom in configuring your network as both a service provider and consumer. This isn't boring :)
- kiallmacinnes 14y ago
  Eircom (an Irish ISP) are trialing IPv6 currently, and the routers they have been shipping for the last year or so support it. Other than that, our co-location provider Blacknight offer IPv6 to their customers.. but that's not exactly residential!
tveita 14y ago
And in Asia: APNIC initiated last block measures in April last year. http://www.apnic.net/publications/news/2011/final-8 http://www.apnic.net/publications/news/2011/final-8
deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
- lrem 14y ago
  At least for them...
ginko 14y ago
I'm afraid of the possibility that instead of adopting IPv6, internet providers will just switch to ISP-wide NAT, making the internet even more asymmetric than it already is.
- kiallmacinnes 14y ago
  I sincerely hope not! ISP wide NAT is bound to cause countless issues for internet services and businesses. The first and mose obvious examples I can think of: * Internet services (eg websites, netfix etc) can no longer blacklist IP addresses without blocking entire ISPs. * Businesses can no longer offer "direct to the office" VPNs for remote workers.. Actually - even site-2-site VPN's will break if both sides are behind an ISP wide NAT.
  - bad_user 14y ago
    Look on the bright side: users will have more privacy.
    - ay 14y ago
      http://panopticlick.eff.org/ http://panopticlick.eff.org/ Works over NATs and proxies. And obviously the techniques from there are already used by those who want to sell your info for profit. So, please, let's put this meme to rest :-) Blacklisting can and will happen based on other things, just that it is more costly and less performant. So the consumers will pay for that in hidden costs - less of the "useful" services delivered, etc. The VPN part is sort-of correct - it will depend on the type of the NAT. With most of the NATs, establishing the direct connection over a pair of them is technically possible - take a look at STUN, TURN and ICE (IETF standards).
  - andreasvc 14y ago
    The first is a feature. The second is not true: a VPN can tunnel through TCP in the worst case, and most NATs allow VPN over UDP using some tricks.
- ay 14y ago
kiallmacinnes 14y ago
For those of you curious about IPv6, and wanting to experiment with it at home or in the office, have a look at SixXS[1] and Hurricane Electric IPv6[2]. They both offer free IPv6 "tunnels" which can be used to provide IPv6 to your home/office. We use SixXS in the office, and the tunnel has been alive without issue for 83 weeks and counting.. (P.S. SixXS is probably the easier choice if you have a dynamic IP, or are not setting the tunnel up from your router directly..) [1]: http://www.sixxs.net/ http://www.sixxs.net/ [2]: http://ipv6.he.net/ http://ipv6.he.net/
- baq 14y ago
  worth noting that HE has tunnel endpoints all over the world. i'm using one right now in europe and it works really well.
sjwright 14y ago
IPv6 is just like the transition to Python 3: it'll happen... eventually. But the only people with an incentive to put the hard work in are people who are genuinely enthusiastic about the transition. Everyone else is sticking it in the too-hard basket.
- ay 14y ago
  This is a fairly outdated meme by now. Just that the enthusiasts are loud about it. Everyone else does not rush tell the world about their plans - it takes on average about 3 years to get everything in place, so this is a pretty good head-start against the competition :-)
  - sjwright 14y ago
    I didn't realise I stumbled upon a meme!
diminoten 14y ago
Hey 2004 called, they want their headline back. When you consider the ability for inter-RIR transfer of networks, not to mention the market being developed (already released?) by ARIN (do other RIRs have markets?), and you've got a great recipe for a run on IP addresses.
TazeTSchnitzel 14y ago
"almost"? I'm still stuck on an IPv4 connection at home, in Britain. My phone still can't get IPv6 on mobile internet. My VPS host still doesn't support IPv6 on my server. And PHP still fails to properly parse some types of IPv6 address. Things have got better, sure, but don't say it's almost gone. Far from it.
- ryannielsen 14y ago
  The notice is about IPv4 allocation, not about IPv6 market penetration. RIPE NCC has just begun allocating IPv4 addresses from the last available /8 block.
  - TazeTSchnitzel 14y ago
    Ah, fair enough.
- juan_juarez 14y ago
  > PHP still fails It still fails to reject February 31, I'm completely not surprised to hear that it fails on IPv6.
  - TazeTSchnitzel 14y ago
    I don't know which specific function you're talking about, but there may be a good reason for it.
    - juan_juarez 14y ago
      Both strtotime() - PHP's "take a string and do your damnedest to make a date out of it" function - and DateTime.parseFromFormat() - the more restrictive TZ-aware class - accept it and give you March 2/3. There's a separate validate_date() or something like that that actually rejects Feb 31.
      - TazeTSchnitzel 14y ago
_suoiruc 14y ago
I know these folks are well-meaning but I find these constant "warnings" to be insulting. What people really need to be aware of is that the folks making decisions of how the internet should run, "the experts", are not always as smart as they think they are. They make mistakes. And it's hard to get a bunch of know-it-all's to agree. It's also hard to get the entire `net to switch their behaviour, and adopt something that is incompatible with IPv4, without telling them what benefit they will gain by doing so. Can you blame them? But the "experts" and their zombie followers sure are trying. IPv4 works. NAT works. NAT can be traversed. So what is the problem exactly? As a home user, I can set up my own NAT'ing scheme with private IPv4 space far easier than I can learn to deal with the added complexity of IPv6. OK, now I will get skewered by IPv6 fanatics. How many of them are getting paid to do IPv6 consulting work? IPv4: It Just Works. "Experts": They make mistakes, just like everyone else. Now, let's hear from the "experts".
- devdas 14y ago
  What happens when your ISP has to NAT you?

78 points by mstevens 14y ago

Yep and nothing will be done by ISPs until they are all completely gone (and maybe not even then, scarcity is good for business).

oasisbob 14y ago
This isn't true. Comcast, Verizon, and T-Mobile are a few of the big eyeball networks who are making large infrastructure investments in IPv6. ISPs are far ahead of most content and hosting providers in this area, as they bear the pain of IPv4 scarcity when providing addresses to their subscribers. Transit providers are on the whole prepared for v6 as well. As an ISP, you don't want to wake up one day and see analysis that your network numbering is at odds with your growth plans.
- zaphoyd 14y ago
  Not only are they making large infrastructure investments, a many of their customers (including myself) can get IPv6 service from all three of those companies today and have been able to for some time.

andyking 14y ago

This seems to have been rumbling on for some time now - at least for the past five years or so. My OS supports IPv6, my home router supports IPv6, but at no point have any of the home ISPs I've used (three in the past five years - BT Internet, Be and Origin Broadband) made any mention of any sort of IPv6 support. I'm not au fait with the workings of such huge operations, so is there any reason for ISP adoption of IPv6 to be so sluggish? It's not like it's been an overnight thing. I'm aware it's unlikely to be a simple case of flipping a switch, or installing a new software package - but we do appear to be approaching an IP crunch. Are there any consumer ISPs that do offer customers a block of IPv6 addresses for use, rather than (or as well as) a single IPv4 address?

daurnimator 14y ago
I'm in the opposite situation. My ISP and wifi router support IPv6; but my modem does not. And without this modem failing, I probably won't shell out $150 for a new one.
michaelt 14y ago
According to [1] there are a few - no big names, though. As [2] says, running IPv6 is fairly boring; you get access to the same web as everyone else. [1] http://www.sixxs.net/faq/connectivity/?faq=native&country=gb http://www.sixxs.net/faq/connectivity/?faq=native&countr... [2] http://bens.me.uk/2011/adventures-in-ipv6 http://bens.me.uk/2011/adventures-in-ipv6
- X-Istence 14y ago
  I'm running on IPv6 on Comcast in the US, and yes while I get access to the same web, I have noticed that I was having issues with IPv4 that I don't have on IPv6. Such as limits per IP/account tuple logged into certain servers. So my iPad, iPhone, and MacBook Pro being logged into the same Google account over IMAP would sometimes cause issues because of too many connections for that specific account, now with IPv6 that isn't an issue because all of my devices now have their own unique IPv6 address. Perfect.
- kiallmacinnes 14y ago
  [2]'s comment "you get access to the same web as everyone else" really only applies to consumers of "the web". And - more importantly - soon no longer applies even to that. IPv4 is essentially gone, and when it is, not having IPv6 will mean your web is smaller. IPv6 gives you much more freedom in configuring your network as both a service provider and consumer. This isn't boring :)
kiallmacinnes 14y ago
Eircom (an Irish ISP) are trialing IPv6 currently, and the routers they have been shipping for the last year or so support it. Other than that, our co-location provider Blacknight offer IPv6 to their customers.. but that's not exactly residential!

tveita 14y ago

And in Asia: APNIC initiated last block measures in April last year. http://www.apnic.net/publications/news/2011/final-8 http://www.apnic.net/publications/news/2011/final-8

deleted 14y ago

[deleted]

lrem 14y ago
At least for them...

ginko 14y ago

I'm afraid of the possibility that instead of adopting IPv6, internet providers will just switch to ISP-wide NAT, making the internet even more asymmetric than it already is.

kiallmacinnes 14y ago
I sincerely hope not! ISP wide NAT is bound to cause countless issues for internet services and businesses. The first and mose obvious examples I can think of: * Internet services (eg websites, netfix etc) can no longer blacklist IP addresses without blocking entire ISPs. * Businesses can no longer offer "direct to the office" VPNs for remote workers.. Actually - even site-2-site VPN's will break if both sides are behind an ISP wide NAT.
- bad_user 14y ago
  Look on the bright side: users will have more privacy.
  - ay 14y ago
    http://panopticlick.eff.org/ http://panopticlick.eff.org/ Works over NATs and proxies. And obviously the techniques from there are already used by those who want to sell your info for profit. So, please, let's put this meme to rest :-) Blacklisting can and will happen based on other things, just that it is more costly and less performant. So the consumers will pay for that in hidden costs - less of the "useful" services delivered, etc. The VPN part is sort-of correct - it will depend on the type of the NAT. With most of the NATs, establishing the direct connection over a pair of them is technically possible - take a look at STUN, TURN and ICE (IETF standards).
- andreasvc 14y ago
  The first is a feature. The second is not true: a VPN can tunnel through TCP in the worst case, and most NATs allow VPN over UDP using some tricks.
ay 14y ago

kiallmacinnes 14y ago

For those of you curious about IPv6, and wanting to experiment with it at home or in the office, have a look at SixXS[1] and Hurricane Electric IPv6[2]. They both offer free IPv6 "tunnels" which can be used to provide IPv6 to your home/office. We use SixXS in the office, and the tunnel has been alive without issue for 83 weeks and counting.. (P.S. SixXS is probably the easier choice if you have a dynamic IP, or are not setting the tunnel up from your router directly..) [1]: http://www.sixxs.net/ http://www.sixxs.net/ [2]: http://ipv6.he.net/ http://ipv6.he.net/

baq 14y ago
worth noting that HE has tunnel endpoints all over the world. i'm using one right now in europe and it works really well.

sjwright 14y ago

IPv6 is just like the transition to Python 3: it'll happen... eventually. But the only people with an incentive to put the hard work in are people who are genuinely enthusiastic about the transition. Everyone else is sticking it in the too-hard basket.

ay 14y ago
This is a fairly outdated meme by now. Just that the enthusiasts are loud about it. Everyone else does not rush tell the world about their plans - it takes on average about 3 years to get everything in place, so this is a pretty good head-start against the competition :-)
- sjwright 14y ago
  I didn't realise I stumbled upon a meme!

diminoten 14y ago

Hey 2004 called, they want their headline back. When you consider the ability for inter-RIR transfer of networks, not to mention the market being developed (already released?) by ARIN (do other RIRs have markets?), and you've got a great recipe for a run on IP addresses.

TazeTSchnitzel 14y ago

"almost"? I'm still stuck on an IPv4 connection at home, in Britain. My phone still can't get IPv6 on mobile internet. My VPS host still doesn't support IPv6 on my server. And PHP still fails to properly parse some types of IPv6 address. Things have got better, sure, but don't say it's almost gone. Far from it.

ryannielsen 14y ago
The notice is about IPv4 allocation, not about IPv6 market penetration. RIPE NCC has just begun allocating IPv4 addresses from the last available /8 block.
- TazeTSchnitzel 14y ago
  Ah, fair enough.
juan_juarez 14y ago
> PHP still fails It still fails to reject February 31, I'm completely not surprised to hear that it fails on IPv6.
- TazeTSchnitzel 14y ago
  I don't know which specific function you're talking about, but there may be a good reason for it.
  - juan_juarez 14y ago
    Both strtotime() - PHP's "take a string and do your damnedest to make a date out of it" function - and DateTime.parseFromFormat() - the more restrictive TZ-aware class - accept it and give you March 2/3. There's a separate validate_date() or something like that that actually rejects Feb 31.
    - TazeTSchnitzel 14y ago

_suoiruc 14y ago

I know these folks are well-meaning but I find these constant "warnings" to be insulting. What people really need to be aware of is that the folks making decisions of how the internet should run, "the experts", are not always as smart as they think they are. They make mistakes. And it's hard to get a bunch of know-it-all's to agree. It's also hard to get the entire `net to switch their behaviour, and adopt something that is incompatible with IPv4, without telling them what benefit they will gain by doing so. Can you blame them? But the "experts" and their zombie followers sure are trying. IPv4 works. NAT works. NAT can be traversed. So what is the problem exactly? As a home user, I can set up my own NAT'ing scheme with private IPv4 space far easier than I can learn to deal with the added complexity of IPv6. OK, now I will get skewered by IPv6 fanatics. How many of them are getting paid to do IPv6 consulting work? IPv4: It Just Works. "Experts": They make mistakes, just like everyone else. Now, let's hear from the "experts".

devdas 14y ago
What happens when your ISP has to NAT you?