IPv6 may already be irrelevant – but so is moving off IPv4, argues APNIC's chief scientist
- Reference: 1729668372
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2024/10/23/ipv6_relevance/
- Source link:
In a lengthy [1]post to the center's blog, Geoff Huston recounts that the main reason for the development of IPv6 was a fear the world would run out of IP addresses, hampering the growth of the internet.
But IPv6 represented evolution – not revolution.
[2]
"The bottom line was that IPv6 did not offer any new functionality that was not already present in IPv4. It did not introduce any significant changes to the operation of IP. It was just IP, with larger addresses," Huston wrote.
[3]
[4]
IPv6's designers assumed that the protocol would take off because demand for IPv4 was soaring.
But in the years after IPv6 debuted, Huston observes, "There was no need to give the transition much thought." Internetworking wonks assumed applications, hosts, and networks would become dual stack and support IPv6 alongside IPv4, before phasing out the latter.
[5]
But then mobile internet usage exploded, and network operators had to scale to meet unprecedented demand created by devices like the iPhone.
"We could either concentrate our resources on meeting the incessant demands of scaling, or we could work on IPv6 deployment," Huston wrote.
[6]250 million-plus unused IPv4 addresses should be left alone, argues network boffin
[7]China pushes for network upgrade blitz as IPv6 adoption slows
[8]Vietnam plans to convert all its networks to IPv6
[9]AWS: IPv4 addresses cost too much, so you’re going to pay
Achieving scale rose to the top of to-do lists. Early mobile networks were built on IPv4, coupled with network address translation (NAT) to enable more devices to connect without requiring a unique IP address.
Not every NAT implementation was the same, but network operators learned to live with that. The advent of Transport Layer Security in web servers also helped to keep NAT viable.
Content providers, seeing the persistence of IPv4, didn't bother to adopt IPv6 – meaning network operators didn't need to, either.
[10]
Around 40 percent of the internet nonetheless came to support IPv6. Huston has previously told The Register a big reason for that is the small IPv4 allocations to China and India, where the old protocol just couldn't be reliably used to support their massive user populations.
But overall, he thinks it is time to stop suggesting that a successful transition from IPv4 to IPv6 means the older protocol has been eliminated.
"Perhaps we should take a more pragmatic approach and … consider it complete when IPv4 is no longer necessary. This would imply that when a service provider can operate a viable internet service using only IPv6 and having no supported IPv4 access mechanisms at all, then we would've completed this transition."
To reach that state, ISPs, connected edge networks and the hosts in those networks all need to support IPv6. So do all websites.
Say my name, say my name
But Huston contends that the advent of content delivery networks – which are the way the majority of content and services reach end-users – means there's no need to adopt IPv6.
CDNs, he argues, rely on domain names, not IP addresses. "It's the DNS that increasingly is used to steer users to the 'best' service delivery point for content or service. From this perspective addresses, IPv4 or IPv6, are not the critical resource for a service and its users. The 'currency' of this form of CDN network is names," Huston argues.
"The implication of these observations is that the transition to IPv6 is progressing very slowly not because this industry is chronically short-sighted," the APNIC scientist added. "There is something else going on here. IPv6 alone is not critical to a large set of end-user service delivery environments."
Indeed, he believes that we are already "pushing everything out of the network and over to applications."
"Transmission infrastructure is becoming an abundant commodity. Network sharing technology (multiplexing) is decreasingly relevant. We have so many network and computing resources that we no longer must bring consumers to service delivery points. Instead, we are bringing services towards consumers and using the content frameworks to replicate servers and services. With so much computing and storage, the application is becoming the service rather than just a window to a remotely operated service."
That trend means Huston wonders if networks will even matter in the future.
"The last couple of decades have seen us stripping out network-centric functionality and replacing this with an undistinguished commodity packet transport medium. It's fast and cheap, but it's up to applications to overlay this common basic service with its own requirements." The result is networks become "simple dumb pipes!"
Given that, Huston wonders if it's time to revisit the definition of the internet as networks that use a common shared transmission fabric, a common suite of protocols and a common protocol address pool.
Rather, he posits "Is today's network more like 'a disparate collection of services that share common referential mechanisms using a common namespace?'" ®
Get our [11]Tech Resources
[1] https://blog.apnic.net/2024/10/22/the-ipv6-transition/
[2] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2ZxjJRnKFsntpXb-3spwf5gAAAM4&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[3] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44ZxjJRnKFsntpXb-3spwf5gAAAM4&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[4] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33ZxjJRnKFsntpXb-3spwf5gAAAM4&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[5] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44ZxjJRnKFsntpXb-3spwf5gAAAM4&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[6] https://www.theregister.com/2024/09/16/240_4_ipv4_block_unnecessary/
[7] https://www.theregister.com/2024/07/10/china_ipv6_update/
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2024/10/14/vietnam_digital_infrastructure_policy/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2023/07/31/aws_says_ipv4_addresses_cost/
[10] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/networks&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33ZxjJRnKFsntpXb-3spwf5gAAAM4&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[11] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Re: He should keep quiet and be thought a fool rather than open his mouth and prove it
What's that wooshing sound?
Re: He should keep quiet and be thought a fool rather than open his mouth and prove it
To be fair, i've now fully read (rather than just skimmed) his blog post and the article summary is not quite what he said.
Re: He should keep quiet and be thought a fool rather than open his mouth and prove it
To be fair, i've now fully read (rather than just skimmed) his blog post and the article summary is not quite what he said.
Well at least the title you chose for your post remains apposite.
Re: He should keep quiet and be thought a fool rather than open his mouth and prove it
Geoff's a bright guy who's been working in the field for aeons and his main focus has always been on the practicalities of network operations. It's usually worth bearing in mind someone's background before commenting on a secondhand report of what they're supposed to have said without checking the original.
From the point at which IP addresses became scarce, it became inevitable there would be abuse of the network layer (by breaking end-to-end connectivity with NAT) or abuse of DNS (by returning different results depending on location rather than the same result everywhere) - or both - until such time as a replacement solution was universally available.
While network architects were wringing their hands over the heresy, network operators went with what they could deploy quickly and I think Geoff accurately describes where we are now and how we got here.
Where I'd differ from Geoff's opinion is that while for the majority individuals using the network the solutions are viable, for machine-to-machine communications a fractured network that depends on intermediaries is far from ideal. But, at the risk of further straining architectural wrists, maybe a separate network is the answer to that.
Re: He should keep quiet and be thought a fool rather than open his mouth and prove it
"I wonder where those CDNs will get their IP addresses"
Assuming you mean legacy IP address, aka IPV4:
They buy them from ISPs moving their customers to CGNAT. And from parties (education) who suddenly find a few Block B's in a drawer now that the price is nice. But those sellers should hurry ... since 2023, the IPv4 price is dropping.
Re: He should keep quiet and be thought a fool rather than open his mouth and prove it
Googling he seems to have had a respected history, is he the internet's Roger Waters or John Cleese?
He's been around pretty much as long as the Internet. Plus being an Asia-Pacific chappie, been knee deep in the trenches when it comes to challenges like resource depletion and the NAT-wars. But also more a nethead rather than a bellhead, so sometimes disagreed with his views on network vs application. Which is pretty much the point of this article. So if you assume the Internet = web/email/apps, then he's right and CDN.
But that assumes the apps people are trying to use fit CDN, either public or private and can work via URI rather than IP. If you can route via URI, then the flavour of IP doesn't really matter. But there are a lot of 'legacy' apps that can't do this. Over time, this will change, but there are still a lot of services that can't do this. There'll still be a fundamental need for network, as in the physical and 'Layer 2' transport. Which these days on the wholesale side is pretty much entirely Ethernet. 100Gbps, 10Gbps, even 1Gbps. Pick your flavour and I don't really care if it's IPv4 or v6, as long as you're trying to transport a valid Ethernet frame. Then I'll switch it wherever you want it.
NAT should be enough for everything
The entire IPv4 address space could be available to every country.
Each country would NAT their international comms to their specific address. That would give us the possibility of multiple millions of countries (not that we need that).
When we have colonies, we could NAT comms between Earth and said colonies (Moon, Mars, Ganymede, whatever else). Each colony would have practially the entire IPv4 address space available.
IPv6 is useless.
Re: NAT should be enough for everything
Tell me you don't understand end to end connectivity without telling me?
The problem is you can't do that, as NAT only works with a middle man. Even with every consumer device behind NAT and no ability for end users to host anything themselves, that still does not leave enough IPs as GCNAT at scale still requires an IP per 100-1000 users to avoid running out of ports.
You then also need more servers to move traffic between those users, which then use more real IPs, create more latency and higher bandwidth costs.
Re: NAT should be enough for everything
That would just result in a future "Who Me" where the UK's internet goes down because the cleaner unplugged the router to do the hoovering.
Re: NAT should be enough for everything
because the cleaner unplugged the router to do the hoovering.
[1]Obligatory xkcd
[1] https://xkcd.com/908/
Re: NAT should be enough for everything
Aside from the fact (as well explained by Blue Shirt Guy) that CGNAT doesn't scale like that (due to port availability), IPv6 has already taken interplanetary comms into account.
All current IPv6 allocations starts with 2xxx:: (aside from a couple of oddball reservations as well as the ff00:: multicast addresses).
That leaves 3xxx:: available for a future Mars network, 4xxx:: for Jovian settlements (with sub-divisions for Moons), etc.
Inter-system comms will likely require an ansible, which will use it's own addressing/entanglement scheme.
Different solutions fit different use cases. Who knew?
Hmm
At this rate, I think by the time we're moving IPv11 people will still be saying "well, we still have to back support IPv4, but we're still going to phase it out eventually"
IPv11
This will be awesome . Just think of the Spinal Tap references.
Would be nice if IPV6 support was actually the norm
Having some locations in primarily IPV6 parts of the world (the Caribbean) having so many services still having no intention of supporting IPV6 results in much head to wall contact.
E.g. I can't even get TrueNAS Scale to update cause the supposed v6 endpoints don't respond properly. Or Ubuntu...
He should keep quiet and be thought a fool rather than open his mouth and prove it
I wonder where those CDNs will get their IP addresses, or is he suggesting no new competition?Does he even know what an A or AAAA record is?
Googling he seems to have had a respected history, is he the internet's Roger Waters or John Cleese?