

Anyone Who Still Thinks IPv6 Won't Happen Isn't Watching the Measurements - skrause
http://www.circleid.com/posts/20140219_anyone_who_still_thinks_ipv6_wont_happen_isnt_watching_measurems/

======
zaphoyd
The change from Jan to Feb 2014 alone is impressive:

Comcast: 20.61% -> 24.42%

AT&T: 13.53% -> 16.77%

Verizon Wireless: 40.03% -> 45.75%

Time Warner Cable: 3.88% -> 5.37%

T-Mobile USA: 9.58% -> 15.76%

Google Fiber: 71.87% -> 76.43%

~~~
abjorn
Where are these numbers coming from? This seems completely divergent from the
statistics here:

[http://www.google.com/intl/en/ipv6/statistics.html](http://www.google.com/intl/en/ipv6/statistics.html)

~~~
nandhp
Also, it's not clear what "Google Fiber 76.43%" means. Is that meant to be the
percentage of subscribers with IPv6 access? I was under the impression that
all Google Fiber customers had IPv6.

~~~
danyork
It's the percentage of IPv6 adoption seen coming from Google Fiber networks by
the companies participating in the World IPv6 Launch measurements program.
(See the bottom of
[http://www.worldipv6launch.org/measurements/](http://www.worldipv6launch.org/measurements/)
for how IPv6 adoption rates are being measured.)

My guess would be that while all Google Fiber customers very well may have
IPv6, they may be using some devices that are only IPv4 capable.

~~~
nextweek2
My internet TV and my Xbox 360 are IPv4 only. So I am guessing they'll be that
way for the next 5+ years of the life span I expect of them.

------
joosters
Mythic Beasts (a great UK hosting/colo service) just announced an IPv6-only
virtual server - £5/month instead of £7/month for IPv4:

[https://www.mythic-beasts.com/order/vps6](https://www.mythic-
beasts.com/order/vps6)

~~~
nly
... a /96? Come on, it's bad enough that my dedicated provider only gives me a
/64

You're better off getting an IPv4 only box and getting a /48 tunnel from
HE.net

~~~
shawabawa3
Is this sarcasm? Isn't a /96 4 billion addresses?

Why would you possibly want more for a single small VPS? Just because you can?

~~~
dspillett
He is overreacting a little, but the design of IPv6 was not primarily focused
on address depletion, it was more about keeping routing tables simple.

A /64 is the base unit for public routing. The recommendation is that each
single end-site should have a /64\. A company or collection of hosts should
get a /48\. An ISP should have a /32 or perhaps more than one (though I doubt
many are big enough to need more than one).

Things are a little confused with VPS providers. If you are running your own
box (or boxes) with many VMs for your self/company on it then a /64 for the
whole lot is how it is generally done, but for renting out VPSs you should
have a /48 and give out /64s to your clients (probably not one per VPS, but
one per client).

So essentially, if you are not getting a /64 it is a sign that your provider
is doing it wrong. While it may seem a _very_ minor point it could also
indicate they have misunderstood or ignored other conventions too.

/96 isn't _really_ bad though - you often see hosts handing out IPv6 addresses
like they are IPv4 addresses. Take for example
[http://serverbros.co.uk/openvz.html](http://serverbros.co.uk/openvz.html), to
pick on someone at random via a quick Google search: a whole _five_ v6
addresses! What a generous arrangement!

~~~
justincormack
"give out /64s to your clients (probably not one per VPS, but one per client)"
\- no, a /64 per VPS and a /48 per client is probably about right.

~~~
dspillett
I suppose it depends what you consider the "end site" to be (the
company/client or the host (virtual or otherwise)). I'm happy to accept other
judgement for lack of more certainty myself! Either way I'd expect more than a
/96 per client if done right.

------
simon_vetter
Yet, popular server software like nodejs still prefer ipv4 over ipv6
addresses, slowing down the transition even more [1].

1\.
[https://github.com/joyent/node/blob/master/src/cares_wrap.cc...](https://github.com/joyent/node/blob/master/src/cares_wrap.cc#L878)

~~~
blakesmith
Doesn't it iterate over IPv6 addresses a few lines down? [1]. Sure, it
iterates through IPv4 first, but does it make sense to prefer IPv6 given that
IPv4 is still the most popular?

1\.
[https://github.com/joyent/node/blob/master/src/cares_wrap.cc...](https://github.com/joyent/node/blob/master/src/cares_wrap.cc#L906)

~~~
simon_vetter
Yes, it will connect just fine over v6 if no v4 addresses are available. It
should, however, try v6 first and then fall back to v4.

At least on Linux and OSX, getaddrinfo() won't return ipv6 addresses if the
local machine doesn't have any global ipv6 address, which means that a server
without ipv6 connectivity won't waste any cycle trying to use addresses it
can't reach.

Preferring v4 means that you'll never shift your traffic over to v6 unless v4
is shut down. Because networks and services are going to be dual stack for as
long as sysadmins see substantial v4 traffic, such behavior will create
another chicken and the egg problem.

It will also put more strain on the network (as traffic will eventually have
to go through multiple layers of NAT, etc), render operations more difficult
(how do I know who made that request if an entire datacenter is behind one or
two ip addresses?), and in the end, make network operations more expensive,
because we'll have to run dual stack longer than necessary.

~~~
blakesmith
Thanks for following up and clarifying!

------
SudoAlex
All ISPs need to do is provide IPv6 connectivity, a router with IPv6 support -
and the traffic will flow.

It really should be as simple as that! Windows Vista supports IPv6, modern
versions of OS X supports IPv6, etc. You don't have to configure it - just
like you don't have to figure IPv4 with DHCP. Typical end users don't question
their IPv4 connectivity, they just plug in their router and things work. The
exact same thing should happen with IPv6.

The only issue is going to be old customer routers which can't be upgraded
with new firmware.

~~~
coldpie
What if the website you want to visit doesn't support IPv6?

~~~
zaphoyd
In this case, your network is probably doing NAT64 or you should be doing it.

For non-HTTPS web there is also:
[https://www.sixxs.net/tools/gateway/](https://www.sixxs.net/tools/gateway/)

~~~
akira2501
NAT64? It's still an absolute mess. From
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NAT64](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NAT64):

"Not everything is accessible with NAT64, such as SIP, Skype, MSN, and sites
with IPv4 literals.[a] However, 464XLAT RFC 6877,[3] which uses NAT64, allows
for such protocols over ipv6 only connections."

~~~
zaphoyd
Agreed. None of the options for accessing IPv4 only websites via IPv6 only
hosts are great. If you are running an IPv4 only website or service this
should hopefully worry you.

------
sargun
Our new DC are all IPv6 enabled (we started launching them in December) with
dual stack, and preference for IPv6. Only 1 of the DCs are online so far, and
we're already pushing around something like 3 Gb/s of traffic over V6. It was
nice how many things just magically worked atop V6, once we added AAAA
records.

One thing that was sad though, is how poorly everything built atop, and around
Ruby worked.

~~~
valas
Do you run virtualization in your DC? If you do, is IPv6 only inside VM
context or you also use it as a transport (i.e. switches see IPv6 packets)?

~~~
sargun
Yes. IPv6 all over. Actually, we're looking at deprecating IPv6 at the
transport layer entirely, and moving to IPv4 in IPv6 over GRE tunnels, but
that's largely reliant on having RFC5549 in a few specific places (the edge
terms).

~~~
valas
What's the benefit of using IPv6 as transport (as opposed to using IPv4 as
transport)?

~~~
nextweek2
One of the big wins you get with IPv6 is that is doesn't allow fragmenting.

This means packets will be dropped but that's not a bad thing when you have
other layers taking care of retransmission. So routers then don't have to
spend a lot of time chopping packets up and can just either shift packets
faster or drop them telling the sender to slow down.

The other advantage I hope we see enabled is multicast. All these streaming
services could massively reduce their bandwidth usage if the Internet allowed
multicasts.

------
pktgen
Expect this number to rise in the near future as Comcast Netflix traffic moves
to IPv6:
[http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r29057080-](http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r29057080-)

------
wglb
Would be interested to know of that percentage how many are NOT dual stack.
Adaptation is one thing, replacement of IPv4 is quite another.

~~~
baq
i wouldn't expect anything more than 0% and i don't think there's anything
wrong with that. dual stack won't die before ipv6 is much, much more above
50%, probably 90% or so.

~~~
rqebmm
Overall I think you're right but I would be surprised if it's 0%. There's
bound to be some peering setups with IPv6 on both sides.

~~~
baq
yeah but google's stats probably won't show them.

------
vidar
I have to admit, back in 2006-7 I was genuinely scared that this couldn't be
done. Happy to be wrong!

~~~
fournm
I'll admit to being scared much more recently than that, ha.

------
apaprocki
Is anyone here actually using IPv6 with US cable modem providers (e.g. TWC)?
Even though the device connected to the modem gets an IPv6 address, it is
completely unclear as to a) what the assigned IPv6 block is or b) how to go
about requesting one. It feels like they're in a limbo state of deployment
where the edges work but they don't have the workflow/infrastructure set up to
dole out address blocks to customers.

~~~
zaphoyd
I have Comcast cable service in Chicago. I have an SB6120 modem and an Airport
Extreme base station. I didn't do anything special beyond plug it in.

The Airport Base has an IPv6 page that shows what the delegated /64 subnet is.
All the devices on my network have autoconfigured themselves with addresses in
that range. I appear to be able to manually set hosts to any address in that
range as well and it seems to work fine. I do this on some of my server VMs
because otherwise they generate a new random address every few days (privacy
mode woo). The privacy addressing makes assigning a DNS name to said VM more
difficult. I've had the same /64 delegated to me since June 2012.

I've heard that you can request a /60 prefix (16 subnets) if your router
supports IPv6 Prefix Delegation (pretty sure the Apple one doesn't). I don't
know exactly how you go about doing that though. I'd probably start with the
HSI forums on dslreports.com

~~~
apaprocki
See, I have exactly the same setup (SB6xxx + AE) and on TWC in NYC it just
doesn't work. The AE gets an IPv6 address from the modem, but TWC isn't
assigning it a prefix, so all IPv6 devices behind the AE just sit there
twiddling their digital thumbs.

~~~
zaphoyd
TWC is definitely not as far along in their deployment. It might just take
some more time. =\

Edit: If I recall correctly, when Comcast was doing their initial deployment
they started with end nodes only (not delegating prefixes). Then moved to
delegated /64s. Now are moving on to delegated /60s and more.

------
chair6
Made this a few years ago but it's still useful - check whether your own site
is accessible over IPv6: [http://ready.chair6.net](http://ready.chair6.net)

Seems this news article isn't --
[http://ready.chair6.net/?url=circleid.com](http://ready.chair6.net/?url=circleid.com)

~~~
ternaryoperator
Good tool. Nicely done!

------
muench
Does anyone have a recommendation for a good primer on IPv6? Is there
something significantly better than reading the IPv6 wikipedia page or
googling 'IPv6 primer'?

~~~
danyork
@muench - we've tried to assemble some pointers on
[http://www.internetsociety.org/deploy360/ipv6/](http://www.internetsociety.org/deploy360/ipv6/)

In particular you may find the "IPv6 for IPv4 Experts" ebook of use:
[https://sites.google.com/site/yartikhiy/home/ipv6book](https://sites.google.com/site/yartikhiy/home/ipv6book)

------
nextstep
IPv6 is such a minor win for the Internet now. I'm more excited for a new
protocol all together, maybe something like Open Libernet:
[http://www.openlibernet.org](http://www.openlibernet.org)

------
nawitus
Hmm, I wonder if smartphones could "easily" switch to IPv6?

~~~
mhurron
Depends on the OS

[https://sites.google.com/site/tmoipv6/lg-
mytouch](https://sites.google.com/site/tmoipv6/lg-mytouch) (For T-Mobile, I
believe AT&T also has IPv6 available)

Also depends on correct instructions, the linked PDF (under screenshots) there
is correct, the instructions at that link do not appear to work.

As for wifi, I can't say, my AP doesn't pass RA's so none of my wireless
clients configure to IPv6. Time to add it to the list of stuff to upgrade.

------
zw123456
A lot of those numbers are deceptive because carriers are starting to use IPv6
for an outer trunking protocol but the users IPv4 flow is encapsulated within.

~~~
p1mrx
I don't think that's right. The stats are based on users' web browsers hitting
the measurement points using an IPv6 HTTP connection.

It would be possible to fake it using NAT-PT, or a transparent HTTP proxy with
IPv6 on the Internet-facing side, but I doubt that ISPs would be deploying
hacks like that on a significant scale.

