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RE: IPv6 Addressing Help


From: "TJ" <trejrco () gmail com>
Date: Fri, 14 Aug 2009 13:06:06 -0400

-----Original Message-----
From: Roland Dobbins [mailto:rdobbins () arbor net]
On Aug 14, 2009, at 10:31 PM, Chris Gotstein wrote:
I'm just not able to wrap my brain around the subnetting that needs to
be done on the router.
One of the things which has struck me as being fairly insane about current
recommended 'best practices' for IPv6 addressing is the practice of wasting
huge blocks of addresses on p2p links; even given the gigantic address
space,
in a world in which every soda-can, every window-blind, and swarms of
medical
nanobots injected into one's bloodstream will potentially become spimes,
this
just seems grossly short-sighted.

It is all a matter of perspective.
If you want to use /126s (or whatever longer-than-64bit-prefix-you-like)
that is ~OK - it certainly works! - but you may be complicating your life in
the future.
It is "your network" - build it however you wish, just be sure of the
benefits and drawbacks associated with those choices.

(Purely an off-the-top-of-my-head hypothetical: What if PtP links become
drastically less common, and you need to re-address your network from ~/126s
to /64s because of that?  You are causing yourself pain, and for what gain?
To conserve a resource that is not (and according to some, will effectively
never be) in short supply?)   

A great counter-point to this is that if you do use /64s (or for that matter
- anything shorter than the currently-not-recommended /127s, AFAIK), you
should apply ACLs to them to prevent ping-pong.


((FWIW - counting the number of individual address being used is a
non-starter ... ~18,000,000,000,000,000,000 addresses on each segment is
more than enough for any solution I expect in the relevant future.  I am not
saying the goal of conservation is bad (e.g. - I like /56s to homes instead
of /48s), just trying to keep things in perspective.))


Pick your flavor of answer, and drink heavily.  I prefer coffee ... or
Vodka.
/TJ



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