Re: IPv6 woes - RFC

[Owen DeLong via NANOG <nanog () nanog org>]

> On Sep 23, 2021, at 13:26 , Joe Maimon <jmaimon () jmaimon com> wrote:
>
>
>
> Owen DeLong via NANOG wrote:
> > > There are real issues with dual-stack, as this thread started out with.
> > > I don't think there is a need neither to invent IPv6 problems, nor to
> > > promote IPv6 advantages.  What we need is a way out of dual-stack-hell.
> > I don’t disagree, but a reversion to IPv4-only certainly won’t do it.
>
> For everyone who does have enough IPv4 addresses, it does. This is the problem in a nutshell. If that starts 
> trending, IPv6 is done

This is virtually no-one with any growth. That’s why Azure, AWS, and Google have been snapping up every large prefix 
that comes on
the market as fast as they can. I don’t see how this can possibly trend long enough to matter before it hits that brick 
wall.
.
> > I think the only way out is through.
>
> I hope not, both for IPv6 sake and for the network users. We dont know how much longer the goal will take, there is 
> materializing a real possibility we will never quite reach it, and the potholes on the way are pretty rough.

By “the only way out is through” I meant that the only way we can get back to anything resembling mono-stack is, in 
fact, to complete the transition to IPv6.

> And as the trip winds on, the landscape is changing, not necessarily for the better.

The IPv4 landscape will continue to get worse and worse. It cannot possibly get better, there just aren’t enough 
addresses for that.

> One more "any decade now" and another IPv4 replacement/extension might just happen on the scene and catch on, 
> rendering IPv6 the most wasteful global technical debacle to date.

If that’s what it takes to move forward with a protocol that has enough addresses, then so be it. I’m not attached to 
IPv6 particularly, but I recognize that IPv4 can’t keep up. As such, IPv6 is just the best current candidate. If 
someone offers a better choice, I’m all for it.

> >  Unfortunately, the IPv6 resistant forces
> > are making that hard for everyone else.
> >
> > Owen
>
> You say that as if it was a surprise, when it should not have been, and you say that as if something can be done 
> about it, which we should know by now cannot be the primary focus, since it cannot be done in any timely fashion. If 
> at all.

It’s not a surprise, but it is a tragedy.

There are things that can be done about it, but nobody currently wants to do them.

> Its time to throw mud on the wall and see what sticks. Dual stack and wait is an ongoing failure slouching to 
> disaster.

IPv4 is an ongoing failure slouching to disaster, but the IPv6-resistant among us remain in denial about that.

At some point, we are going to have to make a choice about how much longer we want to keep letting them hold us back. 
It will not be an easy choice, it will not be convenient, and it will not be simple.

The question is how much more pain an dhow much longer will it take before the choice becomes less difficult than the 
wait?

Owen