Re: Mac OS X 10.7, still no DHCPv6

[Owen DeLong <owen () delong com>]

On Feb 28, 2011, at 12:34 PM, Joe Abley wrote:

> On 2011-02-28, at 15:27, Randy Bush wrote:
>
> > o if ipv6 can not operate as the only protocol, and we will be out
> >   of ipv4 space and have to deploy 6-only networks, it damned well
> >   better be able to stand on its own.
>
> Do you think I was suggesting that IPv6 as a protocol doesn't need to be able to stand on its own two feet? Because I 
> wasn't; that's patently absurd.
It is both absurd and pretty much exactly what you said.

> However, a fixation on v6-only operation makes no sense for general-purpose deployment when most content and peers 
> are only reachable via IPv4.
I guess this is a matter of perspective. For some of us that already have complete dual stack deployments,
focusing on the issues present in IPv6-only operation is just the next logical step.

In some cases, I would say that the v6-only considerations are well worth considering as you prepare
to deploy dual-stack so that you don't deploy dual-stack in such a way as to create unnecessary
inter-protocol dependencies that will hurt you later.

The reality is that IPv6-only networks are not likely in the foreseeable future is only a true statement
if your foreseeable future ends in the past. There are already a certain number of functional operating
deployed IPv6-only networks. Further, it's not going to be more than a few months before we start
seeing networks that have very limited or degraded IPv4 capabilities, if any, due to the inability to
grant addresses to new networks in some areas.

> I appreciate that there are walled gardens, captive mobile applications, telemetry networks and other niche 
> applications for which v6-only networks make sense today. I'm not talking about them. I'm talking about the network 
> that supports what the average user thinks of as the Internet.
And how do you think the average residential end user is going to see the IPv4 internet next year?

> The immediate task at hand is a transition from IPv4-only to dual stack, regardless of how many NATs or other 
> transition mechanisms the IPv4 half of the dual stack is provisioned through.
Yes, but, given the nearly immediate runout of IPv4, I would say that doing so in a way that best
facilitates IPv6-only hosts being functional is very much worthy of consideration in this process.

Owen