IPv6: Behind the hype

Recent developments surrounding the long-anticipated upgrade to the 'Net's main communications protocol.

IPv6 backers have touted the next-generation Internet technology for years, warning U.S. service providers and enterprises that if they don't upgrade soon they'll fall hopelessly behind their Asian and European competitors. These worrywarts may finally be getting it right.

Developed a decade ago by the Internet Engineering Task Force, IPv6 offers many advantages over IPv4 including easier administration, built-in security and an enhanced addressing scheme. IPv6 uses a 128-bit addressing scheme, which allows a virtually limitless number of uniquely identified systems to be connected directly to the Internet. IPv4 uses a 32-bit addressing scheme, which supports only a few billion systems.

Large blocks of IPv4 addresses were allocated to the U.S. government agencies and companies that created the Internet, causing shortages in other parts of the world. That's why there's more interest in IPv6 in Asia and Europe than in the United States.

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IPv6 backers have touted the next-generation Internet technology for years, warning U.S. service providers and enterprises that if they don't upgrade soon they'll fall hopelessly behind their Asian and European competitors. These worrywarts may finally be getting it right.

Developed a decade ago by the Internet Engineering Task Force, IPv6 offers many advantages over IPv4 including easier administration, built-in security and an enhanced addressing scheme. IPv6 uses a 128-bit addressing scheme, which allows a virtually limitless number of uniquely identified systems to be connected directly to the Internet. IPv4 uses a 32-bit addressing scheme, which supports only a few billion systems.

Large blocks of IPv4 addresses were allocated to the U.S. government agencies and companies that created the Internet, causing shortages in other parts of the world. That's why there's more interest in IPv6 in Asia and Europe than in the United States.

Driven by new wireless applications and devices that require many IP addresses, IPv6 is finally gaining momentum. IPv6 is built into most routers and operating systems. New IPv6-enabled network hardware and software products are hitting the market. Venture capital firms are investing in IPv6-related start-ups. And U.S. government agencies, under a mandate to support IPv6 by 2008, are gaining valuable hands-on experience with the technology.

But many challenges remain for IPv6 deployment, including migrating enterprise software to IPv6, training network engineers in the next-generation of IP and allocating the money required for IPv6 upgrades. In addition, systems running both IPv6 and IPv4 suffer from significant performance degradation when compared to today's IPv4-only systems.

Here are some of the latest developments in IPv6 as chronicled by Network World:

InfoWeapons unveils IPv6-ready DNS appliances
Start-up InfoWeapons is selling what it claims are the first DNS appliances to support both IPv4 and IPv6 running in dual-stack mode.