Defining IPv6.

(Internet Protocol Version 6) The next generation IP protocol. Started in 1991, the specification was completed in 1997 by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). IPv6 is backward compatible with and is designed to fix the shortcomings of IPv4, such as data security and maximum number of user addresses. IPv6 increases the address space from 32 to 128 bits, providing for an unlimited (for all intents and purposes) number of networks and systems. It also supports quality of service (QoS) parameters for realtime audio and video. Originally called "IP Next Generation' (IPng), IPv6 is expected to slowly replace IPv4, with the two existing side by side for many years. IPv6 was officially deployed in July 2004 when ICANN added IPv6 records to its DNS root server for the jp (Japan) and kr (Korea) country codes.

Application layer HTTP SMTP FTP, SSH, IRC, SNMP SIP. RTP

Transport layer: TCP, UDP, SCTP, DCCP

Network layer IPv4, IPv6, ICMP, ARP, Data link layer Ethernet Wi-Fi, Token ring, FDDI, Physical layer RS-232 RS-449

IPv6 is version 6 of the Internet Protocol, and initially called IP then Next Generation (IPng) when it was picked as the winner in the IETF's IPng selection process. IPv6 is intended to replace the previous standard, IPv4, which only supports up to about 4 billion addresses, whereas IPv6 supports up to about undecillion addresses. This is the equivalent of 430 quintillion addresses per square inch of the Earth's surface. It is expected that IPv4 will be supported until at least 2025, to allow time for bugs and system errors to be corrected. The compelling reason behind the formation of IPv6 was lack of address space, especially in the heavily populated countries of Asia such as India and China. The introduction of network address translation (NAT) has to a certain extent alleviated this problem. NAT, however, makes certain applications, such as VoIP and certain multi-user games, impossible or technically difficult. Currently the big drive for IPv6 is new uses, such as mobility, quality of service, privacy extension and so on.

IPv6 is the second version of the Internet Protocol to be formally adopted for general use. (There was also an IPv5 but it was not a successor to IPv4; rather, it was an experimental flow-oriented streaming protocol, intended to support voice, video, and audio.)

The plan is for IPv6 to form the basis for future expansion of the Internet. Although IPv6 was adopted by the IETF as the successor to IPv4 over ten years ago (in 1994, worldwide IPv6 deployment as a publicly-accessible intemet is still only a few percent of the size of the worldwide IPv4 Internet.

IPv6 addressing

The most dramatic change from IPv4 to IPv6 is the length of network addresses. IPv6 addresses, as defined by REC 2373 and RF.C 237.4 are 128 bits long; this corresponds to 32 hexadecimal digits, which are normally used when writing IPv6 addresses, as described in the following section.

The number of possible addresses in IPv6 is (insert). The number of IPv6 addresses can also be thought of as (insert) as each of the 32 hexadecimal digits can take 16 values In many situations, IPv6 addresses are composed of two logical parts: a 64-bit network prefix, and a 64-bit host-addressing pad, which is often automatically generated from the inteface MAC address.

It is often argued that 128-bit addresses are overkill, and that the Internet will never need that many. It should be noted that the rationale for the 128-bit address space is not primarily to make sure that addresses never ran out, but rather to ensure that routing can be handled smoothly by keeping the address space unfragmented, rather than as the current situation is with IPv4, where a great number of discrete netblocks can be, and often are, assigned to one organization.

Notation for IPv6 addresses

IPv6 addresses, which are 128 bits long, are normally written as eight groups of four hexadecimal digits. For example,

2001: 0dbB: 85d3: 08d3: 1319: 8a2e: 0370: 7334 ... is a valid IPv6 address.

If a four-digit group is 0000, it may be omitted.

For example, 2001:0db8: 85a3: 0000: 1319: 8a2e: 0370: 7344 is the same IPv6 address as

2001:0db8: 85a3: 1319: 8a2e: 0370: 7344

Following this rule, if more than two consecutive colons result from this omission, they may be reduced to two colons as long as there is only one group of two or more consecutive colons. Thus

2001:0DB8:0000:0000:0000:0000:1428:57ab

2001:0DB8:0000:0000:0000:1428:57ab

2001:0DB8:0:0:0:0:1428:57ab

2001:0DBS:O::0:1428:57ab

2001:ODB8::1428 :57ab

are all valid and mean the same thing, but

2001::25,de::cade

is invalid because it is not clear how many 0000 groups are on each side.

Leading zeros in a group can be omitted. Thus

2001:0DBB:02de::0el3

is the same thing as

2001:DB8:2de::el3

If the address is an IPv4 address in disguise, the last 32 bits may be written in decimal; thus

::ffff- 192.168.89.9 is the same as ::ffffc0a8:5909, but not the same as:: 192.168.89.9 or::c0a8:5909.

The ::ffff. 1.2.3.4 format is called an IPv4-mapped address.

The:: 1.2.3.4 format is an IPv4- compatible address.

IPv4 addresses are easily converted to IPv6 format. For instance, if the decimal IPv4 address was 135.75.43.52 (in hexadecimal, 0x874B2B34), it could be converted to 0000:0000:0000:0000:0000:0000:874B:2B34 or::874B:2B34. Then again, one could use the hybrid notation (IPv4-compatible address), in which case the address would be :: 135.75.43.52. These IPv4-compatible addresses are being deprecated, because IPv6 transition mechanisms no longer use them. The respective RFCs will reflect this shortly.

IPv6 packet

The IPv6 packet is composed of two main parts: the header and the payload. The header is in the first 40 bytes and contains both source and destination addresses (bits each), as well as the version (4-bit IP version, traffic class (8 bits, Packet Priority), flow label (20 bits, QoS management), payload length (16 bits), next header (8 bits), and hop limit (8 bits, time to live). Next comes the payload, which can be up to 64k in size in standard mode, or larger with a "jumbo payload" option.

There have been two slightly different versions of IPv6. The now-obsolete initial version, described in RFC 1883, differs from the current proposed standard version, described in RFC 2460, in two fields: 4 bits have been reassigned from flow label to traffic class All other differences are minor.

Fragmentation is handled in the host only in IPv6. In IPv6, options also move out of the standard header and are specified by the Next Header field, similar in function to IPV4's Protocol field.

An example: in IPv4 one would add a Strict Source and Record Routing (SSRR) option to the IPv4 header itself in order to enforce a certain route for the packet, but in IPv6 one would make the Next Header field indicate that a Routing header comes next. The Routing header would then specify the additional routing information for the packet, and then indicate that the, for example, TCP header comes next. This is analogous to the handling of AH and ESP in IPSec for IPv4 (which applies to IPv6 as well, of course).

IPv6 and the Domain Name System

IPv6 addresses are represented in the Domain Name System by AAAA records (so-called quad-A records) for forward lookups (by analogy with A records for IPv4), reverse lookups take place under ip 6. arpa (previously ip 6. int), where address space is delegated on nibble boundaries. This scheme is defined in RFC 3596

The AAAA scheme was one of two proposals at the time the IPv6 architecture was being designed. The other proposal would have had A6 records for the forward lookup and a number of other innovations such as bit-string labels and DNAME records. It is defined in the experimental RFC 2874 and its references. While the AAAA scheme is a simple generalisation of the IPv4 DNS, the A6 scheme was an overhaul of the DNS to be more general, and hence more complex:

** A6 records allowed a single IPv6 address to be broken across several records, perhaps held in different zones; this allowed in principle for rapid renumbering of networks, for example.

** Address delegation by use of NS records was largely replaced with DNAME records (analogous to the existing CNAME but renaming an entire tree), This permitted related forward and reverse components to be managed together.

A new data type called the bit label was introduced to domain names, primarily for reverse lookups.

The AAAA scheme was effectively standardized on in August 2002 by RFC 3363 (with further discussion of the pros and cons of both schemes in RFC 3364).

IPv6 deployment

On 20 July 2004 ICANN announced that the root DNS servers for the Internet had been modified to support both IPv6 and IPv4.

Disadvantages:

** the need for roll out of pervasive support for IPv6 throughout the Internet and its connected devices

** to be reachable from the IPv4 universe during the transition phase, you still need an IPv4-address or some kind of NAT (=shared IP-address) in the gateway routers (IPv6<__>IPv4) which adds complexity there and means the large address space promised by the specification can't be immediately used effectively.

** remaining architectural problems, such as the lack of agreement for proper support for IPv6 multihoming

* 6bone

* ICN4Pv6

Transition mechanisms

Until IPv6 native connectivity becomes widely available and supported by the routing infrastructure, it is necessary to use transition mechanisms to tunnel IPv6 through IPv4 networks. That can be achieved with:

** configured static IPv6-in-IP tunnels between two dual-stack nodes, or

** 6to4, which is an automatic and asymmetric tunnel mechanism.

These tunnels work by encapsulating IPv6 packets into IPv4 packets with IP next-layer protocol number 41, hence the name proto-41. Similarly, ISATAP allows the transmission of IPv6 packets through an internal IPv4-only networking infrastructure. It also uses protocol number 41.

When IPv6 connectivity is desired from behind a NAT device, many of which do not forward proto-41 packets properly, one may use the Teredo protocol which encapsulates IPv6 over UDP over IPv4. It is also possible to use IPv6-to-IPv4 and IPv6-to-IPv4 proxies though that is typically application-layer specific (eg. HTTP

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