US Has More IPv6 Eyeballs Than Asia, Because of Apple

An anonymous reader writes "Google has been checking to see who's using IPv6. According to the company's tracking, half of all IPv6-capable systems seen by Google are Macs, helping the US land in fifth place in percentage of IPv6 users world wide, ahead of China and Japan."

False negatives abound

[Anonymous Coward]

OK, so I have 7 computers in my house. They all run either Linux or Vista. (Some both as two are dual boot). They are all IPv6 capable. However, my Linksys NATing router is not. So unless my machines find an ISATAP server somewhere, there is going to be no information that Google gets showing that all my machines could do it if I just sprung for a new router. I would imagine there are a lot of people in the same situation. I guess if they are trying to find out how many homes are capable - then maybe this is the right way. But if they are trying to just see how many COMPUTERS - then it isn't going to be correct.

Re:Linux much

[LincolnQ]

Except I'm under Linux and no ipv6 sites seem to work for me (default Ubuntu installation). If Apple is making it work by default, well, that's better than what Linux has been doing.

Re:How can they tell?

[hedwards]

Except he's ultimately right. There's no reason why I should have to replace any network devices on my home network because everybody else is using IPV6. That would be costly and wasteful. And for the near term that's going to be supported by most ISPs out of cheapness, no reason to drag people's home networks into it needlessly.

I prefer to spend my extra cash on death rays and doom devices. Also large quantities of obscure computing equipment bits.

Re:Linux much

[lysergic.acid]

don't you need both? if you have a router that supports IPv6 but your OS isn't configured to use IPv6 then you're still not going to be able to access IPv6 hosts. Windows XP still doesn't have IPv6 enabled by default--you need to go to network connection properties and add the protocol "Microsoft TCP/IP version 6" in order to enable IPv6 support.

so it's not a matter of it being IPv6 pushed in the wrong place, but a matter of networking hardware manufacturers being too slow to adopt IPv6. that's not really up to OS developers.

most existing networking equipment can probably already support IPv6 with a firmware update. but a lot of consumer networking equipment vendors are probably waiting for IPv6 to gain more traction so that they can a separate line of "new and improved" IPv6-enabled routers/switches/etc. to cash in on unnecessary equipment upgrades.

Re:Linux much

[aliquis]

The BSDs has had IP v6 support forever to (and OS X has probably had it as long as it has existed to.) But what good is it if you can't get a real IP anyway. Proxy ftw? For what reason? *care* as long as the ISP don't give me an IP v6 network.

Re:sounds damn scary

[caitsith01]

You're kidding, but why do stories have to use lame 'industry insider' phrases when an ordinary one would do just as well ("actual users" might fit the bill)?

Re:False negatives abound

[Tubal-Cain]

On one side, we have logged-in members of the highly technical Slashdot, all people in technical careers that I know IRL, and even Wikipedia claiming that IPv6 will help security. [wikipedia.org]

On the other side, we have a single AC saying otherwise.

AC must be right

Re:How can they tell?

[ceoyoyo]

Okay, I've got four macs, an airport and an iPhone. Each one gets an IP. I know the airport and the Macs support IPv6. Not sure about the phone.

My anecdote cancels your anecdote?

Re:False negatives abound

[batkiwi]

Firewalls and routers existed well before NAT became mainstream. You do realize that just because NAT acts as a firewall doesn't mean that it is a GOOD firewall, nor the ONLY type of firewall? (most NAT routers now allow in UDP packets from ANY source once a port is opened, for example, to allow for games to work)

Re:How can they tell?

[A beautiful mind]

NAT is causing fucked up problems that are serious but aren't given enough publicity, like making the big DNS vulnerability of the year still apply, even if the software side is fixed due to NAT's tendency to line up/reuse port numbers instead of randomizing them - even if the application side did randomize.

NAT is a horrible, horrible thing that shouldn't be used because it's causing subtle but ultimately very bad things to happen. Besides, home routers could just come with a default denial of all incoming packets unless they are related to an open connection rule to substitute the "firewalling" people enjoy with NAT.

Re:How can they tell?

[aoteoroa]

You shouldn't be providing any services to the internet from your home

Where's the fun in that?

Sure a virtual server somewhere might have more bandwidth than my home cable but at home I can experiment with different setups. Some people play video games. . .I like to play with new distros, or software. If running a http or ssh server from home is wrong then I don't want to be right :-)

Re:You're not so smart yourself

[amorsen]

Next question: What url does Joe Public enter on his browser to get to the router config page, so that he can enter the username and password in order to get access to the ISP's network?

Another topic of debate on IPv6 lists. Apple believes that mDNS+a special configuration program is the solution here. Others have talked about reserving an IP address for this purpose. I believe that mDNS advertising something like router.local or linksys.local will be the most common method.

Re:False negatives abound

[Anonymous Coward]

You do realize this argument assumes that people like Fyodor will never, ever, ever find a way around this particular problem?

You also realize this argument depends on IPv6 addresses being assigned in a non-predictable manner?