Comcast Plans IPv6 Trials In 2010 173
Mortimer.CA writes "In a weblog posting, Jason Livingood, Executive Director of Comcast's Internet Systems has stated that they're beginning public trials of IPv6; Comcast hopes 'that these trials will encourage other stakeholders to make plans to continue, or to begin, work on IPv6 in 2010 so that all stakeholders do their part in ensuring the future of the Internet is as bright and innovative as it has been in the past.' Interested guinea pigs can volunteer at Comcast6.net (FAQ). Those who have IPv6 connectivity via other means can check out their IPv6-only web presence."
ipv6.comcast.net isn't ipv6 only (Score:5, Informative)
I have no ipv6 at this location and it loads just fine here, not exactly 'ipv6 only' like the Dancing Kame ...
Re:Oh, well... (Score:4, Informative)
IPv6 only test... (Score:5, Informative)
ipv6.google.com [google.com] is IPv6 only, and if you can reach it, you are IPv6 enabled.
We actually used this for the IPv6 test in Netalyzr [berkeley.edu] as the basis of the IPv6 connectivity test. Our servers don't have IPv6, but we have a small amount of javascript on the analysis page that tries to fetch the logo from IPv6.google.com and reports success or failure back to the server.
Re:Will they permit NATs? (Score:3, Informative)
Its pretty hard to stop someone from using a NAT. Comcast can't really tell the difference between a NAT and a single machine without deep packet inspection.
I am pretty sure there is no difference between a "normal" and NAT packet once it leaves the router. It doesn't matter how much Comcast examines it.
Re:Will they permit NATs? (Score:3, Informative)
But there is. For one thing the TTL will be one lower than "usual". You can hide that, but there are lots of other ways to detect it.
Re:IPv6? (Score:5, Informative)
Pinging ipv6.comcast.net [68.87.64.59]
It works for me.
$ ping6 ipv6.comcast.net
PING6(56=40+8+8 bytes) 2002:1159:44ef::226:48ff:fe12:a9a7 --> 2001:558:1002:5:68:87:64:59
16 bytes from 2001:558:1002:5:68:87:64:59, icmp_seq=0 hlim=52 time=235.216 ms
16 bytes from 2001:558:1002:5:68:87:64:59, icmp_seq=1 hlim=52 time=245.426 ms
This is through an Apple airport base station via whatever tunnel provider it uses for its IPv6 support. No manual setup, just click the buttons to turn IPv6 on and to block incoming connections.
Re:IPv6 only test... (Score:3, Informative)
208.67.219.132 is OpenDNS.
-molo
You got trapped by OpenDNS (Score:5, Informative)
You got trapped by OpenDNS. OpenDNS is VERY agressive at wildcarding network failures:
132.219.67.208.in-addr.arpa. 18794 IN PTR hit-nxdomain.opendns.com.
So even though there is a valid name for ipv6.google.com (the Google DNS servers return a valid reply with a 0-size answer for an A query, and the whole data for an AAA query), OpenDNS instead goes "hey, lets wildcard it and return our server!"
This behavior is why I'm NOT a fan of OpenDNS.
Re:Grudgingly, impressed. (Score:5, Informative)
I was part of the team that wrote the IPv6 portion of the DOCSIS 3.0 specs. Although DOCSIS 3.0 added a huge number of features, the two that the cable companies were most desperate for were channel bonding (so they could compete with fiber) and IPv6 support.
IPv6 has been internal testing with major cable operators for several years now. Comcast was always likely to be the first to deploy it (for reasons that I can't go into) but I expect the other major operators to follow suit within a year or two.
Re:IPv6? (Score:3, Informative)
Looks like ipv6.comcast.net has both A (IPv4) and AAAA (IPv6) records.
$ host ipv6.comcast.net
ipv6.comcast.net has address 69.252.76.96
ipv6.comcast.net has address 68.87.64.59
ipv6.comcast.net has IPv6 address 2001:558:1002:5:68:87:64:59
ipv6.comcast.net has IPv6 address 2001:558:1004:9:69:252:76:96
Re:And what, pray tell, do these good people do? (Score:2, Informative)
Your ISP can easily protect you from IPv6 by giving you a NAT router, or you can get one yourself. As IPv6 gets rolled out, I expect more and more IPV6 to IPv4 NAT routers will become popular.
You ask for www.google.com, your computer does an IPv4 lookup to the router, the router translates that to an IPv6 lookup, caches the IPv6 address, and returns a valid-looking IPv4 address to your computer. When you ask for that IPv4 address, the router knows what IPv6 address it has associated with it and handles the heavy lifting for you. Just like regular NAT, except there's a protocol change too (which is pretty trivial).
Although, to be fair, you can actually load an IPv6 stack on Microsoft operating systems as far back as Windows 98 (DOS kernel) or Windows 2000 (NT kernel) and you may even be able to go further back than that. If you are concerned about IPv6 support on older operating systems than that, you'll have to opt for the router solution.