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Conflicting stories of IPv6
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Network Architecture Alert Newsletter By Jeff Caruso, Network World, 02/19/08
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4 Y5 ]6 w" C* m7 i8 M, B$ tIPv6 has been written off for years, but the issues that it is designed to address are not going away. These days, you see seemingly conflicting stories in the press - some say we need to change from IPv4 to IPv6 any day now, and other stories saying the need is not so great. But above all the noise, IPv6 adoption is steadily picking up.. ]" E$ U8 D( k `6 E% r( k( Q
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For example, Extreme Networks last week announced that it helped a community college make the transition to a network that supports Internet2 applications and IPv6. Bucks County (Pa.) Community College and its 10,000 students got a network that supports IPv4 and IPv6 switching and routing, and 10 Gigabit Ethernet in the core.
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1 w& u. G+ Y( |! J; b8 N' UExtreme's IPv6 support in hardware was a big part of the decision and the school says the transition to the new version of the protocol was "very simple."- j* \5 ~% c9 J, z( G# l, [
$ ?5 ~& N7 r0 }) d- m4 {- v! |At the same time, you hear that many IT professionals aren't really looking at IPv6 yet. The widely held perception is that IPv4 still has a lot of life left in it, in terms of address space. And then we hear that IPv4 addresses could now become "tradeable goods"; this may delay the need for IPv6 further, but it's unclear how long of a delay that would be.' x4 W3 @. a$ x7 x1 u1 z0 J
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Jeff Doyle has written about IPv4 address depletion in the past in his Cisco Subnet blog; his most recent post on the topic, written in the fall, detailed where we stand on IP address blocks.8 q" F& u! J8 e# c; V- }$ u
% ]7 e4 x$ g4 ?+ O! aMany experts agree that we need to move to IPv6 to avoid a large-scale IP address crisis; the question is, when? The answer at least appears to be a moving target, and that only continues to confuse IT pros. E5 S2 g' P, I! Q
& N! d: e! x. k3 a/ A$ mAll contents copyright 1995-2008 Network World, Inc. http://www.networkworld.com - Y. E l3 j7 M. t$ v
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Source: http://www.networkworld.com/newsletters/lans/2008/0218lan1.html |
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