IPv6 at the University of Wisconsin

Hopefully 79,228,162,514,264,337,593,543,950,336 IP addresses will be enough for a while.

A subset of the UW IPv6 Task Force:

Dale W. Carder - DoIT Network Svcs.

Bob Plankers - DoIT Sys EngineeringSteve Barnet - IceCube

2008-09-26

Agenda

• Quick overview & introductions– Jurgen

• IPv6 Networking Crash Course– Dale

• Technology issues– Bob

• End-User issues– Steve

• Questions– Jurgen or Al, moderator

Why are we here?

- IPv4 resources, shared by campus, are running out.

- IPv4 address space, shared by the world, is running out.

- The need for the true, global, unencumbered, end-to-end connectivity we have today will continue to exist.

What is this IPv6 thing?

• “Just another protocol” – (remember appletalk, decnet, ipx, etc?)

• A Method to continue to give all internet endpoints a globally unique address in the future.

• Not a drop-in replacement for IPv4. In fact, it’s natively incompatible with IPv4! (FAIL)

Addressing Structure “96 more bits, no magic”

• IPv4 address– 32 bits – “dotted quad” format– 128.104.181.26

• IPv6 address– 128 bits– hexadecimal format– 2607:f388:e:100:217:f2ff:fe0a:bdf6

No Native Compatibility between the two.

IPv6 Subnet features• All Subnets are the same, fixed size, supporting a nearly “unlimited” number of hosts.

• UW holds an ISP-size allocation, which allows for theoretically 4 billion subnets.

• This means we can give “a lot” UW entities “a lot” of subnets. One Example method:

2607:f388:0143:1001:0217:02ff:fe0a:bdf6

UW Dept ID Host ID

Dept subnet ID

IPv6 host addressing features

• Automatic address, based on MAC address– MAC: 00:17:f2:0a:bd:f6– IPv6: 2607:f388:e:100:217:f2ff:fe0a:bdf6

• Static assigned addresses- 2607:f388:ab:2ef::53

• “Privacy” addresses- clients change address every day

• Shorthand notation 2607:f388:ab:2ef::1 equals 2607:f388:00ab:02ef:0000:0000:0000:0001

IPv6 / IPv4 coexistence

• Did I mention they are incompatible?

- However, you can run both at the same time. This is called “Dual Stack”.

• An IPv6 enabled host checks DNS and prefers using IPv6 when it can

> dig ricotta.doit.wisc.edu anyricotta.doit.wisc.edu. 14340 IN AAAA 2607:f388:e:100:217:f2ff:fe0a:bdf6

ricotta.doit.wisc.edu. 10341 IN A 144.92.67.161

IPv4 / IPv6 Coexistence (cont)

• The most reasonable deployment model for campus would be to run dual stack.

• Hosts will need to run v6 to get around NAT, or talk to regions of the world without v4. This will be critical for servers.

• Hosts will need to run v4 indefinitely to talk to “legacy” v4-only hosts, applications, lab equipment, etc.

DHCP & DNS in v6

• Hosts don’t have to use DHCP, although it’s still useful to get DNS server info via DHCP

• DHCP can still be used for static host assignment.

• Since host IPv6 addresses are messy, DNS will become more important.

• You may want to consider using dynamic dns from the dhcp server.

IPv6 on the UW network today

• We have our address space, and a preliminary allocation plan.

• Core routers are running v6 today.

• Some testing has occurred.• Firewalling is a weak link.• Integration into AANTS will take some time.

End of dale’s content

• The next slides are stuff I had lying around

• toss them or make new ones• whatever

Why UW must adopt IPv6 at some point

• IPv6 will be the only method left for true end-to-end connectivity

• Collaboration with entities beyond North America

• To be competitive

•Business Continuity

IPv6 timeline• Right now there are a few people trying to reach us via IPv6.

• At some point, there will be people who will only be able to reach us via IPv6.

• IPv6 will probably be the only way to ensure global reachability.

• Campus Backbone Ready

IPv6 Roadblocks

• 3rd Party Application Support• Numerous Backend Systems• Legacy Systems• Staff Training• Transition Issues

• Need to make IPv6 a Requirement on all new Software/System acquisitions.

IPv6 Planning

• Task force stuff

Other stuff

• Host support

- native support in MacOS, Vista, Unixen

- it’s there, but not on by default in XP

Security

• OMFG, really?

Steal more content from the Michaels

• http://net.doit.wisc.edu/~dwcarder/HARE-v6%202008-08-27.pdf