WG Action: Conclusion of IP Version 6 (ipv6)

Sun Sep 30 14:05:56 UTC 2007

John Curran wrote:
> At 7:56 PM +0930 9/30/07, Mark Prior wrote:
>> It would be nice to see some evidence of some forward motion but I don't
>> see any. The vendors seem to point at a lack of demand and the ISPs
>> claim a lack of support from the vendors and/or not customer demand.
> 
> It's going to get real interesting, since (in general):
> 
> 1) Customers aren't going to ask for IPv6 (it's not their problem)

Well some do :) but in general it's just the plumbing that no one cares
about.

> 2) ISP's may plan a few years out, but don't make capital commitments
>     until they're absolutely required.

Yes but many ISPs would be using hardware that the vendors claim is
compliant so why not test their claims and start submitting bug reports?

Of more concern would be the operations and management software, which
probably doesn't exist. This probably means that right now any
deployment would need to focus on the ISP itself rather than their
customers. Although some customers are happy to beta test just about
anything :)

> Alas, this particular feature set (functional IPv6 and transition tools)
> is not just one new protocol feature or option; it's an order of magnitude
> more complex and will take ISP's months (or even years) to deploy.

These are the same ISPs and vendors that seem to have managed to deploy
MPLS in a more rapid fashion.

> It's amazing that got the need for the new protocol right more than a
> decade ago, but seemed to have left all the details to the last minute.

I hope we're not waiting to see what happens at the end of that minute.

Mark.