|
FINAL
DAYS TO REGISTER FOR THE NORTH AMERICAN IPv6 SUMMIT
June
14-17, Santa Monica, CA
Register
Now
At
the request of the Department of Defense the early
bird discount for military/government
has been extended until June 17, 2004. Register
Now
Standing
on The Shoulders of Giants: An Invitation to the IPv6
Summit in Santa Monica
by
Alex Lightman, Publisher
LINK
TO THIS ARTICLE
Excitement
is building for the IPv6 Summit in Santa Monica, even
from professionals who have a well developed sense
of emotional objectivity and don't excite easily.
Signs of uptake are all around this Summit: more corporate,
nonprofit, and media sponsors than ever (in the history
of IPv6 events), our conference hotel - the Loews
- sold out, exhibits area completely filled, and registrations
from all over the world. As Conference Chairman, it's
my job to make sure that all attendees get tremendous
value from the presentations they see and hear, and
the relationships they make, and I'm very confident
that this IPv6 Summit will deliver.
There are several reasons to attend, or, if you are
already registered, to encourage you to send your
recommendation urging everyone you like
who works with the Internet to join you at the IPv6
Summit. Here are mine. Please send me your reasons
if I've missed any.
Speak with Internet Geniuses, Visionaries and Giants
There will be over 50 speakers, all of them knowledgeable,
many of them highly influential, and some of them
giants in the success of the Internet, which now reachs
over 800 million people, including Vint Cerf, Larry
Roberts, and Larry Smarr. As Sir Isaac Newton said,
"If I've have seen a little farther than others,
it's because I stood on the shoulders of giants."
I know most of the speakers, some of them very well,
and can say that they are some of the finest people
I've ever met, and, for those who want to build on
the encounter, meeting some of these leaders can offer
possibly life changing opportunities. After meeting
Larry Smarr (whose lab unleashed what became the standards
for both web server and browser) at a conference I
have, based on Prof. Smarr's introductions, met
over 100 other people, attended leading national and
international conferences, and written a dozen articles
. Meeting Latif Ladid was similarly momentous and
life changing, and led to my organizing four IPv6
events, almost 1,500 attendees in aggregate, in the
last year, and introductions to great people in Japan,
China, Europe, India, and Australia. If you attend
and introduce yourself and avoid the temptation to
bury your head in email sand, you will meet hundreds
of people at the IPv6 Summit. (Get a head start by
reading all the 6Sense articles, because
all the authors will be in attendance, and you'll
have something to discuss). If you follow up,
you will make dozens of new friends who all have in
common a passion for the future Internet, and your
life and work will be enriched. Note that the CharmBadges,
part of a broad class of "wearable computers
capable of intelligently responding to surroundings"
that I recently receive a US patent for, will help
to automatically generate an e-list of all the people
and companies you come face to face with at the summit,
without needing to gather business cards or type them
in. Follow up has never been so easy with new friends!
Profit from New Customers, Partners, and Coalition
Partners
During the course of just a few hours (at the
cocktail reception, two lunches, and after my talk)
at the Beijing IPv6 Summit I was able to connect with
executives and sell sponsorships to NTT/Verio, Intel,
Foundry, Agilent, and the IPv6 Promotion Council of
Japan, a value of about $60,000 now (and potentially
multiples of this later) for the $2,000 cost of my
trip. You have the potential to make an equally good
ROI for yourself and your company. Though there are
more people at the Beijing IPv6 Summit, there are
more IPv6 related decision makers with budgets at
the US IPv6 Summits than anywhere with the possible
exception of Japan. We sell out sponsorships each
time because people in the US are very focused on
using IPv6 for business advantage and getting a good
Return On Investment, and because executives in government
can get measurable improvements in their Mission Effectiveness
Factors. IPv6 will impact billions, then trillions,
of dollars of business every year, and you can't have
too many allies. If we've learned anything from Iraq,
it's that everyone, even the US, needs Coalition Partners,
and the best place to start the process of getting
them related to the future Internet is to meet and
start doing business or projects together at the IPv6
Summit. Again, the CharmBadge will help everyone keep
track of all the people (and only those people) that
they've met face to face and exhibits visited, facilitating
partnership follow up in minutes, vs. the average
45 day delay from a conference booth visit.
Get Your Word on IPv6 to the World
Our IPv6 Summit PR director, Joya Subhudi, in
addition to being a very nice person, has done an
outstanding job getting the top Internet and networking
publications to be media sponsors, which is basically
a zero dollar exchange of messaging that lets us get
the word out from the news makers to the people most
interested in hearing what's happening with the Internet.
By attending the summit you greatly increase your
chances, if you have something to say, of getting
your word out to the world. It's been a year, as of
June 13, since John Stenbit, then CIO of the
Dept. of Defense, announced that the DoD would be
mandating IPv6. This summit, honored by the presence
of dozens of journalists all up to speed on IPv6
is the best place to get the word out. The same is
true for your company or agency's work with IPv6.
I have been in the media over 1,000 times, generating
over $100 million worth of advertising in publicity,
because I go where the press is, and I make sure I
give them an interesting story. Joya has invited the
best press for you to tell your story. Will you rise
to the occasion?
Fill Your Mind with an MIT semester worth
of education at 3% of the cost
We have four full days of content at this summit.
As an MIT graduate, I can confirm that there is about
as much to learn from this summit, especially if you
review the PowerPoints or videos afterwards, ask questions
of the speakers, and discuss key points with
colleagues, as from a full semester of MIT engineering
courses. However, the IPv6 summit costs about $500,
while a semester at MIT costs about $15,000.
Help Bring IPv6 to the US, its Coalition Partners,
and the World
We get asked by very powerful people how
many people attended these summits, what organizations
they represent, and what the changes are
from IPv6 summit to summit. We can confirm that, simply
by showing up, you actually help IPv6 to grow, to
evolve, to get investment, to have Requests For Proposals
be written, and hundreds of other projects. We
honor and appreciate Vint Cerf, for instance, for
being one of the people who made the Internet happen,
and know that it would not have happened the same
way without his personal involvement. IPv6 is still
to be shaped, and, by showing up, you increase the
odds that IPv6 will succeed, and you amplify your
chances of making a personal impact on IPv6.
You are Invited to Attend, and to Invite Others
In case you need an invitation, you are hereby invited.
Please come! Even if you've attended before, there
will be new information. For instance, NTT/Verio will
describe what they've learned from having over a thousand
IPv6 enabled routers. You've never heard this talk
before because they've never said it before, and no
one else duplicates this magnitude, nor this same learning
curve. The same is true for other talks. Even if you
don't want to hear all the talks, you can
spend hours in the exhibits area and get a sense of
the state of the v6 art, and talk with people in one
of the dozens of comfortable conversation nooks, some
with inspiring views of the beach and the historic
Santa Monica Pier (featured in dozens of movies and
television shows, including the upcoming Cellular).
A final reason to come is to have a good time and
kick off the summer. Some attendees are making a family
trip out of their summit visit, flying their spouses
and kids in on Thursday night (June 17) after the
summit to see the amusement parks less than an hour
away for a three day weekend starting Friday, including
Universal Studios, Disneyland, Magic Mountain, Knott's
Berry Farm, and local sights like the world famous
Venice Boardwalk (20 minute walk south on the beach
path), the Santa Monica Third Street Promenade (5
minutes walk north), and Palisades Park, probably
the most beautiful and thinnest urban park in the
world, along two miles of cliff just a block north
of the Loews hotel.
Thanks for thinking about the IPv6 Summit. Please
feel free to introduce yourself while you are at the
summit.
In This Third Issue of 6Sense
Now, onto the articles. We are very honored to
have Internet giant Larry Roberts writing in this
issue on a little know advantage of IPv6; business
articles from the business directors of IPv6 organizations
in the US and Japan; and technology insights from
leading practitioners in the US and Canada. My article
from VOX, the newsletter of the Los Angeles Regional
Technology Alliance is reprinted, in the hope of inspiring
metropolitan areas to stop trying to be the next Silicon
Valley, and to start trying to be the new IPv6 regional
cluster. There are also additional resources, including
free subscriptions to highly credible magazines and
seminars to drill down deeper into other aspects of
IPv6. We highly recommend our IPv6 Summit sponsors
and media partners as the best in the business, and
wish you great success with IPv6.
Winning A Place in the New Multi-Trillion Dollar Market
Junaid
Islam
Managing Partner, Pegasys Global Partners
LINK
TO THIS ARTICLE
With the
communications, consumer product and entertainment
industries now on a collision course we have the making
of a “perfect storm” of opportunity that
will create new winners while eliminating incumbents
on a worldwide scale. The globalization of the service
provider business, the increasing connectivity of
consumer appliances and the growth of on-line media
is creating the foundations for a new integrated multi-trillion
dollar industry.
This metamorphosis is also creating new connectivity
requirements as these industries must now enable the
acquisition, sharing and distribution of content on
an unprecedented scale. To help the players of this
game there is IPv6 – a technology designed to
enable ad hoc, secure connectivity of mobile devices
on a global scale. To help understand the pivotal
role of IPv6 will play in enabling this new multi-trillion
dollar market let’s briefly look at the business
drivers of each industry and the connectivity requirements
for success – and perhaps we can even find a
place for ourselves along the way.
In the service provider market we see a move towards
brand expansion with respect to geographic coverage
and service portfolio. Footprint in the physical and
virtual domains is the benchmark that investors look
at when evaluating who will get their financial backing.
Thus the business challenge for service providers
is how to aggregate subscribers who have been acquired
through merger, acquisition or partnership across
multiple networks. Service providers need to manage
subscribers irrespective of the underlying technology
(GSM, cable, DSL, dial, etc) or device type (PC, PDA,
DTV, etc) and this where v6 comes in. By enabling
a common subscriber service architecture across mixed
access networks IPv6 allows service providers to aggregate
their subscriber population on a global basis. The
higher the level of subscriber aggregation, the more
bargaining power service providers have with infrastructure
and on-line media companies and the greater the profit
potential for themselves.
In the consumer product market we see a growing demand
for devices that support a mix of entertainment, e-commerce
and enterprise applications. Consumers now expect
to listen to music, buy songs on-line and receive
email while talking on a phone (if you can still call
it that). While improvements in CPU, memory and battery
assist, being able to dynamically connect to adjacent
devices while linking to remote services is critical
– and this is where IPv6 comes in. IPv6’s
ability to support ad hoc connectivity (without the
need of a host) while simultaneously supporting WAN
communications with one protocol is a major breakthrough.
Moreover, IPv6s ability to permit persistent personal
networks also enables new types of consumer products
and services that were previously unfeasible. For
example one could create a service that enables mobile
subscribers to access premium content on their home
DVR while traveling or instantly deliver footage from
one’s video camera to digital picture frames
as they are being taken – the possibilities new
product design are endless when local and global connectivity
is embedded.
In the world of on-line media, as content owners and
game developers seek to market their properties globally
the ability to identify users and their devices is
critical. Unlike the existing concept of selling a
CD, content owners need to allow users to share content
across their personal devices without risk of re-broadcast.
For content owners IPv6’s ability to uniquely
identify users and securely deliver encrypted content
is critical for content management and distribution.
For multiplayer gaming, users expect to play
against opponents on the other side of world as well
as across the table (or both). And here we see the
ability of IPv6 to enable ad hoc communities over
distributed computing architectures as a powerful
tool for game developers interested in creating the
ultimate shared experience.
While predicting the outcome of new markets is hard,
IPv6’s role as a foundational building block
in the networked media world is certain. By acting
as the binding agent between consumers and their content,
IPv6 is the glue that will facilitate the up-and-coming
mobile entertainment/e-commence/enterprise communications
revolution. With two billion consumers on-line and
more coming, tomorrow's winners will be those who
recognize the new landscape and leverage communications
technology to win a seat in the emerging multi-trillion
dollar market. Where will your place at the table
be?
Is Best Effort IP Really Economic?
Dr.
Lawrence G. Roberts
LINK
TO THIS ARTICLE
Shortly after
I started the ARPANET in 1969 a religion somehow was
created that "best effort" packet routing
is the most economic way to forward data in the Internet.
This was based on the concept that keeping any state
information in the routers would somehow make them
more expensive or un-scaleable. In 1969 this was true,
memory was so expensive that it would have been foolish
to keep any state information about a flow (a flow
is the sequence of packets that forms a call or individual
connection, all going between the same two processes).
In 1969 the memory to keep state information for all
the flows in the highest speed port would have increased
the cost of the port by a factor of ten. Today, in
2004, although the port speed has increased from 50
Kb to 10 Gbps and the number of flows on a port has
increased from 100 to 2M, the memory cost has decreased
sufficiently faster than the port cost that the memory
to keep all the flow state information is now only
0.6% of the port cost. Thus, it now is worthwhile
to examine what benefit keeping this state information
would achieve. The graph below shows that the cost
of flow state memory became economic in the late 1990's.
Flow state allows one to track and control the rate
of a flow. Router control of TCP flows has been based
on the assumption that rate information was not available
in the router and therefore random discards based
on queue length (RED or WRED) have been the best technique
available. This typically permits at most 40% port
utilization to insure low packet delays. However,
given rate information on each flow and measurement
of the total port utilization, TCP flows can be rate
controlled by the router to just fill each port to
80% and not ever build up queuing delay. This can
be done by discarding packets, as is the practice
with slow-start today, or it could be achieved with
rate feedback to the TCP process so that no packets
would need to be discarded. Once a series of routers
in the flow path can negotiate and return the rate
they can support a TCP flow, slow-start can be bypassed
and the sender could jump to the full maximum rate
the network can support without congestion. Whenever
congestion in the network changes, the rate can be
adjusted, thereby allowing the network to rapidly
adjust to varying load without having to confuse the
sender with discards due to congestion and discards
due to transmission errors.
This rate feedback concept has been introduced into
IPv6 in an in-band QoS option field that negotiates
the TCP rate across the network and returns it to
the sender. Each router can adjust the rate to whatever
rate it can support without congestion. When the sender's
TCP process receives the rate feedback, it can immediately
jump to the agreed rate. From time to time the network
may return a different rate, but the sender never
needs to slow down due to lost packets and only needs
to retransmit those packets truly lost due to transmission
failures. Thus, in one round trip time (.1 to .5 seconds)
TCP can start sending at very high rates and thus
send a 1 MB web page in less than one second rather
than the ten seconds typically required today for
pages 1/10 the size. The 10:1 improvement in WWW access
time could dramatically improve productivity. Also,
this technique works well even when the round trip
delay is long as in overseas access or satellite use.
The reason this in-band option is possible with IPv6
and not with IPv4, is that IPv6 protocol has a flow
label that identifies the flow even when the packet
is encrypted and also IPv6 requires each router to
act on hop-by-hop options like the QoS option. Thus,
as the QoS request progresses across the network,
each router can adjust the TCP rate to whatever rate
it can support. This option processing is normally
feasible in IPv4 and given the important addition
of encryption security, even the flow cannot be identified
without the flow label. The benefit of controlling
the flow rates not only allows ten times faster TCP
operation, but it also permits the routers to achieve
80% utilization of the routers and the trunks. This
is because the combined rate of all flows is known
and the port utilization measured, thereby allowing
much greater control of the accepted load. This 100%
increase in utilization results from the addition
of the additional 0.6% cost for the flow state memory,
thereby clearly exploding the old religion that flow
state would increase cost or not scale. On the contrary,
it reduces cost by 60% and permits full in-band QoS
specification including guaranteed rate flows, precedence,
delay priority and TCP rate feedback.
The end result is that IPv6 with this new QoS option
reduces the cost of IP by at least 2:1, decreases
the time for WWW page access by 10:1, allows no-loss
video and voice guaranteed rate flows at any speed,
supports emergency services like 911 through precedence,
and virtually eliminates packet loss in the network
even for TCP. All this is achieved without the routers
needing to (or being able to due to encryption) peer
into levels 4-7 to make a poor guess about the QoS
desired. Thus the actual processing and cost required
for good QoS is actually less with IPv6 than IPv4
and the result is far superior.
IPv6 in Europe:
From R&D to Deployment
Jordi
Palet, IPv6 TF-SC & Consulintel CEO/CTO
LINK
TO THIS ARTICLE
1. IPv6
in the European Commission R&D Activities
In January 2000, the European Commission (EC) Information
Society Technologies Programme (IST), funded the first
attempt to validate the introduction of IPv6 technology
in Europe, the 6INIT
project.
Since then, a number of IPv6 research and development
projects have been funded, representing a huge investment
on behalf of the EC and the project partners, totalizing
over €180M in about 40 projects.
These projects include a broad scope of activities,
some of them with a strong emphasis on IPv6 "per
se," with the main goal being the research and
development related to the protocol itself, while
others just use IPv6 as part of their broader goals.
2. Research
Topics
The projects address a broad range of research and
development topics, including:
- Multicast,
QoS and DiffServ in relation to active networks
technology (GCAP).
- Wireless
Internet environments with QoS awareness (WINE).
- Wireless
access and IP mobility with GPRS, and 3GPP/UMTS
(6WINIT).
- Satellite
broadband access (SATIP6).
- UMTS enhancements
(OverDRiVE).
- Broadband
access using Power Line Technology with QoS and
multicast (6POWER).
- IPv6 QoS
measurement (6QM).
- Multi-hop
heterogeneous wireless IPv6 networks (6HOP).
In addition,
two very large scale experimentation platforms (Euro6IX
and 6NET) are investigating the actual deployment
of IPv6. Their goal is the broad deployment of IPv6
in Europe, building dedicated native IPv6 networks
involving national research and education networks,
telcos, and ISPs in a complementary approach, and
considering other aspects like applications and Internet
exchanges.
3. IPv6
is about Global Collaboration
All the IPv6-related projects have collaborated within
the framework of the IPv6 Cluster since June, 2001.
A specific project, 6LINK, supports the activity of
the IPv6 Cluster, which resulted in a very interesting
platform that fosters inter-project cooperation --
and the dissemination became a kind of open window
towards the rest of the world.
The Eurov6 project also fostered showcases for demonstrating
using IPv6 products and services and their impact
on "anyone, anytime," by means of fixed
and nomadic showrooms.
The political dimension is addressed by the IPv6 Task
Force Steering Committee (IPv6 TF-SC), whose main
goals are discovering and filling any existing gaps,
to provide strategic guidance with the assistance
of a number of industry and academic players, to quickly
propose measures to appropriate bodies, to coordinate
with the European Commission, and to validate various
long-term projects and the implementation of proposed
measures towards the global deployment of IPv6.
IPv6 involves a great deal of global cooperation.
IPv6 will not happen only in Europe or only in Japan.
Three major projects have achieved very relevant results
that included a tight liaison with similar international
initiatives, generating strong industry and government
awareness globally for IPv6.
4. The
European IPv6 Task Force
The European Commission
started an IPv6 Task Force with key European and
worldwide players, to develop a comprehensive action
plan by the end of 2001 for accelerating the availability
of IPv6.
The conclusions and recommendations of the Task Force
were successfully submitted to the European Council
Spring Meeting of 2002, under the Spanish presidency
(Barcelona), and in the context of this
document, a series of recommendations
pertaining to the implementation of IPv6 by all
relevant ICT sectors were proposed by the Commission.
As a result, the Heads of State resolution was to
prioritize the widespread availability and use of
broadband networks throughout the Union by 2005, and
the deployment of the new Internet protocol, IPv6,
as part of the e-Europe
2005 initiative.
One of the main achievements was a communication from
the Commission to the Council and the European Parliament
called, Next Generation Internet - priorities for
action in migrating to the new Internet protocol IPv6.
In a complementary action, the European Commission
called for the renewal of the mandate of the IPv6
Task Force as a platform for debate on critical issues
concerning IPv6 deployment.
As a consequence, the IPv6
TF-SC project is to be the main strategic instrument
for fostering the deployment of IPv6 technology in
Europe. In addition, the project has collaborated
with other regional groups and initiatives deploying
IPv6, and fostered a number of similar initiatives,
including national IPv6 Task Forces in more than 25
countries around the world, with a similar number
under formation (http://www.ipv6tf.org).
The Task Force is about to enter the third and last
phase, which will facilitate the take-off of IPv6
in a great many industrial and business sectors, with
a resulting large-scale deployment. IPv6 will be adopted
to create new and better products, new services, new
applications, and entire new businesses. We will enjoy
features that still can't be fully imagined, that
will facilitate the next generation of the "Information
Society": the "Knowledge Society".
Only IPv6 can enable the vision of an intelligent
networked environment, that supports not just information
but knowledge, and assures us that we can make the
best usage of all available resources, anytime, anywhere.
5. From
Research and Development to Deployment
Most of the EU IPv6 projects and initiatives are already
completed or about to finish, and they have already
produced very interesting and impressive results.
It is clear that all the R&D investments have
a universal target: ROI. IPv6 can deliver on this,
and not just in Europe.
For example, GÉANT, the network that interconnects
all the National Research and Education Networks across
Europe and with the rest of the world, at gigabit
speeds, has activated IPv6 much earlier than originally
planned, due to the expertise acquired through project
results, mainly in 6NET.
Similarly, thanks to the experience acquired by the
Euro6IX partners in the last months, some of the ISPs/Telcos
in the project have already announced commercial services,
and it is expected that before the projects end, most
of these companies will also be able to initiate service.
IPv6 is also of key importance for the "Broadband
for ALL" EU initiative. New competing access
technologies like Power Line Communications (PLC),
at speeds of up to 200 Mbps., have been demonstrated
in 6POWER, with features such as QoS, multicast, digital
set-top-boxes and VoIPv6 which have already become
commercial services. How else can we imagine, if not
with IPv6, the availability and usage of multi-megabit
speeds throughout the home? We need many new applications
that demand more bandwidth, but only with IPv6 can
information flow between devices, consumer electronics,
and appliances, instead of just between computers:
"Smart devices for a smart world".
In a recent event in Brussels named "Global
IPv6 Service Launch", it was demonstrated
that IPv6 deployment is already here, with global
coverage already offered by IPv6-enabled networks.
There is no excuse for being isolated from this major
trend!
Today IPv6 is no longer about basic research. Instead,
it is a major portal for very creative and powerful
innovation, and a way to add value to your existing
products, services and applications. Not getting on
board right now means missing the time window of this
opportunity. Catch the IPv6 fast train!
Internet Leadership: Another Opportunity for Southern
California
Alex
Lightman, CEO, IPv6 Summit, Inc.
LINK
TO THIS ARTICLE
There have
only been about 60 million Californians, compared
to over 60 billion humans. Californians thus represent
only about 1 in every 1,000 humans that have ever
lived, yet California dreaming has been the source
of some the most imaginative products and services
in history. Arguments could be made for which of these
brainstorms was the most useful, but there is a strong
case for packet switched networks (conceived by Paul
Baran of Santa Monica’s RAND), which largely
contributed to the creation of the Internet.
This is one
of LA’s two major claims to be the inventors
of the Internet, the other deriving from when Len
Kleinrock helped set up the first node of the Internet
in 1968, linking Kleinrock’s UCLA (where he is
still affiliated to this very day) with UCSB, Stanford
Research Institute and the University of Utah (where
computer graphics, later to transform Hollywood, was
being contemporaneously invented by Ivan Sutherland).
The advent
of Internet Protocol version 6 offers an opportunity
again for Southern California to lead. IPv6 is very
far along – the specifications have existed for
nearly ten years, router companies like Cisco, Hewlett-Packard
and NEC include IPv6, and most of the latest versions
of popular operating systems (including Windows XP,
Linux, OS X, Palm 6.0, and EPOC) support IPv6 in some
fashion. However, there are almost no applications,
no content, and no big success stories. The omens
are good – very good, in fact – for Southern
Californians, and LA innovators in particular, to
become leaders, and capitalize on the imagination
of others to generate hundreds of new systems, networks,
services and empires based on IPv6, the New Internet.
Details of
IPv6 could fill a book (in fact, as an Amazon search
will indicate, 15 books), but the basic features are
as follows:
-
IPv6
is the successor protocol to IPv4 (now 31 years
old this June – versions 1, 2, 3, and 5 didn’t
get out of the lab).
-
IPv6
uses a hexadecimal system (some letters, not just
numbers).
-
IPv6
has better support for mobility.
-
IPv6
has mandatory security built in (versus optional
and fragmented).
-
IPv6
has stateless autoconfiguration - roughly comparable
to USB’s “plug and play”.
-
IPv6
has bigger packets called Jumbograms (up to 4
Gigabytes vs. IPv4’s 64 Kilobytes/packet).
-
IPv6
has the ability to chain headers (like ability
to slap labels on a FedEx package).
-
IPv6
has 3.4 x 10 to the 38th addresses available (versus.
250 million remaining for IPv4 - not enough even
for America’s mobile phone users, since 2
IP addresses are needed for each device.
IPv6 has a field for Flow Control, which can now
allow Quality of Service.
-
IPv6
marks the return of the End-to-End principal of
the Internet, compared to going through firewalls
and using private addresses that fracture the
Internet, like roadblocks or millions of gated
communities instead of streets that allow transit.
The net effect
of all these features of IPv6 is to enable a whole
new ballgame for the Internet, one that Southern California
is better positioned to achieve. Michael Porter’s
700 page The Competitive Advantage of Nations hammers
home the point that national competitive advantage
is based on regional clusters of excellent companies
that are so good at competing with (and hiring from
and cooperating with) their neighbors that they blow
away the rest of the world when they meet head to
head.
Southern
California has several advantages, including Hollywood
as the home of nearly 500,000 entertainment industry
workers, including 100,000 in the movie and video
industry alone. IPv6 efficiencies for configuration
(plug and ping), Jumbograms (which can encapsulate
multiple seconds of 24 frame/second high definition
video per packet), and End-to-End can make improvements.
There are also advantages for computer gaming, especially
as Massively Multiplayer Online games continue to
proliferate. The mobility features will be very useful
for automobile safety, fleet management, and, of course,
mobile phone users and content producers. San Diego,
the self-proclaimed wireless capital of the world
based on Qualcomm’s leadership in CDMA, could
become the 4G capital if its cluster woke up to the
possibilities and advantage of IPv6. There are also
regional Internet leaders, such as ICANN (which effectively
governs the Internet from Marina Del Rey), CENIC (broadband
connections between 8,000 campuses), and Cal-(IT)2
(the $500 million Internet-centric research institute
jointly operated by UCSD and UCI), as well as USC’s
ISI (which did the IPv6 implementation for Microsoft
Windows XP) and USC's Institute for Creative Technologies.
Perhaps the
biggest advantage of Southern California is its close
connection with the Department of Defense. DoD CIO
John Stenbit (also from Los Angeles) mandated a transition
to IPv6 by the entire DoD by 2008. The DoD has an
annual IT budget of $25 billion. Dept. of Homeland
Security (DHS) is also planning to require IPv6, and
with DoD accounts for over half the federal IT budget.
LA companies are well positioned to get contracts
related to IPv6 because LA not only has the expertise,
but is also a target for terrorists, and needs all
the mobile, secure, ad hoc networking help it can
get.
Southern
California’s final advantage is that the IPv6
summits take place here, bringing the best experts
in the world to the area and allowing for brainstorming
and networking and entrepreneurial alliance forming
that could form the basis for a regional IPv6 cluster
of world-leading companies. The North American IPv6
Summit will be held June 15 through 17 with 30 leading
authorities, including Vint Cerf (who led the implementation
of IPv4 for DARPA), the director of the DoD IPv6 Transition
Office, and the head of Cybersecurity for the DHS.
Preceding the conference, on June 14 there will be
a tutorial and a security workshop, each a day long.
The cost is $399 for the conference and $199 for the
workshops.
More Information:
www.usipv6.com
Dual IPv6/v4 Stacks for Embedded, Networked Devices
Doug
Roberts, Interpeak, Inc.
LINK
TO THIS ARTICLE
Most of the
contributors to the USIPv6 Summit present the value
and relevancy of switching to an IPv6 network and
Interpeak shares and endorse these many points. Our
immediate attention here is towards those who actually
build the systems used to deploy IPv6 and IPv4 networks.
To the networking world these devices are called routers,
switches, residential gateways, Integrated Access
Devices and the like. To the engineers who design
and build them, they're called embedded, networked
devices.
Most users connected to the Internet sit behind a
Windows or UNIX-based host computer with a screen,
keyboard and mouse. Their focus is towards the application
currently running and not how that web page just downloaded
into the browser. But to the equipment manufacturer
building the network systems connecting users to the
Internet, they puzzle over how to add IPv6 to existing
IPv4 devices. These equipment manufacturers are Interpeak
customers.
Interpeak
customers tend to ask these sorts of questions:
- How do
we fit both IPv4 and IPv6 in the limit memory space
of the device?
- What Internet
applications and security protocols are supported
over IPv6?
- How is
the transition from IPv4 to IPv6 handled?
- Can we
accelerate various parts of the TCP/IP processing?
- Our device
supports both voice and data, so how can your stack
address the Quality of Service requirement?
The embedded,
networked device designer has a number of challenges
to address when building these devices.
Most embedded, networking devices differ from their
corresponding end hosts in a number of ways: generally
no monitor, keyboard or mouse; no rotating disk storage;
a fixed amount of memory without user access for expansion;
a limited set of controls and just several pages of
web content for set up and monitoring. Many of these
systems are operational moments after power up and
their default settings prove useful to the average
user. More complex systems need provisioning by system
administrators when deployed in larger network topologies.
Referenced below is IPNET, Interpeak's dual IPv6/v4
stack. IPNET is an ANSI 'C' source code stack and
is highly scalable to meet a range of embedded network
requirements.
How
does adding IPv6 to an IPv4 system impact memory
requirements and processor utilization?
Both IPv4 and v6 share the same TCP and UDP
transport layers so only the IP layers "double"
up the code. By design, IPNET's dual stack architecture
made extensive use of shared code and data structures
where possible. The same sockets API layer is used
with the addition of IPv6 extensions for the larger
data structures. In some configurations of the IPNET
stack, IPv6 adds just 30% more code over that of
an IPv4-only configuration.
What Internet applications and security protocols
are supported over IPv6?
Many of the familiar networking applications,
such as telnet, ftp, dns, have supported IPv4 for
years and recent extensions have been defined to
run these over IPv6. Interpeak's applications use
the extended address and protocol formats of IPv6,
enabling IPNET applications to determine which IP
version to use for outbound traffic by testing the
remote destination node's IP version.
Protocols such as IPSec were defined along side
of IPv6 and work fine, but what about protocols
such as SSH, SSL and SNMPv3? From Interpeak, they
are configured for IPv6 and adapt to the correct
version of IP. Even Interpeak's Firewall can filter
on either IP versions, enabling stateful firewalling,
using the standard IP Filter rules.
How is the transition from IPv4 to IPv6 handled?
Several methods are defined for inter-working
and transitioning from IPv4 to IPv6. These include:
dual IPv6/v4 stacks, configured tunnels (IPv6 packets
inside IPv4 packets), automatic tunnels (IPv6 packets
with IPv4 addresses) and IPv6 addresses with embedded
IPv4 addresses.
A dual stack implementation is one of the more complete
solutions, if available, for it ensures the greatest
possible level of interoperability. Applications
can distinguish between v4 or v6 destinations and
set up for the correct outbound IP stack. Tunneling
IPv6 packets within IPv4 permits islands of IPv6
hosts/networks to exist while keeping IPv4 backbone
in place. Still other techniques are under consideration
as the industry gains IPv6 experience.
The method(s) employed is determined by network
topology and what constraints must be observed.
Can we accelerate various parts of the TCP/IP
processing?
Developers
of IPv4 based systems understand the processor demands
of IPv4. Less certain is the impact on processor
utilization with IPv6, a mix of IPv6 with v4 or
the inclusion of IPSec. Semiconductor manufacturers
have anticipated this shift with new processors
emerging which include hardware acceleration for
networking stacks, in the areas of:
- on chip
buffer pool use
- hardware
IP checksum
- hardware
accelerated cryptographic algorithms
- ahead-of-access
caching of IP headers
- hardware
frame type detection
- 9KByte
Gigabit Ethernet frames
IPNET is
enhanced to support these features.
Our
device supports both voice and data so how can your
stack address the Quality of Service requirement?
Harking back to the early days of the Internet,
"best-effects" was sufficient quality
of service. Who expected streaming video and placing
a telephone call over the Internet? Characteristically,
the Internet found a way to support these new services,
without disturbing the legacy services. IPNET permits
the establishment of multiple prioritized output
queues. Applications use the priority queue they
need to meet the application's QoS requirement and
by IP sending packets in high-priority queues first.
Extensions to the sockets API are used by the application
to assign the correct priority queue.
IPv6 QoS is set through the Traffic Class field
and Type of Service (TOS) in IPv4.
For the embedded
developer designing the next wave of networked devices,
IPv6 solutions are available now. Through an extensive
partner program for operating system environments,
such as INTEGRITY, routing and network management,
equipment manufacturers have a rich selection of solutions
available.
More Information:
droberts@interpeak.com
IPv6: Real Benefits to Service Providers and Enterprises
Alike
Ahmed
Abdelhalim
Corporate Systems Engineer, Foundry Networks, Inc.
Bob Schiff
Director of Marketing, Foundry Networks, Inc.
LINK
TO THIS ARTICLE
Most in the
industry agree that IPv6 will be the underlying protocol
for the next generation Internet. However, there is
no general consensus on when the transition will happen.
Indeed, the view held by many US IT managers is that
the move to IPv6 is a service provider matter and
has little near-term relevance in the enterprise.
In this article we discuss why it is important to
begin planning for IPv6 even here in the U.S. where
IP address capacity is generally not perceived as
a near-term problem.
Service Providers
Service providers around the globe are investing in
network infrastructure capable of supporting bundled
voice-video-data service offerings. This "triple
play" concept (voice, video, and data) is gaining
momentum as service providers attempt to differentiate
themselves. These service providers are using IP as
the fabric for this convergence. The widespread adoption
of IP by so many independent operators and its use
for so many communication services were not anticipated
by the designers of the current generation of IP.
It is not surprising that the IPv4 32-bit address
space and its usage do not satisfy the super-sized
demands of emerging networks.
As one example, consider the case of one of the largest
service providers in the US that offers wireless and
wired services. The service provider boasts a wireless
subscriber base in excess of 36 million subscribers
and a DSL subscriber base of 2.5 million. This service
provider is very motivated to offer data services
to its wireless subscriber base. Assuming that the
provider actually decides to go forward with IPv4
addresses, and no growth in the subscriber base, the
provider will have a huge demand for IPv4 addresses,
that could very possibly be declined (or not completely
fulfilled) by the American Registry for Internet Numbers
(ARIN). With 36 million users, and assuming a very
high Host-Density (HD) Ratio of 87%, that provider
would require 32 x /8 address blocks. This is roughly
one third of the remaining IPv4 address space. Consider
how this situation is compounded when other providers
begin offering similar services to the tens of millions
of their subscribers.
Recent statistics gathered by the International Telecommunications
Union (ITU) are shown below to help illustrate the
scope of the problem.
- Number
of mobile subscribers exceeded 800 million in 2001
- Number
of mobile subscribers is predicted to hit 1.7 billion
by 2010
- Number
of mobile Internet users is expected to surpass
fixed users in 2006
- Number
of mobile Internet users is expected to hit 850
million by 2010
A recommended
strategy for service providers is to include IPv6
in their planning today. New network equipment should
be capable of both IPv4 and IPv6. This equipment should
support wire-speed performance for both IPv4 and IPv6
applications. This will enable service providers to
maintain high-performance services as they migrate
from IPv4 to IPv6.
Enterprise Organizations
IP address conservation schemes including Network
Address Translation (NAT) have softened the impact
of the exponential growth in Internet usage, and extended
the life of IPv4. However, there are new trends in
enterprise networking that are changing the status
quo. Enterprise networks are fast becoming the fabric
for all communications. Wired and wireless communications
of all kinds including video, voice and web-connected
personal digital assistants are converging on the
enterprise backbone.
This "everything over IP" enterprise convergence
raises the question, "Does it makes sense to
include IPv6 in enterprise network planning today?"
To answer this, let us consider the following:
- Most enterprise
applications are isolated behind corporate NAT routers.
The NAT function can interfere with a number of
these applications especially when communicating
outside of the protected zone. IT managers may find
themselves facing concerns of whether they can successfully
leverage the public Internet for IP-based communications
with a supplier, partner or a reseller.
- A common
protocol is needed at the hand-off between the enterprise
and service provider. Most service providers will
migrate to IPv6 to scale their network and service
offerings, accelerating the availability of IPv6
services. Service providers may not even permit
the use of NAT. NAT can mask the source of a voice
call preventing service providers from determining
the phone that originated the call. This would impede
the efforts of law enforcement, as well as impede
the delivery of emergency 911 services.
IPv6 restores
direct communications between endpoints, using unique
and native device addresses, eliminating the need
for NAT. This greatly simplifies the enterprise edge,
removing the problems that often occur with NAT.
Another dynamic that will impact IPv6 deployment is
the mandate by the US Department of Defense that all
federal government networks must transition to IPv6
by 2008. This will accelerate the availability of
IPv6 solutions from hardware and software vendors
alike. Enterprise customers will be able to take advantage
of the new generation equipment that is fast becoming
available to meet the new requirements. Indeed, a
number of vendors are already offering production-ready
dual stack IPv4/IPv6 products. These IPv6-ready solutions
can be used for IPv4 operation today with a transition
to IPv6 being as easy as a command line configuration
change. With these benefits in mind, it makes good
business sense for IT managers to begin to include
IPv6 in their networking roadmap.
Summary
IPv6 is no longer the R&D work of a select few
in the industry; it offers real value and benefit
to service providers and enterprise organizations
alike. The IPv4 to IPv6 transition will not be a global
cutover, but will be an orderly migration for service
providers and enterprises. IPv6 will enable an entire
new generation of services. It will simplify network
design and operations in the important areas of address
management, allocation and assignment. IPv6 is the
future of networking and it will power our communications
infrastructure for decades to come. It is incumbent
on all networking organizations to learn more about
and plan for IPv6 in their network evolution.
More Information:
Foundry Networks Website
www.foundrynet.com
Making
IPv6 A Reality Now
Jean-Francois Tremblay, Hexago
LINK
TO THIS ARTICLE
Reading May's
edition of the 6Sense newsletter, I had the feeling
a lot of people still try to justify why IPv6 will
be accepted. A quick glance at the growth predictions
doesn't leave a shadow of a doubt in my mind, IPv6
acceptance is gaining momentum and is becoming reality
now. As Yurie Rich from Native6 underlined in his
article last month, the question to be asked is no
longer "why" but rather "how"
to make IPv6 a reality.
From an operational point of view, three elements
must be adapted to IPv6 in order to have a functional
service: operating systems, networks and applications.
These days, most modern operating systems like Windows
XP, Linux, FreeBSD and Mac OS X already support IPv6
to a level or another. A growing number of existing
applications are also being ported to IPv6, on a case
by case basis. The bulk of the work remaining to be
done is the deployment of IPv6 networks. Today's Internet
is still IPv4 by an overwhelming proportion.
The methodology to be used to deploy IPv6 networks
is subject to many debates. Most experts agree that
the next wave of networking hardware must be IPv6
compliant and that some of the existing hardware may
be upgraded through software. However the deployment
of IPv6 is generally presented as a punctual event,
such as "turning on the IPv6 network". This
view does not reflect the fact some IPv4-only network
equipment will be present in the network for a long
time. Some pieces of equipment will never run IPv6
simply because they don't offer the required hardware
resources. Others might never be upgraded because
they are not actively administered, have in mind SOHO
gateways for example.
With 5 years of experience dedicated to IPv6 deployment,
Hexago offers a different perspective on implementing
IPv6. We offer strategies to make IPv6 available now
while ensuring a consistent and incremental transition
to a fully native IPv6 network. This approach also
ensures that legacy devices present in the network
remain operational and useful.
Hexago developed its experience in IPv6 best practices
by participating in initiatives like Moonv6 and by
deploying Freenet6 (www.freenet6.net), a free service
offering IPv6 connectivity. Projects that make use
of IPv6 in real environments allow the discovery of
issues never anticipated in theory. During events
like Moonv6, best practices reflecting an operational
reality can be put together and compared with existing
standards.
From these experiences, deploying an IPv6 network
relates to two fundamental questions: how to distribute
address space and how to make the existing network
support IPv6. Answers to these two questions are the
fundamental blocks on which to build a solid base
for a stable IPv6 network.
A first step is often to get a block of addresses,
either the organization's own prefix or one delegated
by a provider. Then comes the question of how to distribute
this addressing space in the most flexible and practical
way. Some documents such as RFC3531 give some clues
on how to implement this in practice. During Moonv6,
some common misconceptions related to addressing were
also identified. For example, it's not obvious to
most people why half of each IPv6 address cannot be
used to create smaller networks. From the design of
several IPv6 networks, Hexago was able to come up
with methods ensuring few issues are encountered with
IPv6 addressing, minimizing the need to renumber whole
networks while they are running.
Early IPv6 implementers were wondering if IPv6 networks
would expand from the core or from the edge. These
days, we usually see networks being upgraded from
the core to the fringes. However, IPv6 connectivity
is not achieved unless the entire path to the edge
devices is not IPv6. It is possible to have a fully
functional IPv6 network today while incrementally
upgrading pieces of equipment from the core by using
coexistence mechanisms.
Coexistence mechanisms rely on tunneling techniques
to bridge the gaps in IPv6 networks making them act
as a single network. Among these mechanisms, only
the tunnel broker architecture allows for the resources
to be fully controlled by the use of authentication.
Moreover, since this method does not rely on a single
IPv6 prefix, it reduces the need to renumber as the
native network grows.
During the transition to native IPv6, devices such
as tunnel brokers are pushed toward the edge of the
network, ensuring a smooth and incremental integration
of new devices. As the network grows, the same mechanism
can help support older IPv4 devices over IPv6 only
networks.
This is only an example of how Hexago can help in
building an IPv6 infrastructure in a smooth and progressive
way. If you are looking to take advantage of IPv6
new opportunities, Hexago is your first step.
More Information:
Please visit us at www.hexago.com
or at the IPv6 Summit in Santa-Monica, booth #1.
jean-francois.tremblay@hexago.com
Characterizing IPv6 Application Performance
Tony
De La Rosa, Ixia
LINK
TO THIS ARTICLE
One of the
concerns in implementing IPv6 is the impact to network
performance when a variety of IPv6 applications are
introduced. Consequently, a systematic and repeatable
test methodology is required to assess such an impact.
Ixia's IxChariot provides this capability by generating
and measuring mixed IPv4/IPv6 stateful transport traffic
across a variety of networks. With IxChariot,
one has the ability to plan network capacity, identify
network congestion, and evaluate the performance of
new networking devices. This is just one of the topics
that will be discussed at the upcoming IPv6 Santa
Monica Summit.
Ixia has extensive expertise in traffic generation
and analysis solutions, which are able to emulate
routing protocols within a mixed IPv4 and IPv6 test
environment. The IxANVL suite of tests, for example,
verify network conformance to industry standards,
and set the stage for more extensive and deeper testing
methodologies. Collectively, Ixia's IxExplorer's (protocol
server), IxANVL, and IxChariot can easily cover the
needs of any test or network builder for Layers 1-7
of the OSI model.
IPv6 Product Overview from Ixia
http://www.ixiacom.com/solutions/by_technology_being_tested/ipv6/
Read the latest IPv6 White Paper from Ixia
http://www.ixiacom.com/library/white_papers/wp_display.php?skey=ipv6
Ixia IPv6 Sample Test Plan includes: Test setup, Methodology
and Results
http://www.ixiacom.com/library/test_plans/tp_display.php?skey=ipv6
An introduction of "Global IP Business Exchange
2004"
Tatsuya
Kurosaka
Secretariat, IPv6 Promotion Council of Japan
Staff Researcher, Mitsubishi Research Institute, Inc.
LINK
TO THIS ARTICLE
Broadband,
IP-Phone, home electronics, IC tags and a variety
of other Internet based products and services are
penetrating the market in a lot of ways. Expectations
of a breakthrough generating more business by using
IP technology are the highest ever. In this IP world,
IPv6 is the key technology which realizes this market
shift and delivers more options to develop business
models which can not be accomplished by the current
IP structure. Technologies to form new business are
ready and the next step is how those technologies
are applied to business in variety of industries.
Government strategies are also moving forward to enhance
a variety of usages of new IP technologies throughout
the world. The Japanese Government is fully committed
to enhancing a variety of Internet usage under their
e-Japan2 program. The US Department of Defense announced
a shift of their system to IPv6 by the year 2008.
The Chinese Government is fully committed to deployment
of an IPv6 based Internet infrastructure. EU is to
use IPv6 for their e-government system.
There is no doubt that the revolution of the IP technology
featuring IPv6 has changed our business opportunities
in a lot of ways. The challenge of technology never
stops and these continuous developments have created
the market. It is the reason why IPv6 Promotion Council
of Japan decided to shift our strategy of deployment.
The former strategy was focus to increase the awareness
of IPv6. However, the current strategy has moved to
the market development. It has to focus not only for
IT engineer, but prospective providers and buyers
from various non-ITC business sectors.
On the basis of this background, we will hold "Global
IP Business Exchange 2004" on November 16-18,
2004 at the central Tokyo area. This event will be
integrated with exhibition and conference to gather
and provide many opportunities of the real business
relying on the new IP technology not only for buyers
but ITC professionals and providers from the globe.
We hope this event will be the global market place
where the emerging IP technology and solutions meet
with ITC professionals and buyers building breakthrough
to meet emerging technologies. It will offer in-depth
exploration of the industries challenge as well as
demonstrations of how the products, services and technologies
fit into various industries. ITC professionals and
buyers from all industries will be able to take advantage
of this opportunity to gain practical knowledge for
more intelligent decision making, and the tools to
do their business better.
More Information:
kurosaka@mri.co.jp
IPv6 Promotion
Council
Global
IP Business Exchange 2004
Short-Range
Wireless 2004 Event
Short-Range
Wireless 2004 ~ June 6-7 ~ Marriott Denver Tech Center
in Denver, Colorado Co-located with Antenna Systems
2004, Short-Range Wireless 2004 is focused
on the most recent advancements in short-range wireless
technology for industrial, commercial and residential
applications. This event serves technical and management
professionals with end-user organizations involved
in short-range wireless applications; device and electronics
manufacturers; system developers and operators; integrators
and service providers.
The sessions and discussions will aim to provide a
comprehensive, objective view of product, service,
regulatory and market developments in all applicable
wireless device networking platforms, technologies
and standards including Zigbee, 802.11, RFID, Bluetooth,
M2M, wireless automation, UWB, IR, DECT and In-Building
wireless.
For more information on the Short-Range Wireless event
visit www.srw-magazine.com
or contact Jeremy Martin at jeremym@infowebcom.com.
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Sunset
Learning Institute Gears Up for IPv6 Summit
Sunset Learning’s
Network Engineer/Instructor Team has a 13 year history
of embracing, deploying and teaching cutting
edge technologies to its clientele. Our team has been
following the development of IPv6 through the early
RFCs to its current implementations on Cisco router
and Linux platforms. We are currently bringing a number
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