BGPexpert

IPv6 in operating systems since my book was published

Mon, 20 Feb 2012 13:18:14 GMT

I sometimes get the question whether my book "Running IPv6" is still current. Since publication in 2005, not much has changed with regard to the core IPv6 protocols. I may go over what's new in this regard at some point in the future. However, what has changed significantly are the operating systems and other software mentioned in the book. The main things to be aware of are:

Windows:

In Windows XP, IPv6 is a protocol separate from IPv4 that must be installed explicitly. In Windows Vista and Windows 7, IPv6 support is integrated with IPv4 and e...

The "IPv6 Buddy" IPv6 keyboard

Tue, 13 Dec 2011 12:21:31 GMT

There's now a USB IPv6 keyboard called the IPv6 Buddy. It has the hexadecimal keys as well as the colon, double colon, slash, period, tab and enter keys. So everything you need to enter IPv6 addresses, including IPv4-mapped addresses and CIDR notation prefixes. It also works for MAC addresses.

"With all the time I save entering IPv6 addresses, I can concentrate on more exciting things! Like perfecting my BGP, OSPF and VRRP implementations."

Did I mention that my birthday is in a few weeks?

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Death of the Internet predicted, film at your local cineplex

Wed, 23 Mar 2011 18:04:20 GMT

In this Ars Technica article I discuss some research about attacking BGP in the core of the internet by making BGP packets drop through overloading the data plane. The researchers make some unrealistic assumptions, but the data plane overload issue is real.

Counting 32-bit AS numbers

Thu, 17 Mar 2011 21:24:26 GMT

I've had a page that shows how many autonomous system numbers the RIRs have given out for a while now. However, when updating the slides for monday's BGP training course I realized that the results are all AS numbers�regardless of whether they're 16- or 32-bit.

So I updated the page. You can now request either 16-bit AS numbers, 32-bit AS numbers, or both. The total number of AS numbers given out so far is 53780. 1744 of those are numbers above 65535, so they're 32-bit. I was actually surprised that the number is this high. So far this year, the RIPE NCC has given out 59...

BGP in Egypt

Wed, 16 Feb 2011 22:45:06 GMT

Two weeks ago, I wrote this story for Ars Technica with some educated guessing about how the regime in Egypt disconnected the country from the internet three weeks ago. Now the New York Times has a three-page story about the same thing, with many more facts. But strangely, it's still unclear whether routers were turned off, cables were disconnected or maybe the BGP configs were changed. Still,...

End of the IANA global pool

Sun, 06 Feb 2011 13:34:58 GMT

And so it ends. With a ceremony in Miami. You can see the 13-minute video and also the press conference a little later here.

Also see my Ars Technica story: River of IPv4 addresses officially runs dry. Also see my story about World IPv6 Day on june 8 on Ars a few days earlier. Goo...

2010 IPv6 Address Use Report

Tue, 04 Jan 2011 11:45:41 GMT

In 2010, twice as many IPv6 address blocks were given out as in 2009, adding up to 5.5 times as much address space.

2010 IPv4 Address Use Report

Tue, 04 Jan 2011 11:41:01 GMT

As of January 1, 2011, the number of unused IPv4 addresses is 495.66 million. Exactly a year earlier, the number of available addresses was 721.06 million. So we collectively used up 225.4 million addresses in 2010.