IPv6 Attitudes at Interop

The inspiration for this blog came while perusing Google for Interop material when I stumbled upon the following post from Martin Levy, the director of IPv6 strategy for Hurricane Electric, an Internet backbone and colocation provider. In his post he discusses the lack of IPv6 coverage, support, and use by both the Interop show and vendors.

“I returned from Interop 2008 Las Vegas expo, where I attended to gauge how well prepared exhibitors were for IPv6 network deployment. I was very disappointed that out of the approximately 450 exhibitors on the conference floor, there was only one company that even used the term “IPv6″ on the posted exhibitor-list online. When walking around the booths, talking with both hardware and software companies, I was even more amazed at the unknowing responses I received. While I could only sample a percentage of the total exhibitors, a clear trend was coming to light during my discussions.

There are an enormous number of vendors that are either not ready for IPv6, or are simply unwilling to say that supporting IPv6 is the future requirement for enterprise network operators. This future is a lot closer than many expect. Only a handful of the large network hardware vendors at the show were in better shape.”

IPv6 Support Among Network Vendors
In terms of network analysis vendors support for IPv6, Carolyn Duffy Marsan recently looked at where 8 vendors stood in the NetworkWorld article, “Where eight network management vendors stand on IPv6“. When purchasing an analysis solution, be sure that it’s more than just “IPv6 aware”, rather it should support native IPv6, dual-stack IPv4 and IPv6 environments, and tunneling. IPv6 support should also be fully integrated into all analysis features like the experts and application analysis functions.

IPv6 Purchasing
On the federal side with a June deadline from the OMB looming, the government sector has been pushing forward with IPv6. According to a recent NetworkWorld article, “all U.S. federal agencies must be capable of passing IPv6 packets on their backbone networks by June 30, 2008.”

Without a similar push on the commercial side, IPv6 support has been more of a future-proof feature that U.S. customers want to have. But, it hasn’t been the key motivator for someone to purchase product. This may change (by the way I should mention that if you interested in IPv6 - Carolyn Duffy Marsan of NetworkWorld is a must read):

For a decade, IPv6 has been the classic chicken-and-egg conundrum: There has been little North American demand for IPv6, so U.S. carriers haven’t introduced IPv6 services; without commercial IPv6 services available from carriers, U.S. government agencies and businesses can’t migrate to the next-generation Internet technology. Now, cracks are starting to appear in the IPv6 egg…

“We’ve seen commitments by the major telecom carriers. They’re going to be IPv6 ready and enabled by 2010,” says Jerry Edgerton, CEO of Command Information, a Herndon, Va., provider of IPv6 services whose carrier customers include Verizon and British Telecom. “These carriers are now global players, and so are their customers. IBM just moved its supply chain management to China last year. This globalization factor is going to drive demand to IPv6. If I’m a global enterprise, I need to be compatible with the rest of the world.”

Further IPv6 Reading
IPv6 exec says sound the alarm - NetworkWorld
U.S. carriers quietly developing IPv6 services - NetworkWorld
IPv4 vs. IPv6 - NetworkWorld
IPv6 Information Page - IPv6.org
IPv6 Explanation - Wikipedia
IPv6 hype suggests real problems - Peter Judge ZDNet.co.uk

Tags: Carolyn Duffy Marsan, Hurricane Electric, interop, IPv6 adoption, IPv6 monitoring