Subject: [renum] v4/v6 renumbering improvement?

From: Eliot Lear <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 01 Dec 2010 22:39:29 +0100

Brian,

As I wrote elsewhere:

On 11/11/10 8:55 AM, Brian E Carpenter wrote:
> - Should we focus entirely on IPv6? That is probably easier in several
>   ways (new deployment for most sites, not constrained by a shortage
>   of prefixes)

While of course we should focus entirely on IPv6, I would not want to
overstate the value of the size of address space, for the following reasons:

    * Large portions of network devices still require (re)configuration.
    * While aspects of DHCP have evolved in IPv6, their use (a'la Prefix
      Delegation) has to date not been well deployed (yet).
    * One reason is that there is a perceived trade-off between
      stability and the use of signaling mechanisms.  This has been
      reinforced by some operator behavior, where they sell static
      stable address space at a different rate than dynamic space.
    * Interaction between the DNS/and the other L3 components really
      hasn't really evolved at all since RFC 4192, particularly on the
      inter-domain front.  I would propose that this be the subject of
      discussions LONG before a BoF proposal.

This is not to say that there isn't any improvement at all.  Having a
larger block provides for an opportunity to simplify certain aspects of
renumbering, especially when the lower-64 are reserved for hosts.  This
too has not changed since 4192.

Eliot