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The mobile revolution is the current happening thing in India. With the
availability of so many digital devices like cell phones, PDAs, smartphones, etc
that can be connected to the Internet there is a growing need for IP addresses.
There's no way that IPv4 would be able to handle this onslaught of new devices
The thirst for Internet protocol addresses is getting bigger and bigger each
day. A day might come when you will not be able to log on to the Internet
because your computer says, “Sorry all IP address are now being used.” Now
what does one do in a situation like this?
With the rapid growth of the Internet and the proliferation of wireless
devices that require unique IP addresses, Internet protocol vision 4 (IPv4), the
existing technology is beginning to show its age.
The need for the new generation IP protocol version 6 (IPv6) is getting
louder. Dubbed as the next-generation protocol designed by the Internet
Engineering Task Force (IETF) to replace the current version of IPv4 is now said
to be the remedy for shortages of IP addresses. There is plenty of action
happening in the background to make the existing Internet infrastructure ready
for it. Will the Internet ever shift to the new protocol? Let's take a look
Problems
The task force, which worked on the Internet protocol (IP) in the early 1970s
provided for something like 4.3 billion IP addresses (via a 32-bit address
space). That is what the current avatar of IPv4 is on which the Internet runs.
Now surely that number should have been enough for everybody. But the growth of
the Internet has boggled even the most prescient minds, and as IP-enabled
devices extend to the realm of the mobile phone and home appliances, 4.3 billion
seems like an embarrassing figure.
The problem is compounded by an inequitable distribution of addresses, with
the US hogging about 70 percent and the rest of the world left to scrounge
around for the crumbs. India has been allocated about 2.2 million IP addresses,
while China has something like 28 million. Thus clearly the need arises for IPv6
adoption to tide over the crisis.
Indian telecom regulatory body-TRAI in a recent statement said, “Many
developing countries of Asia Pacific region are engaging in large-scale
deployment of IPv6, but in our country the uptake of IPv6 is not satisfactory
and hence some policy initiatives are required to accelerate the policy.
The migration to IPv6 is considered necessary in view of fast expanding
Internet usage and increased demand on the IP address space.”
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| “There are many hurdles to overcome before a
successful transition from IPv4 to IPv6 can be made in India. A key
obstacle to IPv6 deployment is how to migrate to the 'new', while
continuing to support the old”
Simon Newstead
Regional Director-Emerging Technologies Juniper Networks |
Despite all this action, IPv6 adoption in India is still slow. One of the
reasons is that it is not compatible with IPv4. An IPv4 router won't support
IPv6. It must have inherent support built-in for both protocols. Likewise, all
applications and operating systems must be added to support the new protocol. It
will take time, as everybody would first have to understand the complexities and
challenges involved.
TRAI has been monitoring development of IPv6 in India and worldwide. In the
recommendations on broadband, the need for further analysis and discussion on
transition to IPv6 was recognized due to anticipated growth of Internet and
broadband connections. Indian government has already constituted a group called
IPv6 Implementation Group (IPIG) to speed up and facilitate the adoption of IPv6
in the country.
ISPs in the country are still in the phase of information collection. They
have to foresee the costs that will incur on deploying IPv6 or if there is a
possibility of upgrading their existing infrastructure instead of revamping and
setting up complete new infrastructure. The broadband policy framework
visualises creation of suitable telecom infrastructure through various access
technologies, which can contribute to growth and can mutually co-exist. The
government has adopted a technology-neutral approach in the broadband policy to
facilitate usage of all types of technologies for broadband.
Simon Newstead, Regional Director-Emerging Technologies, Juniper Networks
said, “There are many hurdles to overcome before a successful transition from
IPv4 to IPv6 can be made in India. With a huge installed base of IPv4, a key
obstacle to IPv6 deployment is how to migrate to the 'new', while continuing
to support the 'old.' Clearly there can be no 'flick of the switch'
converting computer and communications systems to an all IPv6 world, so
transitional technologies that allow co-existence of both versions and a phased
transition to IPv6 are essential.”
When quizzed about the need of transition in India, Newstead, added, “The
demand for additional naming space overseas comes mainly from the rapid growth
of Internet-enabled mobile devices like PDAs and 3G digital wireless phones. To
access the Internet, each device needs an IP address to distinguish itself.”
Indian IPv6 forum
India has an IPv6 forum, which is active in holding an annual summit, generating
awareness and conducting trials. There's also a moderately active discussion
group with about 45 members, but experts feel that there's a need to step up
the momentum of IPv6 activity considerably, if India is to be anywhere near the
front-runners in adoption.
Worldwide trends
Countries like Japan and China are actively looking into IPv6 deployment in a
full scale. And, we can expect to see IPv6 gradually rolled-out in public
network very soon in these countries.
Given all these benefits, there's some movement towards implementing the
protocol. The US federal agencies are supposed to shift to IPv6 by 2008. China,
Korea and Japan have also been considering the shift to IPv6.
But in India the rate at which the Internet market is growing and especially
with the rapid growth of mobile Internet usage the need is urgent.
Worrying factor
The fact that has really put the brake on transition from IPv4 to IPv6 is the
cost factor. For any ISP in the country to migrate to the higher version would
mean a hefty expenditure. To tide over the crisis network engineers came up with
ingenious work-arounds to enable the re-use of addresses. One is dynamic host
configuration protocol (DHCP) wherein a few addresses are dynamically assigned
to a large number of hosts of which only a tiny subset are online at any given
point. The other is NAT or network address translation. Using NAT boxes, all the
nodes and devices within an organisation-up to 257 of them-appear to be a single
device to the rest of the network and utilise a single IP address.
With NAT in full flow, the spectre of address shortages kind of faded, and so
did the urgency to move to IPV6. But NAT has its limitations. Without getting
into technicalities, we can say that NAT and DHCP don't really matter if all
one wants to do is a bit of web browsing and e-mailing. But that was yesterday.
Today, more and more businesses and individuals demand a unique presence on the
net which is 'always-on, equally-connected and easily-reachable' without
being tied down to a single service provider. This means unique IP addresses and
so the need arises for transition to IPv6 protocol.
-Connect news bureau
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