[arin-ppml] Fantasyland

[michael.dillon at bt.com]

> > Why shouldn't the company in question just deploy IPv6 and install 
> > NAT-PT gateways to cover the next 2-3 years before
> > IPv6 transit is widely available?

> 	Please provide a vendor list for NAT-PT gateways that
> 	provide production level service/availability - today.

I would hope that the company in question would plan their deployment
exercise and not just rush out buying equipment and blasting out their
old network. As part of the planning exercise, they might go to the ARIN
IPv6 wiki at <http://www.getipv6.info/index.php/Investigate_Middleboxes>
where they will note vendor names. If they contact said vendors, then
there is motivation for said vendors to provide production level service
and availabilty within the timeframe for implementation. Note that there
is also the possibility of consulting firms using open-source NAT-PT who
would then provide the SLA and support component.

Obviously, today, there is only one vendor on that page and no mention
of
where open-source NAT-PT can be found. I would hope that anyone with
more
information would log on to the wiki and update this page and others.

I recently discovered that there were a couple of people in my company
who
test and qualify DSL equipment for use on our IPv4 Broadband Internet
service.
I asked them whether they were asking the vendors for their IPv6
roadmaps 
considering that IPv4 exhaustion is only 2 to 3 years away. They were
surprised
but thanked me for the info on exhaustion and told me that they plan to
ask
all the DSL vendors which they deal with, about their IPv6 roadmap.

More people need to do stuff like this, instead of just passively noting
that
vendor X does not support feature Y which you need to deploy IPv6. We
can't just
keep on sitting on our hands. We need to pester the vendors to supply
the features
that we need. We have to deploy IPv6 in our labs and find out what works
and what
doesn't. We need to ask our product managers why they haven't
incorporated IPv4
exhaustion and IPv6 deployment into their product roadmaps.

In fact, a lot of companies are already doing all of these things, which
is
good but since it is simmering under the surface, many observers still
think
that the world is behind on IPv6. I don't think that it is as bad as
that. What
has really happened is that telco work practices now rule the Internet,
and just
as the telco Internet deployment plans simmered under the surface
throughout the 
mid 90's before bursting out and consuming the Internet industry, now
the same
is happening with v6. The difference is that there is no thriving
independent 
IPv6 ISP industry today, so when we compare the external appearance of
things
with 1995, it looks worse than it really is.

--Michael Dillon