[arin-ppml] How hard is it to transition to IPv6?

[Scott Helms]

Ted,

    That is certainly true, but that doesn't (unfortunately) drive the 
decisions of many and perhaps most retail consumers.  I live in an 
upscale Atlanta suburb, but doing some simple scans around my 
neighborhood shows that almost half of the wireless access points are 
wide open.  What's worse more than half of the open AP's still have 
default passwords on the device itself.  Now, that's completely 
anecdotal but I do the same test as I travel around the country and so 
far the results aren't far off.  Even around tech oriented areas I've 
seen much higher rates of owner indifference/ignorance being displayed.  
If large numbers of people in RTP are doing this, what are the chances 
that people living in rural markets are doing better?  (I do see fewer 
open systems around Research Triangle Park, but roughly 1 out 3 is still 
terrible.)  The problem for ISPs is that at the retail level many 
customers don't understand, and taking care of them will be tremendously 
expensive in terms of human resources and gear.

Ted Mittelstaedt wrote:
> But but but,
>
> There's other drivers that push end user purchasing.  For example
> the latest cheap-end Linksys gear now filters bittorrent and all
> the other nasty chatting and p2p stuff that was designed to
> bypass firewalls.   As viruses get more sophisticated the cheap
> stuff is following along blocking it.  Sooner or later the value
> of buying the new cheap router or DSL or cable modem will outweigh
> the few bucks saved keeping the old stuff running, despite IPv6
>
> Ted
>
>   
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: arin-ppml-bounces at arin.net 
>> [mailto:arin-ppml-bounces at arin.net] On Behalf Of Scott Helms
>> Sent: Friday, March 27, 2009 1:04 PM
>> To: Antonio Querubin
>> Cc: arin-ppml at arin.net
>> Subject: Re: [arin-ppml] How hard is it to transition to IPv6?
>>
>> Antonio,
>>
>>     I'm frankly not that concerned about the pieces that I 
>> control, its the hundreds of thousands of end user devices 
>> that I don't.  In addition there are lot of pieces of gear 
>> that ISPs do control that don't have an upgrade path either 
>> because the vendor doesn't exist or the vendor decided to end 
>> of life the product.  I can tell you that most of the smaller 
>> ISPs still providing dial up, and yes there is still a ton of 
>> it out there, are doing it on old gear (much/most of that 
>> being Portmaster 3s).  It's not that there isn't a solution, 
>> but it will be expensive and complicated and again that is 
>> before we include the issues with end user equipment.
>>
>> Antonio Querubin wrote:
>>     
>>> On Fri, 27 Mar 2009, Scott Helms wrote:
>>>
>>>       
>>>>    I wish I were as optimistic as you, and my view is based on 
>>>> testing in our environment.  While it will be fairly easy for some 
>>>> kinds of companies this is going to be a total nightmare 
>>>>         
>> for ISP's.  
>>     
>>>> It's pain that has to borne, but that doesn't make it easy 
>>>>         
>> to swallow.
>>     
>>> I don't think it's that extreme for ISPs.  As with any major 
>>> undertaking, it's best done by breaking the task up into small 
>>> manageable pieces.  It will take time, but it's nowhere near as 
>>> difficult as some say.  The key for us has been to integrate the 
>>> necessary changes into normal equipment, infrastructure, and 
>>> software/application update plans.  We started messing with 
>>>       
>> IPv6 years 
>>     
>>> ago, we're still not completely done yet, and some parts of our 
>>> infrastructure and services may never be IPv6 ready.  But having 
>>> started the transition process early means we're better prepared to 
>>> handle any future customer requirements.
>>>
>>> Antonio Querubin
>>> whois:  AQ7-ARIN
>>>
>>>
>>>       
>> --
>> Scott Helms
>> Vice President of Technology
>> ISP Alliance, Inc. DBA ZCorum
>> (678) 507-5000
>>
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>>     
>
>
>
>   


-- 
Scott Helms
Vice President of Technology
ISP Alliance, Inc. DBA ZCorum
(678) 507-5000