Subject: Re: IPv6 Comment
To: None <current-users@netbsd.org>
From: Ken Hornstein <kenh@cmf.nrl.navy.mil>
List: current-users
Date: 09/01/2000 17:00:39
>Renumbering easily is one of the touted benefits of IPv6, so perhaps
>implementations of rpc2 should take into account not just the spatial
>change of address (the receiver might not see the sender as having
>the same IP address the sender has), but also the possibility that
>the address may change over time.

I can't even BELIEVE I'm answering this .... buuuutttt ...

I've seen the same IPv6 "discussion" on the ietf mailing list that
you've been in the middle of ... and I know that no one there ever said
that "renumbering easily" was a benefit of IPv6.  I believe they said
that IPv6 might make renumbering EASIER, but I think everyone
understands that renumbering is still going to be work; you now have
some tools to solve some of the problems with renumbering, but no one
has suggested (that I saw) that you can switch upstream providers 3-4
times per day and get new prefixes automagically with IPv6 without
there being some serious pain.  I think it's the difference between a
good-sized filling without Novocaine and a root canal without
Novocaine.

Plenty of people smarter than I have said this before to you.  I could
believe that some IPv6 evangelists might have said something like
"renumbering is easier with IPv6" at one time, but either they
misunderstood things or you misinterpreted their statements.  Either
way ... now you're ignoring every correction on this topic, and I think
_THAT_ is wrong.

Even the mobile IP people are not suggesting that applications and
protocols be designed to handle renumbering "on the fly".  Suggesting
that protocols be able to handle renumbering to deal with NAT is
further proof of NAT's bogosity, in my mind.

--Ken