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Yearly reminder that github still does not have an IPv6 address (2023) (sopuli.xyz)

submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/programming

54 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Try the following:

$ nslookup github.com
[...]
Non-authoritative answer:
Name:   github.com
Address: 140.82.121.3

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[–] astral_avocado 9 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

I've talked to several network engineers over the years about IPv6, engineers that work as hands on with actual production infrastructure as you can get. And they all said that IPv6 would likely never be fully adopted.

[–] Wats0ns 5 points 1 year ago (2 children)

But why ?

[–] astral_avocado 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I am not a full network engineer so take my opinion with a grain of salt. From what I understand, NAT with IPv4 works really really well to mitigate IPv4 address exhaustion. Then there's an issue with the amount of extra processing switches and routers need to do IPv6, we're going from 32 bits to 128 bits which is a huge increase and for switches and routers that are handling packets as fast as technically possible with a low amount of resources typically, that's a not insignificant hurdle.

It's just easier to do IPv4 in every way, plus that's what the world's been using and is used to.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

You can't talk about NAT and then mention speed in the same statement...

The 128-bit IPv6 addresses are just four simple 32-bit integers if you think about it, but with NAT you have juggle around and maintain the (internal IP, internal Port, external IP, external Port, Protocol) tuples all the time. That's a significant overhead. Also, switches typically deal with the Layer 2 stuffs. IP is Layer 3.

See the HN discussion for more information.

It's just easier to do IPv4 in every way

Except when you have to NAT transversal. Then you are in a world of hurt.

[–] astral_avocado 2 points 1 year ago

Well, there's the actual engineer response I was looking for

[–] [email protected] -2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

My understanding is it's no longer that critical. The sky is no longer falling on IPv4

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

The numerous CGNAT deployed worldwide suggests otherwise.