When will the RIRs run out?

IANA allocated the last five remaining /8 blocks of IPv4 addresses to the five Regional Internet Registries (RIRs) early last February. Those blocks will be running out of addresses soon. Let’s take a quick look at Hurricane Electric’s IPv4/IPv stats counter (as of 2011-04-21, at around 10:40AM, Philippine time) to see what’s left:

It looks like APNIC might be running out first, which is understandable as demand in Asia is quite high. That might happen within this year. ARIN already has most IPv4 addresses so perhaps it will make do with IPv4 for a while, but that’s being optimistic. My guess is that, for all practical purposes, the world will probably be out of new IPv4 addresses by 2012.

The bottom line, however, is that those numbers aren’t anywhere close to what will be needed to accommodate the new devices that will be needing IP addresses in the near future. The Second Internet (baxed on IPv6) is needed now.

CentOS 5.6 is out

I ran the Yellowdog Update (yum) to upgrade my system the other day and found that I would have to download over 230MB of software. That probably meant one thing: there was a new release of CentOS!

Sure enough, after the system was upgraded, a look at the file, /etc/redhat-release, revealed that CentOS 5.6 was out.

The CentOS support site carried the distro reelease announcement. LinuxDevices also posted this story on the release.

The significant changes include:

• ext4 is now a fully supported file system
• libvirt was updated to 0.8.2
• bind was updated to 9.7 and supports NSEC3 now.
• ebtables was added
• php53 is available as a php replacement.
• System Security Services Daemon (SSSD) has been added.

I can’t wait for the CentOS team to release their version of RHEL 6! It should be in the works now.

Early IPv6 adventures

Just on a whim, I decided to fire up my gogo6 tunneling client once more. Although I’ve had it for months, it has remained unused ever since I first tried it because the IPv6 tunnel was so unstable. It just kept resetting every few minutes. That wasn’t fun at all.

This time, however, things were different.

To my surprise, the tunnel remained stable. As of this writing, it’s been up at least six or seven hours without resetting. Ive managed to surf to a few IPv6 sites and pinged a a few as well (using ping6, of course). The results are in the screenshot below.

Pinging CERNET's IPv6 site with ping6

I checked out the CERNET IVI Project website and ran their IPv6 test. The screenshot below shows a successful test. Take note that I erased my IPv6 address in the screenshot to keep curious fans from trying to connect directly to my system. My assigned IPv6 address is a routable public addresses, after all.

An IPv6 connectivity test from CERNET

With that done, I proceeded to the Hurricane Electric site where I had an IPv6 certification testing account. I was still a certified newbie there and I wanted to run some tests and upgrade my IPv6 certification. And so I did. I must admit, it felt kinda nice getting this:

Needless to say I wanted to advance much farther, but that will have to wait until I can get my hands on an IPv6-capable website or webserver where I have write privileges. Looks like I have some work to do!

IBM centennial kicks off in Cebu

(This article also appeared in the Computerworld Philippines website: http://computerworld.com.ph/ibm-centennial-kicks-off-in-cebu/)

IBM Philippines President and Country General Manager James Velasquez

To launch IBM’s year-long celebration of its 100th anniversary, IBM Philippines conducted a series of briefing sessions in Cebu City dubbed “IBM Comes to Cebu.” The event was held at the uptown Marriott Hotel last march 3, 2011. The Philippine office is joining with other IBM offices around the world in a series of activities engaging those it identifies as local “thought leaders,” centered around the theme of “changing the way the world works.”

As part of the initiative, IBM executives met with around 100 of its business partners in the region, sponsored a lunch with some 25 representatives from all the cities in Cebu, and held a briefing with local media.

James Velasquez, President and Country General Manager of IBM Philippines, began with a presentation of IBM’s long history of innovation and its latest achievements in the last year. These included the inauguration of its new facilities in Buildings E, F and J in UP Ayala Technohub, Smarter Cities Summit last December 2010 at the Shangri-La Hotel in Makati, and the opening of its Global Business Services GDC located at the I2 building in Asiatown IT Park, Cebu City.

“To mark our history and to show our commitment to the future expansion of our business, we will celebrate IBM’s Centennial across the nation with a number of activities including a day of service for the community in June when our employees will have the opportunity to apply their business skills and work experiences to address local critical community challenges and societal needs,” Velasquez announced.

IBM was founded on June 16, 1911 as the Computing, Tabulating, and Recording Company. In 1924 it was renamed International Business Machines, reflecting a global outlook for the future tnat was ahead of its time, Velasquez said. He also noted that IBM Philippines will turn 75 in 2012. The local office was established on July 20, 1937.

Updated: The Second Internet

I didn’t notice that a new update to Lawrence Hughes’ groundbreaking book, The Second Internet, was released last October. You can download a PDF copy from the book’s dedicated website: http://www.secondinternet.org.

The book’s full title is, The Second Internet: Reinventing Computer Networks With IPv6, and the latest update has a revised manuscript. Just to give you all an idea of the book’s extensive coverage, I’m reproducing the table of contents here. Check it out!

CHAPTER 1 – INTRODUCTION
1.1 – Why IPv6 Is Important
1.2 – An Analogy
1.3 – So Just What Is It That We Are Running Out Of?
1.4 – But You Said There Were 4.3 Billion IPv4 Addresses?
1.5 – Is IPv6 Just An Asian Thing?
1.6 – So What Is This “Second Internet”?
1.7 – Whatever Happened To IPv5?
1.8 – Let’s Eliminate The Middle Man
1.9 – Why Am I The One Writing This Book? Just Who Do I Think I Am, Anyway?

CHAPTER 2 – HISTORY OF COMPUTER NETWORKS UP TO TCP/ IPv4
2.1 – Real Computer Networking
2.2 – The Beginnings Of Internet (ARPANET)
2.3 – And That Brings Us Up To Today

CHAPTER 3 – REVIEW OF TCP/ IPv4
3.1 – Network Hardware
3.2 – RFCS: The Internet Standards Process
3.3 – TCP/ IPv4
3.4 – TCP: The Transmission Control Protocol
3.5 – UDP: The User Datagram Protocol
3.6 – DHCPv4: Dynamic Host Configuation Protocol For TCP/ IPv4
3.7 – TCP/ IPv4 Network Configuration

CHAPTER 4 – THE DEPLETION OF THE IPv4 ADDRESS SPACE
4.1 – OECD IPv6 Report, March 2008
4.2 – OECD Follow-Up Report, April 2010
4.3 – How IPv4 Addresses Were Allocated In The Early Days
4.4 – Problems Introduced By Customer Premise Equipment NAT (CPE NAT)

CHAPTER 5 – TCP/ IPv6 CORE PROTOCOLS
5.1 – Network Hardware
5.2 – RFCS: A Whole Raft Of New Standards For TCP/ IPv6
5.3 – TCP/ IPv6
5.4 – TCP: The Transmission Control Protocol
5.5 – UDP: The User Datagram Protocol
5.6 – DHCPv6-Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol For TCP/ IPv6
5.7 – TCP/ IPv6 Network Configuration

CHAPTER 6 – IPSEC AND MOBILE IP
6.1 – Internet Protocol Layer Security (IPsec)
6.2 – Internet Key Exchange (IKE)
6.3 – Mobile IP

CHAPTER 7 – TRANSITION MECHANISMS
7.1 – Relevant Standards
7.2 – Transition Mechanisms
7.3 – Dual Stack
7.4 – Tunneling
7.5 – Translation
7.6 – Recommendations On Transition Mechanisms

CHAPTER 8 – DNS
8.1 – How DNS Evolved
8.2 – Domain Names
8.3 – DNS Revolver
8.4 – DNS Server Configuration
8.5 – DNS Protocol
8.6 – DNS Servers And Records
8.7 – DNS Servers And Zones
8.8 – Different Types Of DNS Servers
8.9 – Client Access To DNS
8.10 – The Root DNS Servers
8.11 – MX And SRV Records
8.12 – ENUM
8.12 – DNSSEC (Secure DNS)

CHAPTER 9 – IPv6 RELATED ORGANIZATIONS
9.1 – Internet Governance Bodies
9.2 – IPv6 Forum Groups
9.3 – Informal IPv6 Network Administration Certification
9.4 – Wide Project, Japan

CHAPTER 10 – IPv6 PROJECTS
10.1 – Project 1: A Standalone Dual Stack Node In An IPv4 Network, Using Tunneled Service
10.2 – Project 2: Dual Stack Router With Router Advertisement Daemon
10.3 – Project 3: Internal Dual-Stack Freebsd Server
10.4 – Project 4: Dual Stack DNS Server
10.5 – Project 5: Dual Stack Web Server
10.6 – Project 6: Dual Stack E-Mail Server
10.7 – Conclusion

APPENDIX A – CRYPTOGRAPHY & PKI
A.1 – Cryptography Standards
A.2 – Cryptography, Encryption And Decryption
A.3 – Message Digest
A.4 – Asymmetric Key Cryptography
A.5 – Hash-Based Message Authentication Code (HMAC)
A.6 – Internet Key Exchange (IKE)
A.7 – Secure Socket Layer (SSL)/ Transport Layer Security (TLS)

BIBLIOGRAPHY
TCP/ IPv4
TCP/ IPv6

INDEX

IPv4 Endgame

I checked out the IPv4 Report website today (Monday, Dec. 06, 2010), and here’s what I saw:

• Projected IANA Unallocated Address Pool Exhaustion: 03-Mar-2011

• Projected RIR Unallocated Address Pool Exhaustion: 02-Dec-2011

That means IANA will run out of unallocated IPv4 addresses to hand out to RIRs in less than three months. In just under a year, the RIRs themselves will be out of unallocated IPv4 addresses. In other words, if you need a new IPv4 address a year from now, you are out of luck. In fact, you may not be able to get one a whole lot sonner than that.

The well-known IPv4 Exhaustion Counter developed by Takashi Arano of Intec NetCore (http://inetcore.com/project/ipv4ec/) shows this:

IPv4 Exhaustion Counter by Takashi Arano (Intec NetCore), as of December 06, 2010 (17:17 hours)

The Second Internet, based on IPv6, isn’t only knocking on our doors. It will come crashing through next year whether we like it or not.

The good news, of course,  is that there really is no reason not to like IPv6.

IPv6 restores the end-to-end nature of the Internet, which has been compromised by the wideapread use of NAT (Network Address Translation). It also provides a nearly inexhaustible number of globally unique and routable IP addresses. In addition, it has built-in IPSEC, new features such as multicast, support for QoS (Quality of Service), and a flat addressing model which is great for P2P applications, VoIP, IPTV, and other neat things.

IPv6: coming to your neighborhood — very soon!

Better Late Than Never

“Better late than never.”

Or so the saying goes. Well, this article is more than a tad late, seeing that its been over two months since my last post on this blog. To top it off, this post is about an event that tookj place on September 19, about a month and half ago.

The photos you will find here are from the last gathering of the Cebu GNU/Libux Users Group (CeGNULUG) at the Casa Verde restaurant in uptown Cebu City. Present were the usual suspects including the group’s President, John Clark Naldoza who presided over the meeting.

The gang's all here (at Casa Verde)

Much time was spent on introducing new members to the group and explaining the basic concepts of free/open source software (especially the legal aspects). Aside from that, however, was the usual shop talk and practical problem-solving. Probably just as much time was spent on eating — and going nuts over one of the largest hamburgers I have ever eaten from.

As I write this, there are already plans for another meeting. Not bad. At least now we’re getting together more than twice a year (and I’ll have more photos to post on this blog).

Hopefully I’ll get to update this blog more often than that!

Somehow, John Clark and the monster burger just go together

As you can see, even a burger that size is no match for the combined appetite of CeGNULUG members

IPv6 at Home!

What’s this?

That’s part of the output from the ifconfig command, which is used (among other things) to show the status of my computer’s network interfaces. This little bit here describes the IPv6 tunnel I managed to get running on my home PC. I’ve blanked out the IP address, of course , so don’t get any funny ideas, hackers.

The tunnel was createed using the Gogo6 client (you can get it from Gogo6.net) and a free IPv6 tunnel account on Freenet6. Linux users will have to compile the client software from the source code. This is easy if you have the all your development tools and libraries installed (I didn’t so I had to do some major updating). The only configuration you have to do is choose your installation directory and edit the file gogoc.conf to enter your Freenet6 credentials and make sure you use an authenticated login. In my case, I chose a non-standard installation directory and had to do a bit of debugging to make sure the client software found all the necessary files.

Not everything is rosy, of course. The tunnel seems to drop every few minutes (its brought up again automatically). I can’t seem to get IPv6 DNS working even though I’ve entered the nameserver in my resolver file (/etc/resolv.conf). That means I can’t ping IPv6-enabled sites using their names. I can, however, ping an IPv6 address.

I guess that means I have to do some more tinkering. Second Internet, here I come!

IPv6 Book: The Second Internet

The founder and Chief Technology Officer of Cebu-based InfoWeapons Corporation, Lawrence Hughes, has written a new book on IPv6 entitled The Second Internet: Reinventing Computer Networking with IPv6. Published in digital format by InfoWeapons, the book has gained critical acclaim from IPv6 and networking experts around the world.

Hughes began InfoWeapons in 2004 to develop and market secure, IPv6-capable network appliances. The company’s research and development facility is in Cebu City.

“I felt that the existing books did not go into enough detail,” Hughes said as he explained his reasons for writing his book. “I tried to help engineers build a bridge from what they know (IPv4) to the new concepts (IPv6). The two main chapters (one on IPv4, one on IPv6) use the same subchapter numbering sequences. So an IPv4 concept might be in section 3.1.2, while the corresponding IPv6 concept would be in section 5.1.2. Kind of like ‘how do I say this in IPv6?’”

“I also created a series of very detailed and complete labs that can be done with generic PCs and open source software, to create a full featured IPv6 testbed network,” he continued. “All labs are done first with just IPv4, then migrated to dual stack (IPv4 + IPv6)… Anyone going through the book together with the hands-on labs will have a fairly complete knowledge of IPv6.”

Although it contains a great deal of technical material, Hughes explained that it will still appeal to a wider audience. “Parts of the book would be suitable for management types that don’t need or want the bits and bytes, but may need to understand timing, transition issues, how to identify products certified to be compliant, and the role of various organizations involved in IPv6,” he said.

CentOS 5.5 on Dell Vostro A840

When I purchased my Dell Vostro A840 last February, it came pre-loaded with Ubuntu 8.04. This version of Ubuntu was a Long Term Support (LTS) release, which means that it is still being updated with security patches and (hopefully) new versions of the installed applications. That being said, I found that this situation left much to be desired.

For one, everytime I upgraded the kernel, I found to my dismay that my sound drivers would go on the blink. Not being familiar with Ubuntu, I didn’t want to go around compiling software (even granting that I could find proper drivers for the hardware). I also found that my applications — updated or otherwise — were very, well… dated. They were usable, yes, but way behind the times.

Upgrading to another version of Ubuntu would have been a solution. But the best way to do that would have been to burn a DVD installer and make a clean installation. If I was going to do that, I thought, then why not go the whole hog and switch to a Liunux version with which I was familiar, such as CentOS?

I checked online and saw that thewre was a new version of CentOS: version 5.5. Now that looked attractive.