IPv6
Overview
The NFM-P supports IPv6 for control-plane addressing on IPv6-enabled devices.
Although the implementation of IPv6 is driven by the diminishing IPv4 address space, it is increasingly necessary to use a protocol that is designed to handle more complex network applications, such as broadband voice and video transmission, IP transit, Internet exchange peering, and other large enterprise applications.
Transition from IPv4 to IPv6
The transition from IPv4 to IPv6 is occurring in stages as network providers, service providers, and end users migrate existing applications and equipment to the new version. Control-plane forwarding of IPv6 packets is an important part of this transition; it allows isolated IPv6 hosts and smaller IPv6 networks to peer across an IPv4 network, using a mechanism such as 6over4 tunneling.
With 6over4 tunneling, a host encapsulates IPv6 packets in IPv4 packets for transport across an IPv4 network. Routers that identify 6over4 encapsulation remove the IPv4 encapsulation before they forward the packets to other native IPv6 hosts. The 6over4 mechanism uses the IPv4 multicast infrastructure for neighbor discovery.
IPv6 benefits
The general benefits of IPv6 include:
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simplified header format and fixed header length
An IPv6 header contains fewer fields than an IPv4 header. IPv6 excludes obsolete IPv4 header fields and processes option fields only when they contain values. IPv6 also standardizes the size of the packet header to 40 bytes to streamline packet processing. These features reduce packet-processing overhead and make routing more efficient.
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IPv6 increases the IP address size from 32 bits to 128 bits to support a greater number of NEs and to provide a more versatile addressing hierarchy. IPv6 also supports address auto-configuration.
The scalability of multicast routing is improved by the presence of a Scope field. IPv6 introduces anycast addressing, which designates a group of disparate NEs as the recipient of a specific data stream.
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improved scalability and extensibility
Built-in traffic optimization makes IPv6 highly scalable, and IPv6 supports future routing technology enhancements using protocol extensions.
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IPv6 features packet prioritization which allows the labeling of packets that require special handling, such as real-time service for VoIP conferences.
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Authentication, encryption, and data integrity features are mandatory components for which IPv6 supports standardized extensions.
IPv6 support on the NFM-P
The NFM-P entities that support IPv6 configuration include the following:
An NFM-P operator enables IPv6 on an interface during interface creation.
The benefits of the NFM-P IPv6 implementation include:
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integration with existing IPv4 configurations on many property and configuration forms
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automatic validation of IP addresses on the client GUI, regardless of the IP version
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support of compressed IPv6 addresses when repeated address octets are present
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separate IPv4 and IPv6 administrative and operational states on an interface
Accepted IPv6 address formats
The NFM-P accepts IPv6 addresses in the following formats:
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colon-hexadecimal, or x:x:x:x:x:x:x:x
where x is a 16-bit hexadecimal number from 0 to FFFF
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a combination of colon-hexadecimal and dotted-decimal, or x:x:x:x:x:x:d.d.d.d
where
x is a 16-bit hexadecimal number from 0 to FFFF
d is an 8-bit decimal number from 0 to 255
Using a combination of colon-hexadecimal and dotted-decimal formats may be convenient in an environment that supports the use of IPv4 and IPv6 addresses.
The NFM-P allows IPv6 address compression for an address that contains repeated zero values. You can use two adjacent colons to represent any group of repeated zero values in an IPv6 address. For example:
2001:DB8::
expands to
2001:0DB8:0000:0000:0000:0000:0000:0000
It is not necessary to supply the leading zeros for a number in an IPv6 address. For example, 2001:DB8::3C:5 is a valid IPv6 address.