IPv6 is coming!

IPv6_readyLast post, I presented you with a challenge number: 340,282,366,920,938,463,463,374,607,431,768,211,456 or 3.40*1038, or 340 undecillion.  I got some great comments and no it is not:

  • The number of possible margarita combinations that are available in a normal human lifetime, well Keith I say we start trying, I think we can get done by next week.
  • Bill Gates's bank account balance :), as far as I know I cannot refute that one Shay  :-)
  • The number of calories in a plate of Outback Steakhouse Cheese Fries (carry the decimal for a Bloomin' Onion). Although I hear that is pretty close Tim.
  • number of windows crash reports sent to Microsoft ;-), lol, and btw, https://absoblogginlutely.net/, that would mean that other OS's are higher. :-)

Aside from my poor right justification, thanks Blake :-). This is the amount of addresses that IPv6 will provide, IPv6 provides 2 to the 128th addresses, even though not all the address's are available, like: like the 6to4 range, fec0::/10 and such (thanks hafthor), which is huge and let me be the first, most likely incorrectly, to state

WE WILL NEVER NEED THAT MANY ADDRESSES. :-)

Just kidding, but it is a a really big number when you think of nanotechnology, I can image that that really big number goes away, just fun to say.  :-)

So why did I  bring this up?  Well my teammate Chris Avis, sent an interesting article talking about the root servers being updated, and when you think about how mathematically big the IPv6 address space is, this is some potentially great times in the networking world.  The full article can be found at the link below, but I really like the beginning sentence:

"Just before year's end, ICANN/IANA sent out a short message saying that "on 4 February 2008, IANA will add AAAA records for the IPv6 addresses of the four root servers whose operators have requested it"

Read the full article here: IPv6: coming to a root server near you 

Happy Hexadecimal math.  :-)