The web server I run this blog’s virtual host from has been IPv6-enabled for about three years. On Monday night I asked myself why I’d never given the blog an AAAA record. So I did.
I just looked at the logs, out of curiosity, to see how many of my readers are IPv6-enabled. It’s painful. Discounting myself, 19 unique visitors out of 1683, 1.13%, came in via IPv6.
If you aren’t thinking about IPv6 you should start. Enabling IPv6 really isn’t a big problem, by itself, as most ISPs can handle requests like that now. If you’re anything like me the problems that will vex you are the little ones: death by a thousand paper cuts. It’ll be the fact that your hosts.allow files need new stuff in them. Or the guy who does DNS doesn’t know what a quad-A record is. Or your web log analyzer script that’s worked flawlessly for a decade now barfs. Each problem, by itself, takes a week or two to fix, and now it’s three years later.
I’ve been running a couple of hosts on their own little VLAN, separate from everything else so that I can figure out what we need to fix at an OS level. Because they’ve been separate I could take my time, fixing things slowly so that as we get ready to turn IPv6 on for more of my organization we’re ready. It’s worked out really well so far, and I’d recommend it to anybody who isn’t testing IPv6 already. Get on it, get an IPv6 allocation and build yourself a small DMZ testing area. Put your desktop in it, too. It won’t be long until you be forced to implement IPv6, and this way you’ll be prepared.
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This is something that I desperately need to do.
None of my cisco gear is IPv6 compliant. I doubt any of my Juniper stuff is. And I have zilch configured internally anyway. A lab environment is definitely in the cards for playing with IPv6. Thanks for the nudge!
Your PTR record seems to to be missing though.
On a different note, the biggest problem here in Germany is, that absolutely no provider seems to be willing to provide native IPv6 connectivity.
Even our university, which already *has* an allocated v6 block (provided via dfn.net to all german universities) has no plans whatsoever to use it.
I’m one of those 19!
Whoo-hoo!
FWIW, even many Win* hosts that are IPv6 capable would get to you over IPv4 if that IPv6edness was provided via automatic tunneling (specifically thinking 6to4 and Teredo here, but applies to ISATAP as well).
I would be one of those getting to you over v6, but at client site – not so much :( …
(and Verizon EVDO now seems to block Protocol41)
/TJ