networking - Barriers to IPv6 deployment: addressing

There are several things that are keeping IPv6 deployment from being a topic of active discussion here at my work. There are the usual technical issues, but one non-technical one appears to be a major stumbling block on the path to actually getting a deployment project going.

Addresses, memorizing of.

Specifically, IPv4 addresses are comprehensible, and IPv6 addresses just look like a big long string of hex. The human mind has real trouble memorizing lists of more than 7-8 items, and an IPv4 address (192.168.231.148) has four items in it which makes it easy for us to memorize. A fully populated IPv6 address has not only 8 sections, but each section has 4 hex digits in it. IPv6 addresses were not designed for memorization. To the technician who knows that the DNS server is at 192.168.42.42 (or more likely "42.42", since the company prefix is likely memorized), the idea of memorizing an IPv6 address fills them with dread. Which in turn makes them much less enthusiastic about participating in an IPv6 deployment project.

Because of how our network works we're not fully dynamic in terms of v4 addressing. We have several to many subnets that are entirely statically assigned for a variety of reasons, chief among them being that the overhead of static DHCP assignments is perceived as being too great. Also, some devices still aren't smart enough to pull DNS addresses out of DHCP while also having a static assignment, and therefore require manually configured DNS settings. Therefore, some v6 address memorization will have to be done.

We're not under any mandate to get v6 out the door, so we don't have pressure from the top. However, it is time to start prepping our infrastructure to handle IPv6 even if we don't convert wholesale.

For those of you who have been in IPv6-land for a while, what short-cut methods do you use to discuss or keep track of subnets and specific/critical IP addresses? If I can help reduce some of the dread surrounding IPv6 we might get the project going.

Answer

Here are things I've noticed after working with IPv6 addresses:

1. Don't use "full" addresses. The :: abbreviation goes a long way.


2. Inside your organization you'll probably deal with a single prefix. This means you can all but ignore the first part of the address.


3. Unless you're using glass teletypes copy and paste exists. Use it.


4. As @TomTom points out, DNS exists. Use it.


5. When you start working with v6 addresses patterns will quickly emerge. You start to recognize things like organizational prefixes (HE, Cisco, etc), Teredo, ISATAP, and stateless autoconfiguration.

IPv6 address don't have to be complex. For example, this is the address of a large company's public web server:

2001:420:80:1::5

I'm assuming the "80" is a subnet reserved for web servers. Unlike IPv4 you could also use the subnet "443" for HTTPS-only servers.