5M prefixes in the core [was: Re: [ppml] [address-policy-wg] Those pesky ULAs again ]

Leo Bicknell <bicknell at ufp.org> writes:

> Today we think of a 5,000,000 prefix Internet as an impossibility.
> No hardware could ever do that.  However, 20 years on I'm not sure
> a 5 million route Internet will be surprising to anyone.

Who is the "we" you refer to above/

Actually, quite a few people are worried that a 5M prefix Internet is
a possibility. There are also debates (i.e., no consensus) that when
that happens, routers will actually be able to cope with the load in
practice.

I.e., see draft-iab-raws-report-02.txt and the efforts going on in the
IETF,  e.g.:

    http://www1.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/int-area/current/msg00763.html
    http://www1.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/int-area/current/msg00783.html

Just to give one data point, router vendors are saying that today,
they have routers that can support 1M routers. Operators (at least
some of them), are skeptical, because that hasn't been proven
operationaly in the field. So, there is at least some uncertainty as
to what can be supported in practice.

> The thing of it is, as we're seeing with IPv4, taking space back
> is really hard.  Now, some people think that a 25 year lifespan for
> IPv6 is "doing good".  I think if by allocating addresses more
> prudently we could make it 50 years, that's billions of future
> dollars and effort saved, and more important to me, perhaps avoiding
> the next version of this transition in my lifetime!

Glad to see you are thinking of an lifespan of more than just a few
years. Indeed, I think many are thinking of even longer time frames.

For example, policy proposal "2005-8: Proposal to amend ARIN IPv6
assignment and utilisation requirement"
(http://www.arin.net/policy/proposals/2005_8.html), which ARIN has
adopted, was motivated very much by looking at time lines 100 years
and longer...

Thomas