On 12/22/2011 04:48, Glen Kent wrote:
In many environments RA is a catastrophic disaster. Some operators need to be able to do everything with RA turned off on routers, disabled on hosts and filtered on switches.
While in some environments, typically with small number of devices, its indispensable. Small businesses may not want the complexity of setting up a central server (for DHCP) - SLAAC works very well in such environments.
Please show me the small businesses that don't already have a DHCP server. Or (equally unlikely) show me the small business whose DHCP server isn't baked into their SOHO router/toaster and works with nearly zero human intervention.
Today, we can get NTP server information only with DHCP (DNS info is supported by both DHCP and RAs). DHCP only works after RAs have been processed. In some environments (mobile IPv6) delays in acquiring NTP and other servers information is critical and waiting for DHCP to come up may not be acceptable.
So clearly the right answer is to make DHCPv6 a superset of RA functionality so that the people who need more than what RA provides only have to run DHCP. Over strenuous objection DNS resolver data was added to RA and the folks over in MIF are just now getting around to sorting out the damage caused by having the same category of information arrive over 2 different configuration protocols with subtly different data. (A 100% foreseen problem that was part of the core of the previously mentioned strenuous objections.) RA was an interesting idea that came to light in an era when DHCP was new, clunky, unreliable, and not widely deployed. None of those things are true anymore, so it would be very helpful if IPv6 deployment planning moved into the 21st Century. Doug -- [^L] Breadth of IT experience, and depth of knowledge in the DNS. Yours for the right price. :) http://SupersetSolutions.com/