Ipv4 What Is
What is IPv4? It routes most of today’s internet traffic – BlueCat …
The short answer to the question, “What is IPv4? ”, is that it’s the fourth version of the internet protocol. IP, which stands for internet protocol, is the internet’s principal set of rules for communications.
In place for more than 35 years, the U. S. Department of Defense first deployed it on its ARPANET (Advanced Research Projects Agency Network) in 1983.
Internet protocol version 4, IPv4, is also at a crossroads: its global IP address supply is exhausted. The internet is undergoing a gradual transition to the next version, IPv6, but not without challenges.
In this glossary entry, we’ll explore the basic components of the internet and how they work together, examine the fourth internet protocol version and its modern-day shortcomings, and touch on its IPv6 successor.
Before IPv4, a little more on how the internet works
More details on IP
IP is part of an internet protocol suite, which also includes the transmission control protocol. Together, these two are known as TCP/IP. The internet protocol suite governs rules for packetizing, addressing, transmitting, routing, and receiving data over networks.
IP addressing is a logical means of assigning addresses to devices on a network. Each device connected to the internet requires a unique IP address.
Most networks that handle internet traffic are packet-switched. Small units of data, called packets, are routed through a network. A source host, like your computer, delivers these IP packets to a destination host, such as a server, based on IP addresses in packet headers. Packet-switching allows many users on a network to share the same data path.
An IP address has two parts—-one part identifies the host, such as a computer or other device. And the other part identifies the network it belongs to. TCP/IP uses a subnet mask to separate them.
How DNS fits in the picture
DNS, or domain name system, is the phone book of the internet. It translates domain names that we easily remember, like, into IP addresses like 104. 239. 197. 100, which are the language of the internet.
DNS allows computers, servers, and other networked devices, each with their unique IP addresses, to talk to each other. And it gets users to the website they’re looking for.
Now, exactly what is IPv4?
IP (version 4) addresses are 32-bit integers that can be expressed in hexadecimal notation. The more common format, known as dotted quad or dotted decimal, is x. x. x, where each x can be any value between 0 and 255. For example, 192. 0. 2. 146 is a valid IPv4 address.
IPv4 still routes most of today’s internet traffic. A 32-bit address space limits the number of unique hosts to 232, which is nearly 4. 3 billion IPv4 addresses for the world to use (4, 294, 967, 296, to be exact).
Today, we’ve run out
Think about it: How many connected devices are in your household?
The median American household has five devices, including smartphones, computers and laptops, tablets, and streaming media devices. That doesn’t even include the range of devices that fall under the internet of things (IoT) category, such as connected thermostats, smart speakers, and doorbell cameras.
So, in today’s world of ultra-connected computer networks, where every stationary and mobile device now has an IP address, it turns out that 4. 3 billion of them isn’t nearly enough.
In 2011, the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA), the global coordinator of IP addressing, ran out of free IPv4 address space to allocate to regional registries. IANA then recovered additional unused IPv4 address blocks from the regional registries and created a recovered address pool. In 2014, IANA announced that it was redistributing the last addresses in the recovered address pool.
When it’s tapped, there will be no more IPv4 addresses left.
Additional limitations
Besides running out of address space, the IPv4 addressing system has some additional downsides:
About 18 million addresses were set aside for private addressing, drawn from a range known RFC 1918. Most organizations use private addresses on internal networks. However, devices on these local networks have no direct path to the public internet.
To access the public internet, devices with private addresses require a complex and resource-intensive workaround called network address translation (NAT).
Furthermore, North America got the lion’s share of IPv4 address allocations. As a result, entities in Asia-Pacific and elsewhere, where internet use has exploded, have purchased large chunks of IP space on the gray market. This has broken up contiguous ranges of IP addresses and made it more complicated to route internet traffic.
To replace IPv4, enter IPv6
To address this problem, the internet is undergoing a gradual transition to IPv6. The latest version of the internet protocol, IPv6 internet addressing, moves from 32 bits to a 128-bit address space, with both letters and numbers in identifiers (for example, 2002:db8::8a3f:362:7897). IPv6 has 2128 uniquely identifying addresses, which is about 340 undecillion or 340 billion billion billion.
This version of IP has some obvious advantages, the primary one being that it’s a lot more space. With IPv6, a single network can have more IPv6 addresses than the entire IPv4 address space.
It seems easy enough, but IPv4 and IPv6 are not directly interoperable. IPv6 is not the easiest protocol to walk into. Understanding IPv4 vs IPv6 is a big undertaking fraught with challenges. And when it comes to transitioning to IPv6 DNS, the BlueCat platform is at the ready to help.
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IPv4 vs. IPv6 Benefits – What is it? | ThousandEyes
What is IPv6?
IPv6 is the next generation Internet Protocol (IP) address standard intended to supplement and eventually replace IPv4, the protocol many Internet services still use today. Every computer, mobile phone, home automation component, IoT sensor and any other device connected to the Internet needs a numerical IP address to communicate between other devices. The original IP address scheme, called IPv4, is running out of addresses due to its widespread usage from the proliferation of so many connected devices.
What is IPv4?
IPv4 stands for Internet Protocol version 4. It is the underlying technology that makes it possible for us to connect our devices to the web. Whenever a device accesses the Internet, it is assigned a unique, numerical IP address such as 99. 48. 227. To send data from one computer to another through the web, a data packet must be transferred across the network containing the IP addresses of both devices.
Why Support IPv6? What are the benefits of IPv6?
IPv6 (Internet Protocol version 6) is the sixth revision to the Internet Protocol and the successor to IPv4. It functions similarly to IPv4 in that it provides the unique IP addresses necessary for Internet-enabled devices to communicate. However, it does have one significant difference: it utilizes a 128-bit IP address.
Key benefits to IPv6 include:
No more NAT (Network Address Translation)
Auto-configuration
No more private address collisions
Better multicast routing
Simpler header format
Simplified, more efficient routing
True quality of service (QoS), also called “flow labeling”
Built-in authentication and privacy support
Flexible options and extensions
Easier administration (no more DHCP)
IPv4 uses a 32-bit address for its Internet addresses. That means it can provide support for 2^32 IP addresses in total â around 4. 29 billion. That may seem like a lot, but all 4. 29 billion IP addresses have now been assigned, leading to the address shortage issues we face today.
IPv6 utilizes 128-bit Internet addresses. Therefore, it can support 2^128 Internet addresses—340, 282, 366, 920, 938, 463, 463, 374, 607, 431, 768, 211, 456 of them to be exact. The number of IPv6 addresses is 1028 times larger than the number of IPv4 addresses. So there are more than enough IPv6 addresses to allow for Internet devices to expand for a very long time.
The text form of the IPv6 address is xxxx:xxxx:xxxx:xxxx:xxxx:xxxx:xxxx:xxxx, where each x is a hexadecimal digit, representing 4 bits. Leading zeros can be omitted. The double colon (::) can be used once in the text form of an address, to designate any number of 0 bits.
With Dual-IP stacks, your computers, routers, switches, and other devices run both protocols, but IPv6 is the preferred protocol. A typical procedure for businesses is to start by enabling both TCP/IP protocol stacks on the wide area network (WAN) core routers, then perimeter routers and firewalls, followed by data-center routers and finally the desktop access routers.
ThousandEyes Support for IPv6
With IPv6 becoming more prevalent in cloud provider and consumer access networks, you may already be on the path to IPv6 deployment with your network and applications.
If you are looking to understand IPv6 in your environment there are three things you should be monitoring:
IPv6 DNS resolution
IPv6 traffic paths
IPv6 BGP prefixes and routes
ThousandEyes has support for IPv6 so that organizations can utilize IPv6 across all of their test types (web, network, voice, routing) and agent types (cloud, enterprise, endpoint).
ThousandEyes Cloud Agent support for IPv6 is provided on six continents allowing global coverage for organizations. ThousandEyes also supports the use of dual-stack IPv4 and IPv6 Enterprise Agents. Enterprise Agents can have both addresses assigned and executes tests based on a user-defined preference for only IPv4, only IPv6 or a preference for IPv6.
Differences between IPv4 and IPv6 – Linksys Official Support
The Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) is a protocol for use on packet-switched Link Layer networks (e. g. Ethernet). IPv4 provides an addressing capability of approximately 4. 3 billion addresses.
The Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) is more advanced and has better features compared to IPv4. It has the capability to provide an infinite number of addresses. It is replacing IPv4 to accommodate the growing number of networks worldwide and help solve the IP address exhaustion problem.
One of the differences between IPv4 and IPv6 is the appearance of the IP addresses. IPv4 uses four 1 byte decimal numbers, separated by a dot (i. e. 192. 168. 1. 1), while IPv6 uses hexadecimal numbers that are separated by colons (i. fe80::d4a8:6435:d2d8:d9f3b11).
Below is the summary of the differences between the IPv4 and IPv6:
IPv4IPv6No. of bits on IP Address32128FormatdecimalhexadecimalCapable of Addresses4. 3 billioninfinite numberHow to ping ping
Advantages of IPv6 over IPv4:
IPv6 simplified the router’s task compared to IPv4. IPv6 is more compatible to mobile networks than IPv4. IPv6 allows for bigger payloads than what is allowed in IPv4. IPv6 is used by less than 1% of the networks, while IPv4 is still in use by the remaining 99%.
Related Articles:
Checking the computer’s IPv6 AddressHow to verify if your system is capable of IPv6 connectivityLinksys devices that support IPv6
Frequently Asked Questions about ipv4 what is
What IPv4 means?
IPv4 stands for Internet Protocol version 4. It is the underlying technology that makes it possible for us to connect our devices to the web. Whenever a device accesses the Internet, it is assigned a unique, numerical IP address such as 99.48. 227.227.
What does IPv4 and IPv6 mean?
The Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) is a protocol for use on packet-switched Link Layer networks (e.g. Ethernet). … The Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) is more advanced and has better features compared to IPv4. It has the capability to provide an infinite number of addresses.
What is IPv4 and how does it work?
IPv4 is the fourth version of IP, it is the basis of the Internet, and establishes the rules for the computer networks functioning on the principle of packet exchange. This protocol is responsible for establishing connections between computers, servers, mobile devices based on IP addresses.Nov 6, 2018
