World IPv6 Day

ISOC have announced the date for World IPv6 Day – mark it in your calendars now – 8th June 2011.

This will be the day that you will need extra support resources available to deal with the potential for brokenness which will ensue from folks with poor v6 implementations or incomplete v6 connectivity.

It may look a bit drastic to submit the Internet at large to this “experiment”, but I think this is an important and sensible move.

Folks such as Marco Hogewoning and Martin Levy (among many, many others, these are the first two which spring to mind if you mention IPv6 to me) have been demonstrating the various gotchas or downright brokenness which exists out there for some time now. Sadly, while the enlightened have no problem listening, some have been sat with their heads in the sand. The bad thing is that these are often the people we need to listen most – software and system vendors.

So, get the popcorn ready, be ready for the unexpected, and watch what happens.

In the meantime, you might want to check how IPv6-ready your network is… not just how much it claims to be.

Best of all, N(ew/A)NOG 52 meeting will be happening in Denver the following week, so we get to have a discussion of the aftermath in near real time. I’d love to link to it, but there’s nowhere to go.

At least it’s a Wednesday – no-one’s Friday is being ruined. 🙂