4 ms·

how do you encode 128 bits without making a long number? and not using hex?

by lamonade 6mo ago

b112 6mo ago
Far easier to use ipv8, which just has 5 octets instead of 4.
- AndrewDucker 6mo ago
  That still means replacing every part of the chain.
  - b112 6mo ago
    There are lots of legacy things in tcp/ip headers. One of them can be for the extra octlet. When ipv4 legacy flies around, that oclet will be null or 0. The entire internet could route just fine, especially if you put the extra octlet at the end. 1.1.1.1 gets an extra 1.1.1.1.newoctlet. So every existing IP gets a bonus 255 new IPs, and for now, routing of those is hardlocked to that IP, and it works with all legacy gear. In 30 years or something, we can care about the mobility of those new IPs.
    - Dagger2 6mo ago
      You're at the very beginning, baby steps stage of inventing IPv6 there. You aren't the first person to come up with the idea of adding extra bits to IP addresses to make them longer. The problem isn't finding somewhere to stash the extra bits in the packet format (which is trivial; you can simply set the next-protocol field to a special value and then put the bits at the start of the payload), it's getting all software to use those extra bits -- and getting that to work requires doing all of the new AF family, new sockaddr struct, new DNS records, dual stack/translation/tunnels etc etc that v6 does. Please consider that maybe the people working on v6 weren't actually complete imbeciles and did in fact think things through.
      - b112 6mo ago
        Please consider that maybe the people working on v6 weren't actually complete imbeciles and did in fact think things through. It is possible for the world to change, and for designs and plans and viewpoints 30+ years ago to be less correct today. This world is not that world. That world had massive concerns about the processing cost of NAT. That was one reason for ipv6. It also had different ideas about where the net would go. We now know that the "internet of things" and "having your fridge online", as well as "5G in everything so people can't firewall it off" is just insane and malign. We also know that tying an IP address to a person (compared to an ISP using NAT) reduces privacy. That devious and devilish actors abound. Even though they thought these things might be neat, many of them aren't.
        kalleboo 6mo ago
        > That world had massive concerns about the processing cost of NAT The processing cost of NAT is still a problem. There's that classic post by a Native American tribal ISP where it was cheaper for them to pay to replace their clients IPv4-only Roku devices with IPv6 capable Apple TVs than to upgrade their CGNAT appliance to handle the video traffic.
        b112 6mo ago
        You misunderstand. The concerns about the "processing cost of NAT" were edge concerns. Companies, homes, edge-devices with 100 or 1000 RFC1918 addressed devices behind them. When ipv6 was created, NAT wasn't a thing, as processing power just wasn't there. And it was thought the processing power would never be there. Yet now everyone has NAT in little devices at home. So the need to route 100 IPs into every person's home isn't a thing. Which is inline with my comment about how the world looked different 30 years ago, and how the concept of "IPs for everything" is the reverse of what people even want now.
        Dagger2 6mo ago
        None of that has anything to do with what you said in the post I replied to. "Add an extra octet to v4 addresses" has hard technical barriers to deal with if you want it to work, regardless of what the world looks like or what you're designing for. > We now know that the "internet of things" and "having your fridge online", as well as "5G in everything so people can't firewall it off" is just insane and malign None of this is really relevant either. IP's job is to handle the addressing used when sending data over the Internet, and it should do this job well regardless of what people end up doing with it. > We also know that tying an IP address to a person (compared to an ISP using NAT) reduces privacy We don't tie IP addresses to people. PI allocations might sort of count, but regular users don't get those.
    - Ekaros 6mo ago
      Pray tell me exactly where in the IP packet you put those extra octets. In a way that it affects zero other devices?
- eqvinox 6mo ago
  We have that variant of IPv8, it's what CGNAT gives you, especially if you run MAP-E or MAP-T (which are technically not quite NAT, but kinda are, it's… complicated). You take some bits from the port number and essentially repurpose them into part of the address. It's a nice band-aid technology, no less and no more.
zem 6mo ago
have that be the invisible bottom layer. come up with a list of 256 common words, one per byte, and have that be the human visible IP address. mentally reading a string of words, however nonsensical, is way easier than a soup of undifferentiated hex digits.
- hnlmorg 6mo ago
  Easier if you’re a native English speaker. Harder if you’re not. My only gripe with IPv6 addresses is they look too similar to MAC addresses. But as a representation, I think they’re absolutely fine.
  - zem 6mo ago
    fair point about native english speakers, but there's also no reason this scheme can't be localised
    - hnlmorg 6mo ago
      That would cause worse confusion when working with teams from different localisations. Not to mention the complexity of now adding localisations to the address parser.

how do you encode 128 bits without making a long number? and not using hex?

b112 6mo ago

Far easier to use ipv8, which just has 5 octets instead of 4.

AndrewDucker 6mo ago
That still means replacing every part of the chain.
- b112 6mo ago
  There are lots of legacy things in tcp/ip headers. One of them can be for the extra octlet. When ipv4 legacy flies around, that oclet will be null or 0. The entire internet could route just fine, especially if you put the extra octlet at the end. 1.1.1.1 gets an extra 1.1.1.1.newoctlet. So every existing IP gets a bonus 255 new IPs, and for now, routing of those is hardlocked to that IP, and it works with all legacy gear. In 30 years or something, we can care about the mobility of those new IPs.
  - Dagger2 6mo ago
    You're at the very beginning, baby steps stage of inventing IPv6 there. You aren't the first person to come up with the idea of adding extra bits to IP addresses to make them longer. The problem isn't finding somewhere to stash the extra bits in the packet format (which is trivial; you can simply set the next-protocol field to a special value and then put the bits at the start of the payload), it's getting all software to use those extra bits -- and getting that to work requires doing all of the new AF family, new sockaddr struct, new DNS records, dual stack/translation/tunnels etc etc that v6 does. Please consider that maybe the people working on v6 weren't actually complete imbeciles and did in fact think things through.
    - b112 6mo ago
      Please consider that maybe the people working on v6 weren't actually complete imbeciles and did in fact think things through. It is possible for the world to change, and for designs and plans and viewpoints 30+ years ago to be less correct today. This world is not that world. That world had massive concerns about the processing cost of NAT. That was one reason for ipv6. It also had different ideas about where the net would go. We now know that the "internet of things" and "having your fridge online", as well as "5G in everything so people can't firewall it off" is just insane and malign. We also know that tying an IP address to a person (compared to an ISP using NAT) reduces privacy. That devious and devilish actors abound. Even though they thought these things might be neat, many of them aren't.
      - kalleboo 6mo ago
        > That world had massive concerns about the processing cost of NAT The processing cost of NAT is still a problem. There's that classic post by a Native American tribal ISP where it was cheaper for them to pay to replace their clients IPv4-only Roku devices with IPv6 capable Apple TVs than to upgrade their CGNAT appliance to handle the video traffic.
        b112 6mo ago
        You misunderstand. The concerns about the "processing cost of NAT" were edge concerns. Companies, homes, edge-devices with 100 or 1000 RFC1918 addressed devices behind them. When ipv6 was created, NAT wasn't a thing, as processing power just wasn't there. And it was thought the processing power would never be there. Yet now everyone has NAT in little devices at home. So the need to route 100 IPs into every person's home isn't a thing. Which is inline with my comment about how the world looked different 30 years ago, and how the concept of "IPs for everything" is the reverse of what people even want now.
      - Dagger2 6mo ago
        None of that has anything to do with what you said in the post I replied to. "Add an extra octet to v4 addresses" has hard technical barriers to deal with if you want it to work, regardless of what the world looks like or what you're designing for. > We now know that the "internet of things" and "having your fridge online", as well as "5G in everything so people can't firewall it off" is just insane and malign None of this is really relevant either. IP's job is to handle the addressing used when sending data over the Internet, and it should do this job well regardless of what people end up doing with it. > We also know that tying an IP address to a person (compared to an ISP using NAT) reduces privacy We don't tie IP addresses to people. PI allocations might sort of count, but regular users don't get those.
  - Ekaros 6mo ago
    Pray tell me exactly where in the IP packet you put those extra octets. In a way that it affects zero other devices?
eqvinox 6mo ago
We have that variant of IPv8, it's what CGNAT gives you, especially if you run MAP-E or MAP-T (which are technically not quite NAT, but kinda are, it's… complicated). You take some bits from the port number and essentially repurpose them into part of the address. It's a nice band-aid technology, no less and no more.

zem 6mo ago

have that be the invisible bottom layer. come up with a list of 256 common words, one per byte, and have that be the human visible IP address. mentally reading a string of words, however nonsensical, is way easier than a soup of undifferentiated hex digits.

hnlmorg 6mo ago
Easier if you’re a native English speaker. Harder if you’re not. My only gripe with IPv6 addresses is they look too similar to MAC addresses. But as a representation, I think they’re absolutely fine.
- zem 6mo ago
  fair point about native english speakers, but there's also no reason this scheme can't be localised
  - hnlmorg 6mo ago
    That would cause worse confusion when working with teams from different localisations. Not to mention the complexity of now adding localisations to the address parser.