2 ms·

My personal opinion of having worked with all layers of networking for my job without developing a comprehensive understanding, is this: We as consumers see an

My personal opinion of having worked with all layers of networking for my job without developing a comprehensive understanding, is this: We as consumers see and use the highest level, which is often https or friends, and due to the layered nature of the OSI stack, as often happens in software, if a layer is lacking in something, it gets fixed 1 or 2 layers up. If then said thing is then implemented on the layer its supposed to, its often unwelcome and just causes issues. TCP/IP has already acknowledged this (haha) by offering UDP, on top of which you can build the network protocol of your dreams. And people have. It's called QUIC or HTTP3. It does everything one could ask of a network protocol, with QoS, NAT punchthrough, packet based low latency/overhead comms, etc. etc. And QUIC doesn't assume any sort of advanced mechanisms beneath, it works happily with IPv4. And once you have everything figured out for you on the level you like to work, there's not really a need for the lower layers to pick up the slack, as long as they work reliably.

torginus 6mo ago
I wish people actually put some thought into responding as opposed to just hitting the downvote button
- yencabulator 6mo ago
  You are being downvoted because nothing you said seems to have anything to do with IPv6. It seems you think as long as it's not your problem, it's solved?
  - torginus 6mo ago
    I feel like it's an entirely reasonable stance. The two valid approaches to solving a technical problem is either you try to solve all of it so that no one is concerned by it any more, or you solve as little of it as possible, but solve that part well, so there's a clear line on what's your job and what is not. IP as a concept of 'digital PO box' falls short even if we upgrade to IPv6 - imagine talking to someone via voicechat on your phone, and moving from home Wifi to mobile data. They are two separate HW interfaces with their own identities and networking stacks, so moving your connection has to bypass the IP layer even on IPv6. On the other hand if your job description is to shuttle packets between 'A' and 'B', where neither is guaranteed to be the actual sender or receiver, IP address becomes an implementation detail, and doing you job on IPv4 is much simpler, with the rube-goldberg stuff of actually figuring out how to connect the actual sender and recipient falling to higher level protocols. So while I don't have strong feelings on the topic, this movement feels like a management reorg, where some business units get shuffled around, priorities change, but ultimately there's very little consistent motive or goal to the whole thing.

torginus 6mo ago

I wish people actually put some thought into responding as opposed to just hitting the downvote button

yencabulator 6mo ago
You are being downvoted because nothing you said seems to have anything to do with IPv6. It seems you think as long as it's not your problem, it's solved?
- torginus 6mo ago
  I feel like it's an entirely reasonable stance. The two valid approaches to solving a technical problem is either you try to solve all of it so that no one is concerned by it any more, or you solve as little of it as possible, but solve that part well, so there's a clear line on what's your job and what is not. IP as a concept of 'digital PO box' falls short even if we upgrade to IPv6 - imagine talking to someone via voicechat on your phone, and moving from home Wifi to mobile data. They are two separate HW interfaces with their own identities and networking stacks, so moving your connection has to bypass the IP layer even on IPv6. On the other hand if your job description is to shuttle packets between 'A' and 'B', where neither is guaranteed to be the actual sender or receiver, IP address becomes an implementation detail, and doing you job on IPv4 is much simpler, with the rube-goldberg stuff of actually figuring out how to connect the actual sender and recipient falling to higher level protocols. So while I don't have strong feelings on the topic, this movement feels like a management reorg, where some business units get shuffled around, priorities change, but ultimately there's very little consistent motive or goal to the whole thing.