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ShareHyderabad: IP depletion is to be taken seriously but it is not the end of days. Under the current IPv4 dispensation there are 4 billion IP numbers. But the regional internet registries (IRI)s and the Internet Assigned Numbers Service (IANS), have said they will stop giving out the IPv4 numbers from April 2011 when they will run out of them. They have already started giving out the IPv6 numbers in tandem.
The situation is reasonably serious but nothing to panic about as there is some time for users to migrate to the new IPv6 systems. Common users will not be impacted by this as they are usually allocated a dynamic IP when they log on to the net. It is the enterprise customers who have permanent IP numbers, who will have to take action. LAN networks, routers, and firewalls will have to made compatible with the new IPv6 ids.
In order to make the current IPv4 and IPv6 compatible network provides and firms will have to install dual interface network cards on their servers. It is important that people start preparing for it now before it is too close to the time when the IPv4 runs out.But it will be unrealistic to expect that the IPv4 will be switched off when the numbers run out. Gateways will be built to make them talk to the IPv6.
India is better prepared than many developed countries in this respect. Service providers are better prepared. For instance Sify is the first provider to be IPv6 compliant.
The author is a representative on Six-Choice committee a European Commission funded project for migration from IPv4 to IPv6.
