CRUX : Home

Home :: Documentation :: Download :: Development :: Community :: Wiki :: Ports :: Bugs :: Links :: About

Back to wiki start page

Categories: Network

IPv6 support with CRUX

Author: Daniel Mueller
Translation: Andrew Green
Wiki: Juergen Daubert


1. What is IPv6 ?

IPv6 is the "next generation" protocol (Sometimes called IPng) designed by the IETF to replace the current version Internet Protocol, IP Version 4 (IPv4).

Features: RFC 8200

More information can you find here: IPv6 Linux Howto


2. What does an IPv6 address look like?

First an IPv4 address:
10.23.53.200/255.0.0.0

Now an IPv6 address:
3ffe:0b90:0a02:815b:0000:0000:0000:0012/128

Nice right ? ;-) But don't worry, you can strip it to: 3ffe:b90:a02:815b::12/128

:is the separator (like the dot "." in IPv4 addresses)
::determines a block of leading and/or trailing zeros "0" in an address (it's a kind of compression ;-)
/128defines the prefix length, also known as "netmask" (RFC 2373 "2.3 Text Representation of Address Prefixes")

Read RFC 2373 for more information about the IPv6 addressing architecture.


3. What software do I need ?

Hehe.. that depends on what you want to do.

normally:

The USAGI (""UniverSAl"" playGround for Ipv6) Project made a lot of patches for well-known applications like netkit, yp-tools or tcp_wrappers to improve the Linux IPv6 support. http://www.linux-ipv6.org

Peter Bieringer has a good Linux-IPv6-Status page for IPv6 enabled applications. http://www.bieringer.de/linux/IPv6/status/IPv6+Linux-status-apps.html


4. Kernel configuration

First of all, you need an IPv6 enabled kernel. Go to your kernel source dir (usualy /usr/src/linux) and run your preferred method for kernel configuration.

 (make config || make menuconfig || make xconfig)

  Networking options -->
  <M>   IP: tunneling                    # believe me - you will need it.
  <M>   The IPv6 protocol (EXPERIMENTAL)

optional: IPv6: Netfilter Configuration

If you chose a kernel module you'll need also an entry in /etc/modules.conf:

 alias net-pf-10 ipv6

5. Base tools

Beginning with version 1.1 CRUX comes with IPv6 enabled base packages:

5.1 net-tools

ifconfig -a should print inet6 information:

  danm@torax#~: /sbin/ifconfig eth0
  eth0    Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr 00:01:02:06:B6:7F
	      inet addr:192.168.0.23  Bcast:192.168.0.255  Mask:255.255.255.0
	      inet6 addr: fe80::201:2ff:fe06:b67f/10 Scope:Link
	      UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
	      RX packets:313180 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
	      TX packets:793034 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
	      collisions:0 txqueuelen:100
	      RX bytes:31306615 (29.8 Mb)  TX bytes:906202803 (864.2 Mb)
	      Interrupt:5 Base address:0xb800

5.2 netkit-base

One missing/incorrect entry in /etc/protocols prevents ping6 from doing it's work.

  ipv6-icmp       58      IPv6-ICMP # ICMP for IPv6

should be:

  ipv6-icmp       58      IPv6-ICMP icmpv6 icmp6  # ICMP for IPv6

Without these entries, ping6 says "ping: icmp6: unknown protocol". If you want to use inetd applications like in.telnetd or in.ftpd you will probably need an IPv6 enabled netkit-base too.

5.3 tcp_wrappers

A few network daemons use the tcpd library (tcp_wrappers). If the tcp_wrappers are not able to handle ipv6 connections you will get an error message and your application will not work.

5.4 filesystem

There should be some ipv6 specific entries in /etc/hosts:

    ::1             ip6-localhost           ip6-loopback
    fe00::0         ip6-localnet
    ff00::0         ip6-mcastprefix
    ff02::1         ip6-allnodes
    ff02::2         ip6-allrouters
    ff02::3         ip6-allhosts

5.4 iputils

IP utilities is a nice toolkit of administrative applications like ping6 or traceroute6. I highly recommend you to install this package since tools like ping make live much easier ;-)

These tools are backward compatible.


6. Configuring the netlink

Did you install the base packages ? Yes ? So then let's setup an ipv6 netlink. The site-local address-range should be used for private networks. The site-local prefix is fec0::0/10.

More information:

First check your current settings:

  danm@torax#~: /sbin/ifconfig eth0
  eth0    Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr 00:01:02:06:B6:7F
	      inet addr:192.168.0.23  Bcast:192.168.0.255  Mask:255.255.255.0
	      inet6 addr: fe80::201:2ff:fe06:b67f/10 Scope:Link
	      UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
	      RX packets:313180 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
	      TX packets:793034 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
	      collisions:0 txqueuelen:100
	      RX bytes:31306615 (29.8 Mb)  TX bytes:906202803 (864.2 Mb)
	      Interrupt:5 Base address:0xb800

My network card has the unique interface id 00:01:02:06:B6:7f (MAC; Media Access Control). The MAC was used to generate the link-local address (Scope:Link).

    fe80:0000:0000:0000:0201:02ff:fe06:b67f
    xxxx:xxxx:xxxx:xxxx:xx01:02xx:xx06:b67f
                       00:01:02  :  06:B6:7F

The prefix fe80::/10 is reserved for link-local addresses. These addresses are only accessable in your local net-segment. Yes - all components plugged on your switch/hub/bridge can talk to each other with their link-local address. And yes - these addresses are determinated automatically. The site-local address-range is equivalent with the private ""IPv4"" Class A Net 10.0.0.0/8. So you can use it freely.

Let's setup eth0 with fec0:0000:0000:0000:0000:0000:0000:0001/64 (stripped fec0::1/64)

  root@torax:~$ ifconfig eth0 add fec0::1/64

Check:

  root@torax:~$ ifconfig eth0 | grep inet6
	        inet6 addr: fec0::1/64 Scope:Site
	        inet6 addr: fe80::201:2ff:fe06:b67f/10 Scope:Link

ifconfig said "inet6 addr: fec0::1/64 Scope:Site" - the site-local address is up and usable.


7. IPv6 Routing & Autoconfiguration

Please have a look here: http://www.linuxhq.com/IPv6/radvd.html and here: http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Linux+IPv6-HOWTO/chapter-configuration-route.html