SPAM

[Leon Roskilly]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/online/story/0,3...,685810,00.html

 

TL - leon

[Newt]

Nice one Leon. Thank you.

 

The idea they mentioned of everyone having a permanent IP address is probably not real far down the road.

 

The problem now is the address pattern we use. When it was originally designed, they allowed for way more total addresses than could ever, possibly, under any circumstances be needed.

 

Well Oops. There are nowhere near enough right now and that is why your ISP will loan you an address and then free it up for re-use if you don't use it for a short while. They will typically try to use around 20 for each hundred subscribers (or some such ratio). This isn't by choice but because they simply can't get enough to assign one to every subscriber.

 

There is a plan nearly in place to enlarge the IP address (Version 6) to include enough addresses that every human on the planet could have 10 of them and there would still be extras.

 

It won't be cheap to implement since much of the internet routing equipment and personal/business routing equipment will need to be upgraded or replaced to deal with the larger number scheme. And computer operating systems, switches, and lots of other parts will need an upgrade as well.

 

But it does have to happen and my guess would be within the next several years.

 

I think Cisco (one of the largest makers of high end routers) already has a device that will handle IP V6 when it arrives and I imagine others do as well. Just haven't kept up with that part of the business lately.

 

Right now my street address in unique as is my telephone number. Why shouldn't my IP address be as well?

 

BTW - for any old timers on here, do you remember telephone "party lines"? When I was much younger, we had the same issue with the phone system. Not enough numbers. So you would get a phone number that was also used by other folks (your party). Usually they used a distinctive ring to indicate who the inbound call was for. But the other folks could listen if they picked up their phone and you couldn't make a call or get a call if someone else was using the phone. Of course, this was in the days when a live operator handled all the calls. You would simply pick up your phone and the operator would ask "number please". You would tell her what number you wanted to ring and she would move plugs to make the connection. If fact, in a small town such as the one where I lived, you could just tell the operator who you wanted and she (all women as I remember) would connect you. No number needed.