RFC 7421 · INFORMATIONAL · 2015

Analysis of the 64-bit Boundary in IPv6 Addressing

Overview

RFC 7421, “Analysis of the 64-bit Boundary in IPv6 Addressing”, is an Informational document published in January 2015 by B. Carpenter, T. Chown, F. Gont, S. Jiang, A. Petrescu, A. Yourtchenko. The canonical text is published by the RFC Editor.

Abstract

The IPv6 unicast addressing format includes a separation between the prefix used to route packets to a subnet and the interface identifier used to specify a given interface connected to that subnet. Currently, the interface identifier is defined as 64 bits long for almost every case, leaving 64 bits for the subnet prefix. This document describes the advantages of this fixed boundary and analyzes the issues that would be involved in treating it as a variable boundary.

Abstract as published in the RFC, via rfc-editor.org.

What “Informational” means

Published for the general information of the community. It does not define an IETF standard and carries no standards-track status.

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The canonical text of RFC 7421 is hosted at rfc-editor.org. Available in TXT,HTML.

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