IPV6 Configuration with Starwind

[abhay_elk]

Hi,
I have starwind free version downloaded & installed over the windows 2008 Server.
The windows 2008 server has only IPv6 protocol enabled.
I have created new device & i want to attach the device to the windows 2008 server with IPv6 enabled.
The communication should happen between target server & initiator server over IPv6

Is this a supported configuration with Starwind?

Thanks
Abhay

[Robert (staff)]

Abhay,

Ipv6 is currently not supported by StarWind Server.

Thanks.

[Thona]

May I suggest you clean up THAT mess fast?

Quite some companies (and some government institutions) are forbidden from purchasing any equipment that is NOT Ipv6 capable Especially I think the US government has that policy. You may loose customers.

Not relevant for ME personally - I use some other stuff, too, that is not yet v6 ready But it would be nice to see that on a planned release list.... the time we dump v4 is slowly coming.

[Robert (staff)]

Thona,

Thank you for your feedback and I think we will come up with the release plan and IPv6 support soon.

Thanks

[Aitor_Ibarra]

Look, this is just my opinion, based on my limited experience, but I don't think this is a huge priority...

Very few organisations *need* the huge address range that ipv6 gives them. 10.x.x.x is good enough for most networks. The main reason why ipv6 gets deployed internally is because some stuff relies on it (e.g. Exchange 2007) and it's usually alongside ipv4.

If you are following best practices, then you are putting your iSCSI stuff on its own subnet and/or VLAN. So even if you do run everything else as IPv6, the only reason you'd need more than IPv4 for Starwind would be if you had millions of iSCSI initiators and targets. If that's the case and you are about to spend several billion dollars on your iSCSI SAN then I'm sure your needs can be accommodated really quickly!

For the Internet, yes IPv6 is going to be very necessary real soon now. So maybe if you want direct access to your iSCSI target from anywhere on the Internet, you'll have a burning need for it to be in Starwind. Otherwise it's just a checkbox feature.

If the cost in development time is low, then by all means add it, it won't do any harm. But please don't let it come at the expense of more urgent priorities!

cheers,

Aitor

[anton (staff)]

StarWind (as any IP SAN software) is not expected to run outside DMZ (with the gate to the Internet). Just an opposite, IP SAN traffic should use dedicated hubs, NICs and wiring as much as possible. So 6 byte address is kinda redundant. However we'll add IPV6 to post V5.5 version of the StarWind.

[Thona]

Look, this is just my opinion, based on my limited experience, but I don't think this is a huge priority...

SERIOUSLY limited experience.

See, there are some small organization (like the US government) that demand IPv6 capability. Part of the long/mid term policy. No IpV6 - hard time selling there. That simple.

Even my small shop starts moving into IpV6 for our internal network, completely. We are not there yet (even MS has some products not supporting IpV6 yet), but it is one point on the list. Why bother with the hard to maintain IpV4 in emergency cases (either hardcode all network settings - which is hard to maintain - or DHCP may not trigger if a server starts before the dhcp server) when IpV6 handles dynamic address reallocations (addresses assigned when the network router boots up) perfectly well Among other things.

IpV6 is absolutely NOT ONLY about the hugh address space. It is also about ease of management.

Nice to hear v5.5 will add it.

[Constantin (staff)]

No, StarWind 5.5 will have no support of IPv6

[Radick]

Ok, does StarWind 5.8 have a IPv6-Support?

[Max (staff)]

Currently StarWind does not support IPv6, please stay tuned for our future releases.

[Radick]

Thank you.
Do you have an idea, when IPv6 will be implemented?

[anton (staff)]

Had a discussion with engineers of our core team recently. In some of the V6 post-versions. Fall-2012 I guess...

Nobody with a ready P.O. have ever been pissed off with lack of it supported. Low priority for now. Sorry.

Thank you.
Do you have an idea, when IPv6 will be implemented?

[Radick]

Thank you.

[anton (staff)]

Nothing for. We'll keep you updated.

If you have something you think you can to me so we could re-schedule the IPv6 please drop me a message to anton@starwindsoftware.com - I'll be happy to talk to you

Thank you.