Internet of Things (#IoT) is Here Upon Us, So Where is #IPv6
Internet of Things (IoT) has existed as a concept for a while now, but now it is a hot buzz word. As geeky as it may sound you are probably using something that falls in this category already, SmartTVs, Chromecast, Internet radios, major appliances, cars, smartphones, tablets, smart thermostats (Nest for instance) and all of the devices that they integrate with, and now smart watches.
Last year I cut the cable cord and got a Nexus Player and a Tablo. I already had Amazon Prime that I can watch with my PS3. It's a shame that Amazon can't get over themselves and just support Android. Fire was built on Android so its obvious they just want to have a pissing war to try and sell more Fire products. I am not a fan of walled garden devices but that is a different discussion. I added Sling TV when it came out and recently added Netflix back to the fold. (I had used it back in the DVD days before they changed the pricing model). Now I can watch TV and movies anywhere I please on any device whether I am home or not for far less than the cable company. All made possible by Internet of Things devices.
Last fall we finally gave in and replaced our oil burner, which does our hot water as well. We had replaced the old dial thermostat with a programmable thermostat, but I went ahead and replaced it with a Nest thermostat and connected with our cell phones so it knew when we were not home. I did not do the math but with the combination the oil bill was way down last winter and it was COLD and very SNOWY.
I broke down and decided to check out the smart watch craze and got myself an LG Urbane. I will do a follow up on that later on but in general the smart watch is still pretty immature, but seems to be growing up quickly. The watch uses wireless networks that you have connected to from your phone and/or Bluetooth to your phone, so this qualifies as yet another type of Internet of Things device.
To handle of all of these wireless devices I replaced the wireless in the house with a UniFi AP-AC. I have used these in business environments for wireless roaming and the signal range on these is awesome, but achieve this they use a software component to control the access point though you can set them up to run on their own in single access point setups. In any case I didn't want it to rely on my desktop being turned on all of the time, so I got a Raspberry Pi 2 (CanaKit) which is a low powered cheap computer. It is marketed as a $35 computer, but to get it to work you do need a few other pieces so the kit I purchased was $69. But I was able to install the controller software on there and access it over the Internet.
What does all of this have to do with IPv6? The organizations that hands out the blocks of IP addresses that get assigned to companies or that are used dynamically to connect cell phones, residential and other business customers, has officially run out of IPv4 addresses. We can blame the sales guys at the cable providers for this one. When you call them for a static IP address most try to oversell most customers into getting a block of 5 or more when they really only need 1 in most cases. Companies that only need 3-5 usually end up with a block of 14. The unused ip addresses go wasted and the sales guy gets a few more dollars in his pocket.
As more and more of these Internet of Things devices go mobile they will need to be able to get an IP address and most likely will need to use IPv6, but most providers are slow in rolling this out even though it has been around for 17 years now on paper. Instead of rolling out with IPv6 we created NAT, which was actually an ingenious that enabled offices and homes to connect many devices from the same IP address. It was actually a dirty hack and looks to be on it's way out with IPv6, but the jury is still out on that one and I don't see NAT going away any time soon. Bottom line here is that it costs money to replace equipment to pay employees to implement and the ISPs have historically bad reputations for reinvesting in their networks, especially if there is no competition is certain markets.
Now that we are have all of the IPv4 allotments assigned lets hope that the ISPs get their acts together before we have a larger problem and they cannot give you an address period. We may have a few years left before that happens. I have heard of one company forcefully reassigning static IPs in areas to realign the blocks that they are issued to free some addresses up.
Last year I cut the cable cord and got a Nexus Player and a Tablo. I already had Amazon Prime that I can watch with my PS3. It's a shame that Amazon can't get over themselves and just support Android. Fire was built on Android so its obvious they just want to have a pissing war to try and sell more Fire products. I am not a fan of walled garden devices but that is a different discussion. I added Sling TV when it came out and recently added Netflix back to the fold. (I had used it back in the DVD days before they changed the pricing model). Now I can watch TV and movies anywhere I please on any device whether I am home or not for far less than the cable company. All made possible by Internet of Things devices.
Last fall we finally gave in and replaced our oil burner, which does our hot water as well. We had replaced the old dial thermostat with a programmable thermostat, but I went ahead and replaced it with a Nest thermostat and connected with our cell phones so it knew when we were not home. I did not do the math but with the combination the oil bill was way down last winter and it was COLD and very SNOWY.
I broke down and decided to check out the smart watch craze and got myself an LG Urbane. I will do a follow up on that later on but in general the smart watch is still pretty immature, but seems to be growing up quickly. The watch uses wireless networks that you have connected to from your phone and/or Bluetooth to your phone, so this qualifies as yet another type of Internet of Things device.
To handle of all of these wireless devices I replaced the wireless in the house with a UniFi AP-AC. I have used these in business environments for wireless roaming and the signal range on these is awesome, but achieve this they use a software component to control the access point though you can set them up to run on their own in single access point setups. In any case I didn't want it to rely on my desktop being turned on all of the time, so I got a Raspberry Pi 2 (CanaKit) which is a low powered cheap computer. It is marketed as a $35 computer, but to get it to work you do need a few other pieces so the kit I purchased was $69. But I was able to install the controller software on there and access it over the Internet.
What does all of this have to do with IPv6? The organizations that hands out the blocks of IP addresses that get assigned to companies or that are used dynamically to connect cell phones, residential and other business customers, has officially run out of IPv4 addresses. We can blame the sales guys at the cable providers for this one. When you call them for a static IP address most try to oversell most customers into getting a block of 5 or more when they really only need 1 in most cases. Companies that only need 3-5 usually end up with a block of 14. The unused ip addresses go wasted and the sales guy gets a few more dollars in his pocket.
As more and more of these Internet of Things devices go mobile they will need to be able to get an IP address and most likely will need to use IPv6, but most providers are slow in rolling this out even though it has been around for 17 years now on paper. Instead of rolling out with IPv6 we created NAT, which was actually an ingenious that enabled offices and homes to connect many devices from the same IP address. It was actually a dirty hack and looks to be on it's way out with IPv6, but the jury is still out on that one and I don't see NAT going away any time soon. Bottom line here is that it costs money to replace equipment to pay employees to implement and the ISPs have historically bad reputations for reinvesting in their networks, especially if there is no competition is certain markets.
Now that we are have all of the IPv4 allotments assigned lets hope that the ISPs get their acts together before we have a larger problem and they cannot give you an address period. We may have a few years left before that happens. I have heard of one company forcefully reassigning static IPs in areas to realign the blocks that they are issued to free some addresses up.