Cisco Systems 3750E DNS for IPv6, Path MTU Discovery for IPv6 Unicast, ICMPv6, Neighbor Discovery

Chapter 39 Configuring IPv6 Unicast Routing

Understanding IPv6

These addresses are defined by a global routing prefix, a subnet ID, and an interface ID. Current global unicast address allocation uses the range of addresses that start with binary value 001 (2000::/3). Addresses with a prefix of 2000::/3(001) through E000::/3(111) must have 64-bit interface identifiers in the extended universal identifier (EUI)-64 format.

•Link local unicast addresses can be automatically configured on any interface by using the link-local prefix FE80::/10(1111 1110 10) and the interface identifier in the modified EUI format. Link-local addresses are used in the neighbor discovery protocol and the stateless autoconfiguration process. Nodes on a local link use link-local addresses and do not require globally unique addresses to communicate. IPv6 routers do not forward packets with link-local source or destination addresses to other links.

See the “IPv6 Address Type: Unicast” section in the “Implementing Basic Connectivity for IPv6” chapter in the Cisco IOS IPv6 Configuration Library at this URL:

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/sw/iosswrel/ps5187/products_configuration_guide_chapter0918 6a00801d65f5.html

Each IPv6 host interface can support up to three addresses in hardware (one aggregatable global unicast address, one link-local unicast address, and zero or more privacy addresses).

DNS for IPv6

IPv6 introduces new Domain Name System (DNS) record types that are supported in the DNS name-to-address and address-to-name lookup processes. The new DNS AAAA resource record types support IPv6 addresses and are equivalent to an A address record in IPv4. The switch supports DNS resolution for IPv4 and IPv6.

Path MTU Discovery for IPv6 Unicast

The switch supports advertising the system MTU to IPv6 nodes and path MTU discovery. Path MTU discovery (RFC 1981) allows a host to dynamically discover and adjust to differences in the MTU size of every link along a given data path. In IPv6, if a link along the path is not large enough to accommodate the packet size, the source of the packet handles the fragmentation. The switch does not support path MTU discovery for multicast packets.

ICMPv6

The Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP) in IPv6 (RFC 2463) functions the same as in IPv4. ICMP generates error messages, such as ICMP destination unreachable messages, to report errors during processing and other diagnostic functions. In IPv6, ICMP packets are also used in the neighbor discovery protocol and path MTU discovery. A value of 58 in the Next Header field of the basic IPv6 packet header identifies an IPv6 ICMP packet.

Neighbor Discovery

The switch supports Neighbor Discovery Protocol (NDP) for IPv6 (RFC 2461), a protocol running on top of ICMPv6, and Static Neighbor Discovery for IPv6 stations that do not support NDP. The IPv6 neighbor discovery process uses ICMP messages and solicited-node multicast addresses to determine the link-layer address of a neighbor on the same network (local link), verify the reachability of the neighbor, and keep track of neighboring routers.

Catalyst 3750-E and 3560-E Switch Software Configuration Guide

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