exhaustion

Comcast and Time Warner Cable, two major Internet service providers, will participate in the World IPv6 Day testing June 8 to help test readiness for the next-generation Internet Protocol.

Because the two companies are crucial gateways to the Internet for millions of people, their test will be an important--both for trying their own technology and for supplying some IPv6 users who can help other's setup. The companies announced the test today.

Internet Protocol version 6 supplies a vastly larger address space for attaching computers to the Internet than IPv4, which was established with a paltry 4.3 billion addresses … Read more

Microsoft's search engine will be one of the major Web sites available in a synchronized effort to iron out problems moving to a vastly more spacious Internet based on the coming IPv6 standard.

"On June 8, we will enable worldwide IPv6 connectivity to Bing.com, for the purposes of a one-day test," Bing program manager Kevin Boske said. "Consumers with IPv6 Internet capabilities will automatically access this new method of connectivity. This necessitates both a device that supports IPv6 (like a Windows 7 PC), and support from your Internet provider."

IPv6, or Internet Protocol version … Read more

The Internet's overseers bid adieu to the last 83.9 million addresses needed to connect devices to today's Net--then took advantage of the moment to evangelize the next-generation Internet and the dangers of life support for today's Net.

Today's Internet is wired up with a technology called Internet Protocol version 4, or IPv4, which comes with 4.3 billion addresses to send data from one computer to another. That's a lot, but it's not enough, so now the move to the vastly more accommodating IPv6 is beginning in earnest.

"This is one most … Read more

Today is the beginning of the end of the Internet as we know it.

That's because the rules that govern how data is sent across the Net, a standard called Internet Protocol version 4, just became significantly more obsolete. The central Net authorities just handed out the last batches of IPv4 addresses at a ceremony today in Florida, beginning the cascade of scarcity that eventually will mean the computing industry must make the painful transition to the newer but incompatible IPv6.

It's not an urgent problem for average consumers with broadband or even for many businesses with lots … Read more

Yesterday marked an important step toward the end of Internet plumbing as we know it.

Specifically, the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) allocated two of the last seven blocks of Net addresses that use today's Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4). That will trigger the automatic distribution soon of the last five, one each to the five regional Internet registries (RIR) that oversee the distribution of the numbers farther downstream, to the Internet service providers and other companies that actually need the IPv4 addresses.

It's hard to predict how long it will be before these eventual customers of IPv4 … Read more

Remember Y2K? The Internet today is facing a similarly big problem all over again, but nobody knew exactly when it would hit--until now.

The problem is the day the conventional Internet runs out of room for new computers because the world has used up the supply of Internet addresses that computers need to communicate over the Net.

It's likely that this week or next, the central supplier of Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) addresses will dole out the last ones at the wholesale level. That will set the clock ticking for the moment in coming months when those addresses … Read more

The final stages of the squeeze are arriving: of the 4.3 billion Internet addresses possible with today's Net mainstream technology, 95 percent are gone.

That's the word Monday from the Number Resource Organization, a group representing the world's five regional Internet registries (RIRs) that dole out the numeric addresses.

"This is a major milestone in the life of the Internet and means that allocation of the last blocks of IPv4 to the RIRs is imminent," Axel Pawlik, chairman of the Number Resource Organization, said in a statement.

Text-based Internet addresses, such as http://news.… Read more

The artery walls of people living within 100 meters of a highway thicken more than twice as fast as the average person's, according to a report this week in the journal PLoS ONE.

Researchers from Spain, Switzerland, and the U.S. used ultrasound to measure the carotid artery wall thickness of 1,483 people living near freeways in the Los Angeles area. They took measurements once every six months for three years and correlated the numbers with estimates of outdoor particulate levels at each participant's home.

The artery wall thickness among those living within 100 meters (328 feet) … Read more

Where was this when my tire blew out on me (which fortunately happened in a quiet neighborhood)? Unfortunately, being a quiet neighborhood, help wasn't too forthcoming. So while twiddling my thumbs for more than an hour waiting for the mechanic to arrive, I had plenty of time to contemplate the folly of the mini-jack, which looks more like a weapon of mass destruction to the less mechanically inclined and isn't at all kind to manicured nails.

So bless Chandler Products for the Titan Exhaust Air Jack, which is dead-simple to use. You just need to connect the hose … Read more