[throw0101a]

> Of all the things to regulate why bother with this one? It's not like IPv6 is better for the environment or useful to the consumer.

If I'm with a small-time ISP that has to use CG-NAT because they don't have the cash to buy/lease enough IPv4 addresses to give one to each CPE WAN interface, then using things like Xbox/PS multiplayer/P2P gaming is no longer possible. Want to host a Minecraft server? Too bad.

Are those two use-cases "useful to the consumer"?

[icedchai]

You are right, but ISPs will tell you that you're not allowed to host servers anyway. Most have it in the AUP.

[throw0101a]

1. Is trying to use Xbox/PS2 multi-player functionality "hosting"?

2. Perhaps our expectations of what you should be allowed to do is too low?

[icedchai]

1. I'd say "no", but if it involves opening a port, I could see the ISP argument even if I disagree with it. 2. I agree. The Internet was supposed to offer end-to-end connectivity. That went out the door with NAT...

[jjmarr]

I did port forwarding in 2010 for a Minecraft server. Basically every router supports it.

It wasn't meaningfully more difficult than setting up the server.

[lazide]

Most isps, you can’t do that anymore as you no longer have a publically reachable IPv4 address. It moved the ‘just configure your router’ part to their equipment, as they now use CGNAT.

It’s gotten much worse.

[IsTom]

You can't do that with CGNAT.

[crote]

You can, it just requires the ISP to play nice.

CGNAT doesn't have to draw a random ip:port combo out of a hat for every new connection. Nothing is stopping an ISP from implementing it by taking one ip and assigning ports 1-10.000 to customer A, 10.001 - 20.000 to customer B, and so on. Similarly, nothing is stopping an ISP from adding long-lived mappings to an otherwise-random pool which outlive the initial connection.

Some ISPs offer CGNAT traversal by letting you request a fixed ip:port combo via their self-service website. It's pretty much the same as regular NAT traversal, except that you can't freely pick the outside port. And because the number of people who actually care about it is so small: some ISPs even let you request to be exempted from CGNAT altogether! They'll already have a pool of legacy non-CGNAT customers and a pool of new CGNATted ones, so assigning a handful of nerds to the legacy pool to prevent them from complaining isn't a big deal.

[TuxPowered]

> Nothing is stopping an ISP from implementing it by taking one ip and assigning ports 1-10.000 to customer A, 10.001 - 20.000 to customer B, and so on. Similarly, nothing is stopping an ISP from adding long-lived mappings to an otherwise-random pool which outlive the initial connection.

I’m pretty sure that the scarcity of Legacy IP addresses and port numbers (!) is exactly what stops providers from doing that, at least by default. I’ve seen NAT running out of ports way too many times, and shortening of connection tracking lifetime comes with a whole set of hard to spot bugs.

[kalleboo]

Can we at least stop claiming that IPv6 is "more complicated" than IPv4 when we're making it a requirement for IPv4 ISPs is to create CGNAT management portals.