pppd's defaultroute option

[Mouse]

It appears to me that pppd's defaultroute option simply doesn't work
for IPv6, nor do I see any v6 analog of it. Is there some reason for
this? It's annoying to have to install a default route in ipv6-up
when, as far as I can see, there's no reason pppd couldn't do it for me
just as easily as it does for v4.

The system I care about at the moment is 4.0.1, but based on the
manpages this appears to be just as true on the other two versions I
run myself (5.2 and 1.4T) and according to a guest account I have on a
system which reports itself as 6.1_STABLE.

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[Christos Zoulas]

Post by Mouse
It appears to me that pppd's defaultroute option simply doesn't work
for IPv6, nor do I see any v6 analog of it. Is there some reason for
this? It's annoying to have to install a default route in ipv6-up
when, as far as I can see, there's no reason pppd couldn't do it for me
just as easily as it does for v4.
The system I care about at the moment is 4.0.1, but based on the
manpages this appears to be just as true on the other two versions I
run myself (5.2 and 1.4T) and according to a guest account I have on a
system which reports itself as 6.1_STABLE.

Well, does the other side send RA's over the link?

christos


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[Michael Richardson]

Post by Mouse
It appears to me that pppd's defaultroute option simply doesn't work
for IPv6, nor do I see any v6 analog of it. Is there some reason for
this? It's annoying to have to install a default route in ipv6-up
when, as far as I can see, there's no reason pppd couldn't do it for me
just as easily as it does for v4.

IPv6 over PPP uses either DHCPv6 or IPv6 RAs.
The conclusion was that IPCP was wrong to add all sorts of PPP options,
and that it should have used DHCP(v4) INFORM, but it was too late for v4.

If your ISP doesn't provide either of those, then you have to configure
something manually. You would have to configure address ranges manually
anyway.

Having pppd do it would be wrong: you might as well do it in an ip-up script.

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] Michael Richardson, Sandelman Software Works | network architect [
] ***@sandelman.ca http://www.sandelman.ca/ | ruby on rails [


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[Mouse]

Post by Michael Richardson

Post by Mouse
It appears to me that pppd's defaultroute option simply doesn't work
for IPv6, nor do I see any v6 analog of it. Is there some reason
for this?

IPv6 over PPP uses either DHCPv6 or IPv6 RAs.

Actually, IPv6 over PPP works just fine without either one, once I
kludge around the lack of a defaultroute6 option. I infer that this is
another IPv6 religious issue, akin to MAC-based autoconfig, and I
should just shut up and toe the party line.

No.

I likely will not do anything now, because I have it working with route
commands in ipv6-up. But, if it bothers me in the future, expect me to
fix the damn software rather than running even more (and more complex)
software to make up for some fool's religious insistence that everyone
else should see network configuration the same way The IPv6 Cabal does.

Having to run a DHCP server - or something rtadvdish - just to get a
default route amounts to saying that static configurations are broken.
I most vehemently disagree. (Almost?) all of my network configurations
have changed significantly less often than such software typically
misbehaves; static config is easily the lowest-maintenance option, and
any dogma that says it is Wrong I will summarily ignore.

And, if there's nothing wrong with static config, where's the issue
with pppd helping out?

Post by Michael Richardson
Having pppd do it would be wrong: you might as well do it in an ip-up script.

Having pppd do it is no more wrong than having pppd do it for v4 is.

Except for values of "wrong" that amount to "happen to make tradeoffs
in ways that disagree with The Cabal's dogma".

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[Michael Richardson]

Post by Mouse
Actually, IPv6 over PPP works just fine without either one, once I

IPv6 over PPP works just great if you put in the default route, of course.

Post by Mouse
kludge around the lack of a defaultroute6 option. I infer that this is
another IPv6 religious issue, akin to MAC-based autoconfig, and I
should just shut up and toe the party line.

You can can say that if you want to.
Or it could be that PPPv4 was simply a total botch.

Post by Mouse
I likely will not do anything now, because I have it working with route
commands in ipv6-up. But, if it bothers me in the future, expect me to
fix the damn software rather than running even more (and more complex)
software to make up for some fool's religious insistence that everyone
else should see network configuration the same way The IPv6 Cabal does.

Or you could continue to support the IPv4 Cabal of backbone operators who
want you to have only NAT'ed IPv4. If could be, that the IPv6 way is the
way *out* of the "some fool's" belief that you are merely a consumer.

Post by Mouse
Having to run a DHCP server - or something rtadvdish - just to get a
default route amounts to saying that static configurations are broken.

You could read what was written: you can run a DHCPv6 client, which could
almost be written in a shell script with nc. Or you can continue to run
triple NAT'ed IPv4.

Post by Mouse

Post by Michael Richardson
Having pppd do it would be wrong: you might as well do it in an ip-up script.

Having pppd do it is no more wrong than having pppd do it for v4 is.

I'm glad you agree with the IPv6 architects.

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] ***@sandelman.ca http://www.sandelman.ca/ | ruby on rails [

[Mouse]

Post by Michael Richardson

[I]f it bothers me in the future, expect me to fix the damn software
rather than running even more (and more complex) software to make up
for some fool's religious insistence that everyone else should see
network configuration the same way The IPv6 Cabal does.

Or you could continue to support the IPv4 Cabal of backbone operators
who want you to have only NAT'ed IPv4.

I could. But I see no more reason to follow them (in any respect) than
I do to follow IPv6 dogma on network configuration.

Post by Michael Richardson
If could be, that the IPv6 way is the way *out* of the "some fool's"
belief that you are merely a consumer.

_That_ is something I have no reason to think v6-vs-v4 will have any
effect on at all. The very most I can see it doing there is removing
the address space size excuse for NAT.

Post by Michael Richardson

Post by Michael Richardson
Having pppd do it would be wrong: you might as well do it in an ip-up script.

Having pppd do it is no more wrong than having pppd do it for v4 is.

I'm glad you agree with the IPv6 architects.

Well, I disagree with _someone_, since pppd has defaultroute but no
defaultroute6 (and you seem to think adding defaultroute6 is wrong but
haven't given any signs of removing defaultroute). You made it sound
as though this were a philosophical design (mis)feature of IPv6, which
is why I laid at the v6 "Cabal"'s door.

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[Gert Doering]

Hi,

Post by Michael Richardson
I'm glad you agree with the IPv6 architects.

Well, just for the record - "the IPv6 architects" are a cabal that cannot
agree with *themselves* on anything, plus, half of that stuff was designed
for an Internet of 20 years ago...

So, yes, having DHCPv6-PD and no-NAT is a cool thing (undoubtedly!), but
how exactly does DHCPv6-PD help with "no default route", given that
the oh-so-wise architects decided that "no, DHCPv6 doesn't deal with
routing info"?

So, it will work if you have a remote end that sends you RAs - but it will
not give you a default route if the remote only does DHCPv6...

But independent of all the religion, I can't see a good reason why it
would be "wrong against whatever truth" to just permit pppd to install
a defaultroute if you know you need one, instead of having to write a
script to do it... not all setups are borne equal, and "the other end
not sending RA" does not mean "you have to run NAT on your side".

(And please refer to the RFC that says Having A Default-Route Option In
PPPD Is Totally Frowned Upon).

gert

[Mouse]

Post by Gert Doering
(And please refer to the RFC that says Having A Default-Route Option
In PPPD Is Totally Frowned Upon).

Which one is that? I don't recall seeing such a thing, so it's not one
of the RFCs I know (a tiny fraction of the whole list), and I'd be
interested to read any rationale its authors may have included. (I
don't see anything wrong with such an option, but I've missed enough
things that I'd like to at least consider any such arguments.)

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[Mouse]

Post by Christos Zoulas

Post by Mouse
It appears to me that pppd's defaultroute option simply doesn't work
for IPv6, nor do I see any v6 analog of it. [...]

Well, does the other side send RA's over the link?

I don't know. What's that got to do with it? That sounds to me like
another way to set up routes, not a fix for the peculiar omission of
this way of setting up routes. (Peculiar until hearing of the dogma
mcr outlined, that is.)

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[Martin Husemann]

Post by Mouse
I don't know. What's that got to do with it? That sounds to me like
another way to set up routes, not a fix for the peculiar omission of
this way of setting up routes. (Peculiar until hearing of the dogma
mcr outlined, that is.)

I think you are right and pppd should have that option - but I guess
you will not find many target routers not running rtadvd (or equivalent),
so this is a rare issue.

Martin

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[Gert Doering]

Hi,

Post by Mouse

Post by Gert Doering
(And please refer to the RFC that says Having A Default-Route Option
In PPPD Is Totally Frowned Upon).

Which one is that? I don't recall seeing such a thing, so it's not one
of the RFCs I know (a tiny fraction of the whole list), and I'd be
interested to read any rationale its authors may have included. (I
don't see anything wrong with such an option, but I've missed enough
things that I'd like to at least consider any such arguments.)

That was directed at MCR, and there is no such RFC - so I consider all
statements like "The IPv6 Architects have decided that PPP should not
have a defaultroute6 option" to be a bit unfounded.

gert

[Michael Richardson]

I want to point out that in IPv4, on many platforms, that in order to install
the default route through the ppp device, you'd need to the equivalent of:

route add -net default 1.2.3.4

where 1.2.3.4 was the IP address of the remote end of the PPP connnection,
which because it could change in general, you need pppd to do this for you.

Of course, in *BSD (since >=4.3, I think), on Linux since the 2.0-ish kernel,
one can do instead:
route add -interface -net default ppp0

(although I'm not sure if that is the exact syntax, and I've no way to test it)

In IPv6, you would essentially always do an interface route like this.
So it's hard to think of what "defaultroute6" would do for you, that having:

#!/bin/sh
route add -interface -net default $1

in /etc/ppp/ip-up won't do.

But, as you wish.

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[Gert Doering]

Hi,

Post by Michael Richardson
In IPv6, you would essentially always do an interface route like this.
#!/bin/sh
route add -interface -net default $1
in /etc/ppp/ip-up won't do.

"not maintain yet another config file, which is global by nature and might
not even apply to all peers I speak PPP with"?

There's reason why ppp has arguments that apply to *this* connection...

gert