Improving IPv6 transition management with IPv6 network virtualization

We have entered the transitional period between IPv4 and IPv6. However, IPv6 transition management involves entirely new challenges. To tackle these management challenges, we propose a management architecture (VNET6) to improve IPv6 transition manageability. Compared with the traditional network management architecture, VNET6 presents four different aspects: network layer virtualization for IPv4/IPv6 coexistence, service abstraction for IPv6 transition technologies, dynamic and autonomic management manner and end-to-end communication guarantee over heterogeneous networks. The implementation and evaluation demonstrate that VNET6 is a distributed enabler for the dynamic and autonomic management of IPv6 transition. This enabler facilitates incremental IPv6 deployment and simplifies the management of IPv4/IPv6 coexistence. Meanwhile, this enabler can effectively ensure application's end-to-end communication across multiple heterogeneous administrative domains. Especially, VNET6 makes it easier to provide performance-assured end-to-end paths for application's communication. Hence, VNET6 can improve the manageability for IPv6 transition. The manageability can facilitate IPv6 deployment and transition in a stable and manageable manner.