IPV6 Migration Guide for Developers using AWS EC2 — A Primer

Initially on tonym.us

With the information that AWS will likely be now charging about $4 / instance-month for public IPv4 addresses, many
builders who procrastinated ipv6 migration are lastly updating each ends of their growth setup.

It is a good time emigrate, as all of the intermediate infrastructure now helps IPV6 readily. Furthermore, you will profit from everlasting , world
addresses to your growth situations.

Professionals

• A single, world, secure deal with for EC2 situations that by no means modifications. No want
  for dynamic DNS and different hacks
• No must pay for Elastic IP addresses on
  dev situations
• International addressing for mutual duplex companies (no extra NAT wanted)
• Higher flexibility and readability for addressing, together with Hyperlink Native & native addresses

Cons

• Time wanted emigrate infra to IPV6
• Clumsier & less-memorable addresses, with unfamiliar idioms (e.g. no extra
  utilizing 127.0.0.1 or 192.168.1.1 — although there are replacements)
  inherent
• Bugs in legacy code that assumes 32 bit & string-representations of ipv4
  addresses

Ideas & Method

In principle, IPV6 makes use of 128bit addresses rather than 32 bit. Many of the
intermediate infra (ISP, spine) is now appropriate. The 2 areas of consideration
for builders could be the server aspect with AWS , and the consumer aspect along with your
residence/workplace community.

The 2 topic areas needing consideration for builders are addressing & routing.
On the server aspect this implies coping with addressing on EC2, VPC, VPC subnets &
routing tables, and on your property/workplace community updating your property router config
to acquire & allocate IPV6 addresses.

Updating the Shopper Aspect

Residence routers throughout the previous 5 years help IPV6 in settings, although often disabled for simplicity. As soon as enabled the WAN & LAN will obtain two addreses.

Make sure to choose NATIVE as an alternative of PASSTHROUGH to get full IPV6 help

Check your config utilizing Test IPV6 . At this level you
ought to have an IPV6 deal with to your WAN. This will likely be mandatory for routing &
safety teams on the AWS aspect

VPC Modifications

AWS supplies a thorough guide for migrating to IPV6

1. Replace VPC with an IPV6 allocation
2. Replace every subnet with a IPV6 subnet allocation — make sure you resize and order the subnets to the size wanted . Make sure to disable IPV4 auto deal with allocation, and allow IPV6 deal with allocation
3. Replace the routing tables so as to add the V6 ::/0 route
4. Replace your safety teams so as to add your client-side WAN IPV6 IP
5. Select an occasion to replace to IPV6 addressing. this may enable you to take a look at the e2e VPC routing & addressing config

At this level it is best to be capable of ping & SSH to the take a look at occasion utilizing all IPV6 addressing

EC2 Modifications

The EC2 change above will work so as to add IPV6 addresses to situations, however they may nonetheless purchase IPV4 addresses till they’re re-launched. This implies you will nonetheless be paying for public IPV4 IPs — about $4 extra per instance-month

To launch public IPV4 IPs, the situations will should be re-launched.

Rapidly Relaunch EC2 Situations Utilizing AMI

1. Cease (don’t terminate) every occasion
2. Select Actions → Pictures & Templates → Create Picture
3. create AMI
4. Launch new occasion with AMI. Check IPV6 deal with & verify no IPV4 deal with was allotted
5. [optional] If the occasion has a number of volumes, detach the amount & re-attach to the brand new occasion with the identical gadget ID
6. Mark the outdated occasion for termination on a later date

Evaluation IPV4 Handle Allocation & Billing

As soon as the EC2 migration is full, review IPV4 address usage using VPC IP
Address
Manager
and AWS Billing Cost
Explorer (group
by API to see EC2 networking prices)

Extra Sources & Guides