Re: IPv6 terminology question

[Matt Anderson <matt@mattanderson.net>]

I find the word "field" too generic, just like "parts" and "sections."

In IPv4, we call them "octets," because each is 8 bits wide.  In IPv6,
I've always thought of them as "hextets," because each is 16 bits
wide.  "Hextet" may also remind novices that they are working in
hexadecimal, not base-10 like they're used to with IPv4.

A quick Google search will reveal a number of places where the word
"hextet" is used ("hextet ipv6" has 800+ results).

I think that most people familiar with IPv6 would understand what
"hextet" means, in this context, even if they hadn't heard the word
before.

On Fri, Aug 7, 2009 at 9:19 PM, Brian E
Carpenter<brian.e.carpenter@gmail.com> wrote:
> I don't see why C terminology wins, especially in a reference back to
> traditional mini-computer architectures. For example, in the most accurate
> ABNF we have for the presentation format, they're called "hex4"
> (draft-ietf-sip-ipv6-abnf-fix).
>
> As Bob said, they're generically called "fields" in the defining
> RFC, which seems fine to me.
>
>    Brian
>
> On 2009-08-08 10:27, Dunn, Jeffrey H. wrote:
>> Colleagues,
>>
>> From an applications programming viewpoint, the 2 octets between the colons are called an unsigned short, as in the 16-bit C language data structure. RFC 3493 specifies the IPv6 address structure as 16 unsigned 8-bit integers; however, this is functionally equivalent to 8 unsigned 16-bit integers. As a result, the x's in the message below are unsigned shorts.
>>
>> Best Regards,
>>
>> Jeffrey Dunn
>> Info Systems Eng., Lead
>> MITRE Corporation.
>> (301) 448-6965 (mobile)
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: owner-v6ops@ops.ietf.org [mailto:owner-v6ops@ops.ietf.org] On Behalf Of Joel Jaeggli
>> Sent: Friday, August 07, 2009 4:32 PM
>> To: Daniel Stickney
>> Cc: IPv6 Operations
>> Subject: Re: IPv6 terminology question
>>
>>
>>
>> Daniel Stickney wrote:
>>>> Daniel,
>>>>
>>>> This is defined in RFC4291 "IPv6 Addressing Architecture" Section 2.2 "Text Representation of Addresses".  It says:
>>>>
>>>>    1. The preferred form is x:x:x:x:x:x:x:x, where the 'x's are one to
>>>>       four hexadecimal digits of the eight 16-bit pieces of the address.
>>>>       Examples:
>>>>
>>>>          ABCD:EF01:2345:6789:ABCD:EF01:2345:6789
>>>>
>>>>          2001:DB8:0:0:8:800:200C:417A
>>>>
>>>>       Note that it is not necessary to write the leading zeros in an
>>>>       individual field, but there must be at least one numeral in every
>>>>       field (except for the case described in 2.).
>>>>
>>>> The closest thing to a definition would be to call them "field"s.  For example, "an IPv6 address is made up of 8 colon separated fields".
>>>>
>>>> Bob
>>>>
>>>> p.s. Suggest in the future, try reading the actual specifications.
>>>>
>>> I appreciate your input Bob.
>>>
>>> What term do you all normally use in your discussions with other
>>> engineers? I'm fine with "field", just haven't heard or seen anyone else
>>> use it yet.
>>
>> A book that I performed a review on covering this subject states:
>>
>> "IPv6 addresses are written in 8 groups of 16 bits each, or 8 groups of
>> 4 hexadecimal numbers separated by colons." - Goralski, "The Illustrated
>> Network" 2009
>>
>> I'm comfortable with that being sufficiently unambiguous, modula you
>> have to skip to the next paragraph to get abbreviation.
>>
>>> Thanks,
>>>
>>
>
>