Saturday, January 29, 2011

Clemson University

This week is being spent at Clemson University in South Carolina. Midway through the flight yesterday, I started to wonder why I do this to myself. I left Fairbanks at 1:30AM and arrived in Greenville at 6:30pm. This left a 50 mile drive to Clemson. This was when I started to look around I remember why I enjoy traveling. I love to visit new places. I'm here for the ESCC/Internet² Joint Tech meeting being held at a Madren Conference Center attached to Clemson University. We are separated from the campus by a golf course that is, surprising to me, isn't very green (the color not its environmental impact). The only negative so far is that food doesn't seem to be readily available near the conference center and what little there is seems be located on the far side of the university. I think they didn't want to impact their catering business for meetings held here. Today, there was an all-day tutorial
on MPLS. The meeting starts tomorrow morning until Wednesday at noon. After that, I'm one of the instructors for a hands-on IPv6 workshop that runs through Friday. IPv6 has been getting a bit of publicity lately since the last remaining blocks of IPv4 addresses are going to be allocated to the RIRs sometime this week. What this basically means is that once the RIRs have given out all of their allocation, there isn't anymore available through normal channels. This would limit the ability for new businesses, networks, ISPs, etc. to join the Internet. Here in the U.S. there hasn't been a lot of concern about this since the US based organizations own the majority of the IPv4 address space. The widget I just added to the left side of the page was developed by Hurricane Electric, an Internet and co-location business that has providing IPv6 connectivity for years.

Update Monday, 6:30 EST - The last unallocated /8s were allocated to APNIC today which only leaves the last 5. Each RIR will receive one of the last /8s. IANA no longer has anymore IPv4 addresses to hand out when an RIR runs out...

I was sitting in a meeting this evening and noticed that Apple needs to come here to make a commercial. In the two rows of people on the other side of the room (24 people), all but three of the laptops were Macbook Pros. Of the remaining 3, one was an iPad, one was a PC running Windows XP and the other a PC running Ubuntu. Kind of interesting.

There were a lot of inquiries into Alaska tourism since the next time this group meets will be next summer in Fairbanks. Meeting with the network engineer here in Clemson and looking into what they had to do to host this meeting. It looks like some people back in Fairbanks are going to be busy. He mentioned that hosting the meeting was a great way to ensure that you have your IT infrastructure is in order.

Moto related content - No update yet from Porter's Beemershop. I probably should give them a call sometime. Today, in Fairbanks, the local Airheads group is getting together to overhaul a couple of 38mm Bings. I have never taken my carbs apart so I'm kind of sorry to miss this particular tech day. On the other hand, my gas mileage has been running in the mid to high 40s so maybe I shouldn't mess with them. Other things on my maintenance list have not been started due to cool temperatures in the garage.

I guess I expected to see more bikes on the road as the high temperature was in the mid-70s.

Update Tuesday, February 1, 2011 - No more 70°F days...


This is the foggy view of the lake behind the hotel this morning. It has been raining continuously since before noon and others are finding their return flights cancelled.

9 comments:

  1. You were on the road for awhile, but I hope everything went smoothly. Maybe all those motorcycles you weren't seeing up there were down here for the MC Show? It was packed down here. And you didn't miss anyting at the show...

    Have a great week!

    -Lori

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  2. Lori:
    It's been pretty wet the last couple of days but today (Wednesday) it started to clear up. Haven't been out and around much as meetings and such have gone on past 9PM. Today, I started teaching and since I don't do it that often it is a challenge.

    Too bad the show was a bust for you bit at least you are able to get out on the bike.

    Richard

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  3. Always good to know you're in the "neighborhood". Also good to know that someone is addressing the IPv4/6 situation. I remember about 10 years ago having a discussion that we would run out of IPv4 addresses when we began assigning addresses to network peripheral devices. Little did we know how much more would be taking on addresses ten years later.

    Hope you get those heads back soon. I am certainly not envious of your flight schedule. Get some rest!

    -Peace

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  4. Allen Madding:
    I didn't know you were in that part of the U.S.

    The discussion around the IANA announcement was great. There are many of us trying to come up with ways to encourage U.S. higher ed institutions and research organizations to switch to IPv6 for years. Not too successful. DREN has been modestly successful but have run into numerous issues trying to get feature parity with IPv4 from equipment vendors.

    Thank you for stopping by and commenting.

    Richard

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  5. You were within 19 miles of me during your visit.

    We have had an unusual amount of cold, rain, and snow in the upstate of South Carolina. That may be the reason why you did not see many bikers out.

    I passed just north of Clemson on my way to the little mill town of Newry the morning of January 29.

    Sorry I missed you.

    The grass on the golf course fairways is a warm season grass that turns brown in the winter months unless overseeded with annual rye grass.

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  6. Dear Richard:

    I haven't got a clue as to what the hell it was you were at Clemson for... But I hope you got it straightened out. Does this mean that if I start a new business I won't be able to get an internet address?

    Fondest regards,
    Jack • ®eep • toad
    Twisted Roads

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  7. Jack:

    Currently ARIN, the Nort American Registry, still has addresses but the rep for ARIN sain that they could run out somewhere between weeks and months. Again, this is about the IP addresses (numeric) not domain names (alphanumeric).

    Richard

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  8. Bucky:

    Thank you for stopping by and commenting. Last Sunday, the weather was wonderful. It was sunny and got up into the mid-70s. Beautiful area and we had a great time at Clemson. They were wonderful hosts for the meeting and a great facility.

    Richard

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  9. Dear Richard M.:

    That clears it up for me. (You have no idea how dense I am in some areas.) I'm sure you guys got it all straightened out so I will sleep much better tonight — and forever.

    Fondest regards,
    Jack • reep • Toad
    Twisted Roads

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