Correct way of adding IPv6 capability to server

Server operators
1

I currently have a server on IPv4, and wish to enable this on IPv6 as well. What is the correct/preferred way of doing that?

I was planning to change the DNS A record to ntp-ipv4, and add a new ntp-ipv6 AAAA record and add that as a new server. Is that the right way to go about it?

2

Good question. I did it exactly like you’re thinking, two servers registered as ntp1-ipv4 and ntp1-ipv6. If there is a better way…

3

You don’t need to have separate hostnames for IPv4 and IPv6. You can just add an IPv6 address to your existing hostname in your DNS config, and then add that hostname again to the pool server management page. The pool server management page will notice that the IPv4 address for that server has already been added, and will then add an entry for the server’s IPv6 address.

I have four servers in the pool and all of them are dual-stacked. My management page shows eight IP addresses with four different hostnames.

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4

Thanks! Can I update the hostname, but keep the IP on my server the same way? Just add the new hostname, and it will notice that the IP already exists and update only the hostname?

Edit: I tried that, didn’t work; I wrote an e-mail to get it changed.

5

Servers added to the pool can be specified directly by their IP address. They are not required to have a name. At least none of my IPv6 servers have and I could add them with no problems.

6

True; I just like naming things :slight_smile:

7

No, the process I mentioned does not update the hostname. The described scenario works in a situation where ntp.example.com has initially only an IPv4 address and is in the pool, and then later on an IPv6 address is added to the same ntp.example.com hostname.

If you wish to update the hostname to, say, ntp-v4.example.com, it’s possible to ask that from NTP server support people, or just delete & re-add the server with the new hostname.

Besides, it’s 2018 already and IP version specific hostnames are soooo old. ntp.example.com with both an IPv4 address and an IPv6 address is the way to go.

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8

Yeah, I sent an e-mail to get the server hostname updated. I currently have only example.com as the server hostname, but with IPv6 I need to split the different services into their own subdomains as I don’t use NAT with IPv6. So after the hostname has been updated to ntp.example.com I will add the IPv6 server with that hostname as well :slight_smile: Thanks for your reply :slight_smile: