thePipeline

IPv6 has class

IP Version 6 continues to gain ground among agencies, and that means people need to know all the ins and outs about it. According to officials at training firm Native6, IPv6 is more than a souped-up successor to IPv4.

It's probably not coincidental, then, that Native6 officials have created new courses and augmented others to reflect the growing IPv6 user base.

Officials announced last week that they have updated the Building IPv6 Networks course, completed an IPv6 training program for Cisco Systems employees and launched an entirely new course, IPv6 for Programmers.

Military agencies have been the most fertile market for Native6 so far. Company officials said they have taught the five-day Building IPv6 Networks course to employees at the Joint Interoperability Testing Command, the Army's Electronic Proving Ground, the U.S. Army Space and Missile Defense Command, the Marine Corps Network Operations and Security Command, and the Navy IPv6 Project Office, Office of the Chief Engineer, at the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command.

For Cisco, Native6 officials provide content and subject matter expertise for the company's internal IPv6 Accelerate program, said Yurie Rich, president of Native6.

Civilian agencies are exploring the adoption of IPv6, too, Rich said, but, "I think they don't have the technical mandate or the kind of a technical need that [the Defense Department] has."

The company grew from the ashes of a now-defunct Internet service provider called Zama Networks, Rich said. When Native6 first began offering training in 2001, the customers were largely major information technology firms, including Hewlett-Packard and Symantec, he said. Then DOD officials began calling.

The new offerings represent the evolving needs in the market, he said. There are still plenty of customers who have little knowledge of IPv6 and need to learn the fundamentals.

But there are also a growing number who have the foundation and are ready to move to more advanced topics. Additionally, the technology continues to evolve, he said.