GitHub seems to be enabling IPv6 for GitHub Pages

This is extremely misleading at best. As far as I can tell from reading this stuff, the only thing that has changed recently is that github-repository-files.githubusercontent.com has started serving an AAAA record. (Perhaps other subdomains as well, but that’s the only one reported and it’s definitely not all.) That’s nothing to do with GitHub Pages. GitHub Pages has unofficially supported IPv6 for more than three years apart from the DNS records, so if you’re brave or foolish enough you could add AAAA records on a custom domain that’s handled by GitHub Pages.

Re: GitHub seems to be enabling IPv6 for GitHub Pages

#5

Post by dheera » Sat, Aug 14, 2021, 5:19 PM UTC

Too bad I often have to disable IPv6 because my ISP suddenly decides to stop routing it from time to time.

This is Comcast, so arguing with them doesn't get me anywhere, all I get is "Thanks for expressing your concern." "Rest assured that I will solve all your problems." from the support dude in some random call/chat center.

Re: GitHub seems to be enabling IPv6 for GitHub Pages

#6

Post by ahmedfromtunis » Sat, Aug 14, 2021, 5:24 PM UTC

Silly question (especially for this forum): how would ipv6 be useful for websites served via Github Pages?

Re: GitHub seems to be enabling IPv6 for GitHub Pages

#7

Post by miyuru » Sat, Aug 14, 2021, 5:32 PM UTC

dheera wrote: post #5

Too bad I often have to disable IPv6 because my ISP suddenly decides to stop routing it from time to time. This is Comcast, so arguing with them doesn't get me anywhere, all I get is "Thanks for expressing your concern." "Rest assured that I will solve all your problems." from the support dude in some random call/chat center.

Doesn't Happy Eyeballs fallback to IPv4 on that situation?

Re: GitHub seems to be enabling IPv6 for GitHub Pages

#8

Post by andrewjf » Sat, Aug 14, 2021, 5:39 PM UTC

ahmedfromtunis wrote: post #6

Silly question (especially for this forum): how would ipv6 be useful for websites served via Github Pages?

There are more and more networks that are native IPv6. And IPv4 connectivity is done with double NAT, NAT64, 464XLAT and other heroics.

The faster we can allow native IPv6 end-to-end, the faster we can get rid of the complex IPv4 compatibility technologies and simplify the entire internet. At some point, you may start to see networks with no v4 connectivity whatsoever (maybe they already exist, but I can't imagine them being useful), so this allows those users to reach github pages.

To directly answer your question, it's investment and maintenance in infrastructure, not for user features.

Re: GitHub seems to be enabling IPv6 for GitHub Pages

#9

Post by lima » Sat, Aug 14, 2021, 6:39 PM UTC

chrismorgan wrote: post #4

> GitHub seems to be enabling IPv6 for GitHub Pages This is extremely misleading at best. As far as I can tell from reading this stuff, the only thing that has changed recently is that github-repository-files.githubusercontent.com has started serving an AAAA record. (Perhaps other subdomains as well, but that’s the only one reported and it’s definitely not all.) That’s nothing to do with GitHub Pages. GitHub Pages ha…

Don't underestimate the amount of backend plumbing necessary to enable this kind of thing at scale, even if it's "just" a CDN feature flag (analytics pipeline, authorization, rate limiting, and so much more...)

Re: GitHub seems to be enabling IPv6 for GitHub Pages

#10

Post by remram » Sat, Aug 14, 2021, 6:39 PM UTC

I'm surprised they didn't have it until now. Every cloud provider's load balancer and CDN has had IPv6 for a while. That they don't have it for the site or SSH is less surprising, but GitHub Pages is static content.