IPv6

IPv6 presents challenges for competitive enterprises

Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) will soon be the standard in the global marketplace. Accelerated by the U.S. government's decision to require all federal agencies to implement IPv6 by 2008, the transition to IPv6 will require an investment in technology that will support the new standard. As most enterprises will make the transition gradually, there will be a sustained period of overlap, where most enterprise networks will need to support both IPv6 as well as the current IPv4 standard. With interoperability issues likely to arise, it will be imperative to maintain consistent network timekeeping in order to avoid further difficulty.

Symmetricom provides IPv6-ready time servers

Symmetricom, one of the world's leading providers of networking timekeeping solutions, now offers a time server with IPv6 support: the SyncServer S200 GPS Network Time Server. As an NTP Stratum 1 IPv6 device with integrated GPS receiver, the S200 can derive the correct time with nanosecond accuracy by communicating with the atomic clocks aboard the satellites in the GPS system. The built-in flexibility of this IPv6 time server allows it to adapt to any network topology and it works effortlessly within IPv6 and IPv4 networks, as well as a hybrid of both. Supporting hundreds of thousands of clients, the S200 IPv6-ready time server lets network administrators easily manage timekeeping for current networks as well as during the transition to the network architecture of the future.

An IPv6 network requires highly accurate timekeeping

During the transition to IPv6, accurate network time synchronization will help enterprises mitigate the dangers of poor network timekeeping.

Symmetricom's IPv6 time server will help improve enterprise security by keeping the time on servers and clients closely synchronized, in order to tighten security and prevent breaches of the IT security perimeter.

Standard data operations can fail when timekeeping is inaccurate, since many data operations require a series of events to be executed in a specific chronological order across a number of computers. Consequently, the S200 IPv6 time server can help ensure high availability and the integrity of operations like data backup and order processing.

Data loss can also be prevented with this IPv6-ready time server. Accidental data loss can occur when timestamp accuracy is poor and an old version of a file is saved as the new version.