IPv6 Addressing, Operation, Routing, Packet Analysis, and Troubleshooting
2-Day Instructor Led Hands On Lab Class
Available in either Web Based delivery or On-Site Delivery
Minimum 10 students – Maximum 16 students
What Students say about this course:
- “Like how the instructor provided context and “why” behind the way things were designed.”
- “Loved going over the packet captures”
- “I now feel that I have a very firm understanding of IPv6 basics. “
- “The labs setup with individualized work areas was excellent. Best hands on class I have had in my 25 years.”
- “This was the most enjoyable training session I have ever been to.”
- “I enjoyed every bit about the lab[s] very interactive”
- “HANDS ON.. love it. “
Course Description
IPv6 is no longer a technology that network professionals are simply preparing for. It is an operational part of today’s Internet, broadband, mobile, cloud, service-provider, and enterprise networks.
Understanding IPv6 therefore requires more than learning how a 128-bit address is written. Network professionals need to understand how IPv6 devices discover routers and neighbors, obtain addresses, resolve names, select routes, communicate across IPv4 and IPv6 environments, and respond when something does not work.
This hands-on course develops those practical IPv6 skills.
Students learn IPv6 through a combination of instructor-led explanation, network configuration, protocol analysis, hands-on exercises, and packet captures. Cisco-based lab systems are used to reinforce the concepts and allow students to configure, observe, verify, and troubleshoot actual IPv6 operation.
Rather than simply memorizing IPv6 terminology and commands, students learn how IPv6 works and why it behaves the way it does.
Throughout the course, students answer practical questions such as:
- How does IPv6 differ from IPv4?
- How does IPv6 addressing and subnetting work?
- What are link-local, global unicast, multicast, and anycast addresses?
- How do hosts discover routers and neighboring devices?
- How do SLAAC and DHCPv6 work?
- What role does ICMPv6 play in normal IPv6 operation?
- How does DNS support IPv6?
- How is IPv6 routed using OSPFv3 and BGP?
- How do IPv4 and IPv6 coexist?
- How do IPv6-only systems reach IPv4 resources?
- What security issues must be considered in an IPv6 network?
- How can Wireshark and packet analysis be used to troubleshoot IPv6?
Course Objectives
Upon completion of this course, students will be able to:
- Explain the fundamental operation of IPv6 and its major differences from IPv4.
- Read, write, compress, and interpret IPv6 addresses and prefixes.
- Identify and explain major IPv6 address types.
- Understand IPv6 subnetting and address-planning concepts.
- Explain the role of ICMPv6 in IPv6 operation.
- Describe and analyze IPv6 Neighbor Discovery.
- Explain Router Solicitation and Router Advertisement operation.
- Configure and verify IPv6 Stateless Address Autoconfiguration.
- Explain the roles of SLAAC and DHCPv6.
- Understand DNS operation in IPv6 networks.
- Configure and verify IPv6 connectivity and routing.
- Configure and analyze OSPFv3 operation.
- Understand the use of MP-BGP for IPv6 routing.
- Explain IPv6 multicast and anycast operation.
- Analyze IPv6 packets using Wireshark.
- Recognize common IPv6 configuration and connectivity problems.
- Apply basic IPv6 security and access-control practices.
- Explain dual-stack, IPv6-only, and IPv4/IPv6 coexistence strategies.
- Describe NAT64, DNS64, and other modern IPv4/IPv6 transition approaches.
- Use a structured troubleshooting process to isolate IPv6 network problems.
The emphasis throughout the course is on connecting protocol concepts to actual network behavior. Hands-on exercises reinforce the material and develop skills that students can apply directly in operational networks.
Audience
This course is designed for technical professionals who need a practical understanding of IPv6 addressing, operation, routing, and troubleshooting.
Ideal participants include:
- Network Engineers
- Network Administrators
- Broadband and Service Provider Technicians
- Network Operations Center personnel
- Customer Support Engineers
- Network Design Engineers
- Network Management and Operations personnel
- Test and Systems Engineers
- Technical Support personnel
- Technical Sales Engineers
- Technical Marketing personnel
- Certification candidates seeking deeper IPv6 knowledge
The course is particularly valuable to anyone who may be required to configure, support, analyze, or troubleshoot networks where IPv6 is present.
Course Prerequisites
Students should have a basic understanding of IP networking and common network operations.
Familiarity with IPv4 addressing, Ethernet, routing, and basic router configuration is helpful, but prior IPv6 experience is not required.
Students participating remotely should have a computer capable of connecting to the provided lab environment.
Course Materials
Students receive:
- Course Student Guide
- Hands-On Lab Guide
- Access to the course lab environment
- IPv6 configuration and troubleshooting exercises
- Packet captures used for IPv6 protocol analysis
Course Outline
Section 1: IPv6 in Today’s Networks
- Why IPv6 was developed
- IPv4 and IPv6 coexistence
- IPv6 deployment models
- Where IPv6 is encountered today
- Understanding dual-stack and IPv6-only networks
- Preparing the lab environment
Lab: Preparing for IPv6 Exercises and Experiments
Section 2: IPv6 Protocol Fundamentals
- IPv4 and IPv6 header comparison
- IPv6 header operation
- Traffic Class
- Flow Label
- Next Header
- Hop Limit
- IPv6 Extension Headers
- Fragmentation differences between IPv4 and IPv6
- Path MTU Discovery
Packet Analysis: Examining the IPv6 Header with Wireshark
Section 3: IPv6 Addressing
- IPv6 address format
- Hexadecimal addressing
- Address compression
- Prefix notation
- IPv6 subnetting
- Interface Identifiers
- Global Unicast addresses
- Link-Local addresses
- Unique Local addresses
- Loopback and unspecified addresses
- Special-purpose IPv6 addresses
- IPv6 address planning concepts
Lab: Configuring and Verifying IPv6 Addressing
Section 4: IPv6 Multicast and Anycast
- Why IPv6 relies heavily on multicast
- IPv6 multicast address format
- Multicast scope
- IPv6-to-Ethernet multicast mapping
- Solicited-Node multicast addresses
- Multicast Listener Discovery
- IPv6 Anycast
Packet Analysis: Examining IPv6 Multicast Traffic
Section 5: ICMPv6 and Neighbor Discovery
- The critical role of ICMPv6
- Neighbor Discovery Protocol
- Neighbor Solicitation
- Neighbor Advertisement
- Router Solicitation
- Router Advertisement
- Duplicate Address Detection
- Neighbor Unreachability Detection
- Prefix discovery
- Default-router discovery
Lab: IPv6 Neighbor Discovery
Packet Analysis: NS, NA, RS, and RA Messages
Section 6: IPv6 Address Configuration
- Stateless Address Autoconfiguration
- Router Advertisement flags
- Prefix Information Options
- SLAAC operation
- DHCPv6
- Stateful and stateless DHCPv6
- DHCPv6 Relay
- DNS and IPv6
- AAAA records
Lab: IPv6 Stateless Address Autoconfiguration
Lab: DHCPv6 and DHCPv6 Relay
Section 7: IPv6 Routing
- IPv6 routing fundamentals
- Static IPv6 routing
- IPv6 routing-table interpretation
- OSPFv3 fundamentals
- OSPFv3 neighbors and adjacencies
- IPv6 route advertisement
- MP-BGP support for IPv6
- Service-provider IPv6 routing considerations
Lab: Configuring IPv6 Routing
Lab: OSPFv3 Routing in an IPv6 Network
Lab/Exercise: MP-BGP for IPv6
Section 8: IPv6 Security
- IPv6 security considerations
- IPv6 Access Control Lists
- ICMPv6 filtering considerations
- Neighbor Discovery security
- Rogue Router Advertisements
- Rogue DHCPv6 services
- IPv6 first-hop security concepts
- Extension-header considerations
- Security implications of dual-stack networks
Lab: Configuring IPv6 Access Control
Section 9: IPv4 and IPv6 Coexistence
- IPv4 and IPv6 coexistence challenges
- Dual-stack networking
- IPv6-only networking
- Translation versus tunneling
- NAT64
- DNS64
- 464XLAT overview
- Service-provider transition considerations
- Recognizing legacy IPv6 transition mechanisms
Lab: IPv4 and IPv6 Dual-Stack Networking
Exercise: Understanding IPv6-to-IPv4 Translation
Section 10: IPv6 Troubleshooting and Packet Analysis
- Developing an IPv6 troubleshooting workflow
- Verifying addressing
- Verifying link-local operation
- Checking Router Advertisements
- Troubleshooting Neighbor Discovery
- Troubleshooting SLAAC and DHCPv6
- Troubleshooting DNS
- Verifying IPv6 routing
- Identifying MTU problems
- Separating IPv4 problems from IPv6 problems
- Using Wireshark to validate IPv6 behavior
Lab: Troubleshooting an IPv6 Network
Packet Analysis: Identifying IPv6 Problems with Wireshark
Related Training
Students who need additional IP networking fundamentals may benefit from completing a TCP/IP Fundamentals or IP Addressing and Routing course before attending.
Students seeking deeper skills can continue into advanced IPv6 routing, IPv6 security, and packet-analysis training.
Course Availability:
Contact us for schedule dates and times.
View the course calendar and browse for our schedule.
Course Description, Content, Outline, and Instructional Design are Copyright ©CellStream, Inc.