Top all-time · #8545
Occasionally Coherent
Personal blog · blog.bimajority.orgsystemssecurityprogramming
Occasionally Coherent is a personal blog at blog.bimajority.org about systems, security and programming. Since 2013, 9 different Hacker News readers have linked it 12 times, most often “IPv6 privacy addresses crashed the MIT CSAIL network”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2026-04-14, and you can follow it by feed.
Too few sampled comments (8) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
HN links it as support for arguments against IPv6 design choices such as NAT-free addressing, privacy extensions and rotating addresses, often citing its 2014 'network nightmare' post. It is also cited on train acceleration physics.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 8 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
Any actual sense is an unintentional lapse.
Most-linked posts?
- IPv6 privacy addresses crashed the MIT CSAIL network3 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2014-09-06
- /2014/09/05/the-network-nightmare-that-ate-my-week/2 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2017-04-20
What Hacker News says?
Rotating IP is nightmare for network admin: http://blog.bimajority.org/2014/09/05/the-network-nightmare-...
Comment linking /2014/09/05/the-network-nightmare-that-ate-my-week/
on “The IPv6 Numeric IP Format Is a Usability Problem”Submitted IPv6 privacy addresses crashed the MIT CSAIL network as a story · 180 points
HN discussionSeriously problematic for browsers - see Garrett Wollman's article linked below, and follow the link to his previous "defence" which has a good roundup of problems https://blog.bimajority.org/2016/05/02/an-update-on-the-http...
Comment linking /2016/05/02/an-update-on-the-https-client-certificate-issue/
on “API Security Checklist for developers”Submitted In defense of client certificates as a story · 68 points
HN discussion> No, a stateful firewall keeps state per connection, not per address, the number of distinct addresses is of no consequence. which is all well until it isn't: http://blog.bimajority.org/2014/09/05/the-network-nightmare-...
Comment linking /2014/09/05/the-network-nightmare-that-ate-my-week/
on “IPv6 celebrates its 20th birthday by reaching 10% deployment”Submitted What's wrong with Metcalfe's Law? as a story · 2 points
HN discussionThis article completely fails to mention that IPv6 is not just an extension of the address space but a whole different worldview about how to run a network: - IPv6-to-IPv6 NAT has only been accepted very recently and very begrudgingly. Whatever your views are on NAT, the fact is that lots of people have network designs that rely on it, and if you want them to stop, you're now asking them to couple two major transiti…
Comment linking /2014/09/05/the-network-nightmare-that-ate-my-week/
on “Is there hope for IPv6?”Submitted The admin’s manifesto as a story · 2 points
HN discussion> if you're connecting it to N cities you won't need to lay N new lines, you might get away with a couple Trains accelerate slowly. Adding stops non-linearly increases travel time [1]. A few extra stops might thus make total travel time by train meaningfully more than by air. [1] https://blog.bimajority.org/2018/10/20/interlude-physics-of-...
Comment linking /2018/10/20/interlude-physics-of-train-acceleration/
on “Spanish airline reserves 10 Airlander airships”Privacy Extensions is dangerous: http://blog.bimajority.org/2014/09/05/the-network-nightmare-...
Comment linking /2014/09/05/the-network-nightmare-that-ate-my-week/
on “IPv6 Adoption Statistics”Appending MAC to address is a privacy nightmare and is going away with privacy extensions. (I dont want people to know what NIC i have and potentially track me by looking up who bought it). Because of that DHCP may be needed and ARP as well... nice right? Getting rid of NAT is also questionable and there are now tools to do NAT with IPv6. So common sense and learned practices win. (I still prefer NAT and firewall, d…
Comment linking /2014/09/05/the-network-nightmare-that-ate-my-week/
on “IPv4, IPv6, and a sudden change in attitude”No implication that NAT is bad. 6to4 space (and RFC 4193 space, if needed) would be explicitly okay for use with NAT, like RFC 1918 space. Allow NAT from IPv6 on the inside to IPv4 on the outside, as well as IPv6-to-IPv6 NAT. Extend ARP to support IPv6 addresses instead of designing NDP. Use DHCPv6 like DHCPv4. Don't have SLAAC; encourage the use of existing techniques (static addressing or DHCP). Don't have RAs. Do…
Comment linking /2014/09/05/the-network-nightmare-that-ate-my-week/
on “Next Generation MITnet”
