Setting Up IPv6 Networking

vSphere supports both Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) and Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) environments. With IPv6, you can use vSphere features such as NFS in an IPv6 environment.

An IPv6-specific configuration in vSphere involves providing IPv6 addresses, either by entering static addresses or by using DHCP for all relevant vSphere networking interfaces. IPv6 addresses can also be configured using stateless autoconfiguration sent by router advertisement.

You can set up IPv6 networking for a host by changing the HostIpConfig.ipV6Config property, which is a HostIpConfigIpV6AddressConfiguration data object. HostIpConfigIpV6AddressConfiguration allows you to specify whether auto-configuration is enabled, whether DHCP for ipV6 addresses is enabled, and an array of IPv6 addresses (HostIpConfigIpV6Address data objects).

HostIpConfigIpV6Address allows you to specify all aspects of the IPv6 address including the state of the address, the address (unless DHCP is enabled), life time, operation, origin, and prefix length. See the API Reference. The following code fragment illustrates setting the VMkernel NIC to get an automatic IPv6 address from router advertisements and through DHCP. The user provides the IP address on the command line when calling the program from which the fragment is taken. The sample retrieves the address using the cb.get_option utility applications call.

private HostVirtualNicSpec createVNicSpecification() {
     HostVirtualNicSpec vNicSpec = new HostVirtualNicSpec();
     HostIpConfig ipConfig = new HostIpConfig();
     
     //setting the vnic to get an automatic ipv6 address from router advertisements
     // and through dhcp
     
     ipV6Config = new HostIpConfigIpV6AddressConfiguration();
     ipV6Config.setAutoConfigurationEnabled(true);
     ipV6Config.setDhcpV6Enabled(true);
     ipConfig.setIpV6Config(ipV6Config);
     vNicSpec.setIp(ipConfig);
     return vNicSpec;
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