Re: [perl #75740] IPv6 support missing in perl5.10, perl5.12

On 15 June 2010 17:45, Nicholas Clark <[email protected]> wrote:
>> We could provide instead a bare-bones module that just wraps around
>> getaddrinfo, getnameinfo, inet_ntop and inet_pton (maybe other ones).
>>
>> What about the IP:: namespace for those ? (or we could also stuff them
>> in POSIX::)
>
> We added inet_ntop and inet_pton to Socket in March 2009:
> http://perl5.git.perl.org/perl.git/commit/036d8bd42e6e43

Ah, I already forgot about that.

> Hence they are already in Socket 5.12
> That leaves only getaddrinfo. What is wrong with also putting that in Socket?

And probably getnameinfo too, for good measure.
Yes, I agree, we could complement Socket with them. (And probably
ipv6 functionality as you suggested below)

>> > - IO::Socket::INET6 which is similar to IO::Socket::INET but supports
>> >  also IPv6
>>
>> It currently requires Socket6, which could be made optional.
>>
>>
>> > - Net::INET6Glue, which is a hack to provide IPv6 functionality in the
>> >  Net::* Modules, LWP...
>> >
>> > So what could be done?
>> > I think it's not that hard:
>> > - integrate Socket6 and IO::Socket::INET6 into CORE, complementing
>> >  Socket and IO::Socket::INET
>> > - integrate IPv6 in the Net::* CORE modules, thus making a lot of
>> >  Net::INET6Glue obsolete. This is not hard, it's mostly using
>> >  IO::Socket::INET6 instead of IO::Socket::INET if available. I did this
>> >  with IO::Socket::SSL already, which is automatically IPv6 aware if
>> >  IO::Socket::INET6 is available.
>> >  The added functionality needed for Net::FTP can be used from
>> >  Net::INET6Glue::FTP.
>>
>> For that you'd need to ask Graham Barr, maintainer of libnet on CPAN.
>> The perl core just integrates the CPAN version. I personally like the
>> idea. Graham ?
>
> I think that this comes down to a policy/philosophy distinction.
>
> Either:
>  Socket is called Socket, not Socket4, and likewise NET::*, such as
>  IO::Socket::INET being that, not IO::Socket::INET4
>  Hence they're not just about IPv4, so *they* should be made to support
>  IPv6 too (and no new namespaces)
>
> Or:
>  IPv6 is something new, and it is reasonable for programs to need to load
>  new/different modules to support it.
>
>
> Personally, I prefer the former. I'm not sure how hard it is to get there.
> This means that I am disagreeing with the specific proposal to integrate
> Socket6 and IO;:Socket::INET6 into the code.
>
> Partly this is because I believe that it is viable (and not that hard)
> make this work in the core modules, without breaking the existing IPv6
> specific modules on CPAN, such that existing code that loads them will
> continue working, but new or updated code can be cleaner.


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