TABLE OF CONTENTS The stateless address autoconfiguration procedure defines the processes necessary for a host to configure addresses of various scopes using both locally available information and information distributed by routers. This configuration process requires no manual intervention at the host, minimal configuration at the router, and does not require any type of server other than the routers. Part of the procedure defines the Duplicate Address Detection (DAD) algorithm that is executed for each configured address on a given link. For each configured address a node will operate the DAD algorithm over the ND protocol messages to verify the uniqueness of that address on the associated link.
The stateless address autoconfiguration process begins with the generation of a link-local address followed by address uniqueness validation through DAD. This part of the process is completely autonomous, that is, it does not require any external aid such as a router or a server. A host can begin communication with neighbors that are attached to the same link as soon as the link-local address validation completes.
A global scope address is required to communicate with off-link (i.e., not on-link) nodes. A host uses the prefix information distributed through Router Advertisement messages for the autonomous generation of global scope addresses. This part of autoconfiguration requires help from a router, but it is still stateless in that the router does not have to manage the information about which hosts configure which addresses.
IPv6 also supports DHCP for host configuration (DHCPv6, see Chapter 4...
