Dual Stack IPv4/IPv6 on Cisco RV042G Dual WAN Router

• Dual Stack IPv4/IPv6 - Both IPv4 and IPv6 are available on the network.
• Cisco RV042G - Cisco router for small business networks. (https://www.amazon.com/CISCO-Dual-Gigabit-WAN-Router/dp/B008CWW6VY)
• Dual WAN Router - 2 ISPs (Internet Service Providers) are connected to the same router.

I have several servers on AWS (Amazon Web Services). I pay a fee each month for an Elastic IPv4 address. I use this address for an OpenVPN server to access my EC2 instances.

I found that AWS provides free public IPv6 addresses for all EC2 instances in a VPC (Virtual Private Cloud) networks.  The key here is that a public IPv6 address is permanently assigned to the EC2 instance, whether it is running or not.  There is no need to pay the fee for an Elastic IP address.

https://docs.aws.amazon.com/vpc/latest/userguide/vpc-ip-addressing.html

"No distinction between public and private IP addresses. IPv6 addresses are public"

"An IPv6 address persists when you stop and start your instance, and is released when you terminate your instance."

I confirmed all my computers, network equipment, and ISPs would work with IPv6.  After upgrading my router to a Cisco RV042g, I had everything.  However, IPv6 addresses were not working.  I found the time to troubleshoot the problem and found a solution.

I have Spectrum (Time Warner Cable / Road Runner) on WAN1 and AT&T on WAN2.  Both are on a gigabit connection.  AT&T is metered, so I use Spectrum as primary and AT&T as backup.  I also route all voice-over-IP traffic through AT&T.  Both WANs are configured the same in the IPV6 configuration in the Cisco router.

Note: IPv6 will not automatically fail-over.  It looks like IPv6 is not getting rerouted to the backup WAN.  IPv6 seems to have an affinity for the last WAN it was using.  Resetting the network connection on the computer solves the problem, but that is not automatic.  I tried a smaller value for "Router Lifetime" (30 seconds) in the Router Advertisement configuration.  The IPv6 traffic did not get rerouted to the backup WAN. I updated to the latest firmware v4.2.3.09 (Jul 2 2018 14:38:22), but IPv6 would not reroute to the backup WAN.

https://blog.ipspace.net/2014/03/can-we-use-ipv6-router-advertisements.html

Enable ICMP (Ping) on Windows 10 Firewall (Inbound and Outbound):

I found this command to open ICMP on my Windows firewall

netsh firewall set icmpsetting type=all mode=enable

https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/all/windows-10-firewall-filtering-icmp/527551d0-e477-4dd6-a0a0-eae724940ba3



Then, I disabled all the rules that allow inbound and outbound ICMPv4.

Cisco RV042g Configuration (non-default settings for IPv6):

Note: Some of these images were captured with the primary WAN (WAN1) disabled.

These are Google's IPv6 DNS Servers:

• 2001:4860:4860:8844
• 2001:4860:4860:8888

After configuring IPv6, I was able to contact my Cisco router using this URL:

https://[fc00::1]/home.htm

Spectrum (WAN1) IPv6 Test Results:

I ran these tests with the WAN2 port disabled on the router.

AT&T (WAN2) IPv6 Test Results:

I ran these tests with the WAN1 port disabled on the router.

"ipconfig" Shows my Ethernet Adapter Configuration:

Note:  Unlike IPv4, there are many IPv6 addresses on my network adapter.  Also, there are 2 sets of IPv6 addresses, one for each ISP (Dual WAN).

• 2605:6000... - Spectrum
• 2600:1700... - AT&T

Express Edition 18c ORA-12505 listener does not currently know of SID given in connect descriptor

Brief Solution:

Oracle Database Express Edition (XE) 18c was easy to setup.  However, I was surprised when I tried to login to the database today and received the ORA-12505 error message.  The problem was a different IP Address assigned to my computer.  These IP addresses are located in 2 configuration files for the TNS Listener.

• ORACLE_HOME/network/admin/listener.ora
• ORACLE_HOME/network/admin/tnsnames.ora

I was able to connect after correcting the IP address for my computer in both files.

More Details:

First, the TNS Listener typically uses the listener.ora file for startup configuration.  The default name for the TNS Listener is LISTENER.  The LISTENER section of the listener.ora file includes the HOST.  This tells the LISTENER what interface/network to open for reading.

The XE 18c installation used an IP address for this HOST setting.  In my case, DHCP assigned a different IP address to my computer when I connected.  The old IP address would not allow the TNS Listener to run.  After correcting the IP address in the listener.ora file, the TNS Listener ran, but the database would not register with it.

The database parameter LOCAL_LISTENER tells the database where to find the TNS Listener.  The XE 18c installation sets this value to LISTENER_XE.  When the database attempts to register, it uses the tnsnames.ora file to find the LISTENER_XE alias.  Similar to the listener.ora file, the tnsnames.ora file has a LISTENER_XE section that includes a HOST value.  After correcting the IP address in the tnsnames.ora file, the database successfully registered with the TNS Listener.

Oracle Documentation:

About Service Registration (Net Services Administrator's Guide)

https://docs.oracle.com/en/database/oracle/oracle-database/18/netag/understanding-oracle-net-architecture.html#GUID-A47F7687-1F80-48B1-8E76-7FF9D410560A

If the listener is not running when an instance starts, then the LREG process cannot register the service information. LREG attempts to connect to the listener periodically, but it may take up to 60 seconds before LREG registers with the listener after it has been started. To initiate service registration immediately after the listener is started, use the SQL statement ALTER SYSTEM REGISTER.

Overview of Oracle Net Listener (Net Services Administrator's Guide)

https://docs.oracle.com/en/database/oracle/oracle-database/18/netag/configuring-and-administering-oracle-net-listener.html#GUID-A3263EB4-C3F2-4529-ABC2-ADE749114D33

Because the configuration parameters have default values, it is possible to start and use a listener with no configuration. This default listener has a name of LISTENER...

Registering Information with a Local Listener (Net Services Administrator's Guide)

https://docs.oracle.com/en/database/oracle/oracle-database/18/netag/configuring-and-administering-oracle-net-listener.html#GUID-0E7C39E3-4627-403A-AE69-E9AA2C7E4C57

Synchronization occurs when the protocol address of the listener is specified in the listener.ora file and the location of the listener is specified in the initialization parameter file.
To have the LREG process register with a local listener ..., configure the LOCAL_LISTENER parameter in the initialization parameter file to locate the local listener.


Protocol Parameters (Net Services Reference)

https://docs.oracle.com/en/database/oracle/oracle-database/18/netrf/protocol-address-configuration.html#GUID-71A0702F-A5C6-4122-907D-5E9BFA1DCE45

The listener and Oracle Connection Manager are identified by protocol addresses.
The following table lists the parameters used by the Oracle protocol support: