Testing the response of operating systems to different IPv6 flows

Abstract

The aim of the thesis is to create an array of virtual machines and research their response to the IPv6 protocol. Another signifcant part is to utilize the provided tool for generating and sniffng IPv6 traffc and verify its correct functionality. For such purpose, the GNS3 open-source software is selected. A reader is familiarized with the concepts of virtualization, GNS3 functionality and various methods of software testing together with the implemented practical models. The IPv6 protocol is introduced in detail as well as the packet format, address types and several IPv6 protocols useful for the thesis. The practical part is discussed in the Numerical results chapter. The topology is established and connectivity verifed using IPv4. Confguration of static IPv6 addresses is performed on the devices as well as confguration of router to distribute particular prefxes. 5 testing scenarios are proposed that increase the input load to the tool in sense of higher number of addresses for the 3 different modes – passive, active and aggressive. 3 scripts were developed. Performance testing script measures utilization of computational resources. The other 2 scripts perform packet capturing and further analysis to compare the results of proposed scripts with provided tool. The comparison is done utilizing passive and aggressive modes. Active mode is used to observe the response of various operating systems to different IPv6 fows. Specifcally, multiple Windows 10 builds, Linux distributions, Windows XP, 7, 11, macOS and Android.