ACT Fibernet rolls out IPv6 in Chennai after Bangalore

Update as of  1st Sept 2019 - ACT customer servie informed me on a call to my inquiry that v6 is no longer offered; they only activate WAN side v6 when the dynamic IP pool is congested and normally v6 is not offered. Even funnier is business customers with static IP's are never presented with v6 and are stuck with v4 alone. Pity as v6 will soon gain wider adoption in India after Jio comes up with its home broadband.

Update as of  30th Sept 2019 - Not sure what happened, I am fully getting WAN side V6 now; it can mean two things - either the load is constantly high and thus V6 is available or they just started activating V6 full time. Either way, IPv6 is active and usable with ACT.

ACT after testing it out in Bangalore, has now enabled IPv6 in Chennai; making ACT as the only ISP after Jio to provide services in IPv6.

Right now they're using 64 prefix.

Sites to see if you are IPv6 enabled:

https://ipv6test.google.com
https://test-ipv6.com
http://v6.testmyipv6.com / http://ds.testmyipv6.com
http://ipv6-test.com


Recommended IPv6 DNS:

2620:fe::fe / 2620:00FE:0000:0000:0000:0000:0000:00FE

2606:4700:4700::1001 / 2606:4700:4700:0000:0000:0000:0000:1001

2001:4860:4860::8888 / 2001:4860:4860:0000:0000:0000:0000:8888

2620:0:ccc::2 / 2620:0000:0CCC:0000:0000:0000:0000:0002

2606:4700:4700::1111 / 2606:4700:4700:0000:0000:0000:0000:1111

2620:0:ccd::2 / 2620:0000:0CCD:0000:0000:0000:0000:0002

2001:4860:4860::8844 / 2001:4860:4860:0000:0000:0000:0000:8844

OneDrive A newer version of OneDrive is installed

Recently I was being bugged by OneDrive not starting; as a O365 user I wasn't able to use OneDrive with NGSC (Next Generation Sync Client) to download files on the go.

If you face a similar situation, follow these steps, in this particular order - if possible.

• Navigate to HKCU\Software\Microsoft\OneDrive & delete it. i.e, Delete the OneDrive registry keys under the Microsoft folder.
• Use Revo Uninstaller, while I used the pro version, the free version can also be used; no difference. Just run it, pre-configure it to do a back up of the registry and also a system restore point. It will try and run the native uninstaller & nothing will happen. Once you see the 'Scan/Next', click on it and remove all registry keys and left over files it displays.
• Sign Out & Reboot.
• Do not download the usual OneDrive installer from https://onedrive.live.com/about/en-in/download, that will be 24,XXX KB on disk; this is unusable. Get the one from here https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/p/?linkid=844652, it should be 25,239 KB on disk. 
• Install this, open OneDrive settings & click on "Add an account"
• Navigate to C:\Users\Karthikeyan\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs & delete all previous OneDrive shortcuts. Goes without saying, replace my name with your user directory name.
• Create a new shortcut and point it to C:\Users\Karthikeyan\AppData\Local\Microsoft\OneDrive\OneDrive.exe 
• Pin this new shortcut to the start screen or to the taskbar & use this to launch OneDrive moving forward.

That is all! Now you can actually use OneDrive as it is supposed to work :)


Hat-Tip to the following sources:

 LincolnLog's reply - https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/windows/en-US/09425bf9-55ee-4ade-831c-b4650799dd59/a-newer-version-of-onedrive-is-installed?forum=win10itprogeneral

Someone in UV - https://onedrive.uservoice.com/forums/262982-onedrive-archive/suggestions/18734299-fix-a-newer-version-is-installed-and-onedrive-fa

Quad9 Indian Server Location

I love Quad9’s service & am continuing to use it over my ISP, CloudFlare, Google and numerous other DNS service providers as Quad9 is both swift & safer.

I had a quick question, as per this tweet, Quad9 have a server in Mumbai, India & Columbo, Sri Lanka; which are closer to Chennai. However, I did a trace route and noticed I’m being responded from Singapore.

Tracing route to dns.quad9.net [9.9.9.9]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

  1     3 ms     2 ms     2 ms  R7000P [192.168.1.1]
  2     3 ms     3 ms     3 ms  XXX
  3     4 ms     6 ms     3 ms  broadband.actcorp.in [XXX]
  4     4 ms     3 ms     3 ms  broadband.actcorp.in [XXX]
  5     3 ms     3 ms     3 ms  XXX.STATIC-Chennai.vsnl.net.in [XXX]
  6     3 ms     3 ms     3 ms  XXX
  7     3 ms     3 ms     3 ms  ix-ae-4-2.tcore1.cxr-chennai.as6453.net [180.87.36.9]
  8    37 ms    36 ms    35 ms  if-ae-13-2.tcore1.svw-singapore.as6453.net [180.87.36.83]
  9    36 ms    35 ms    35 ms  if-ae-11-2.thar1.svq-singapore.as6453.net [180.87.98.37]
 10    35 ms    35 ms    36 ms  ae-6.r00.sngpsi05.sg.bb.gin.ntt.net [129.250.8.241]
 11    38 ms    35 ms    35 ms  ae-10.r20.sngpsi05.sg.bb.gin.ntt.net [129.250.7.18]
 12    36 ms    36 ms    35 ms  ae-3.r20.sngpsi07.sg.bb.gin.ntt.net [129.250.4.34]
 13    36 ms    36 ms    36 ms  ae-1.r01.sngpsi03.sg.bb.gin.ntt.net [129.250.4.175]
 14    36 ms    36 ms    37 ms  ge-100-0-0-11.r01.sngpsi03.sg.ce.gin.ntt.net [116.51.27.54]
 15    35 ms    36 ms    35 ms  dns.quad9.net [9.9.9.9]

Pinging 9.9.9.9 with 32 bytes of data:
Reply from 9.9.9.9: bytes=32 time=36ms TTL=50
Reply from 9.9.9.9: bytes=32 time=36ms TTL=50
Reply from 9.9.9.9: bytes=32 time=37ms TTL=50
Reply from 9.9.9.9: bytes=32 time=35ms TTL=50

Ping statistics for 9.9.9.9:
    Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
    Minimum = 35ms, Maximum = 37ms, Average = 36ms

I’m not sure why Singapore is preferred over within the country & neighbouring country servers which are closer in terms of distance. I had few theories, then I recollected learning about international fiber optical networks and then it struck me!

ISP ACT Broadband is routing to Tata Communications/VSNL, this is expected as Tata is the Tire-1 with a landing in Chennai
 
I hope there is a national optical fiber network which connects Mumbai & Chennai; and I know as a matter of fact that TIISCS directly connects Chennai with Singapore with its submarine fiber optic cable.

Then I looked into the cable landing points in India and the various international cables that touches each of the nodes.

Chennai is a cable landing point for 4 cables (more on this later)

• BBG – This is not used as Chennai needs to connect to Malaysia to reach Sri Lanka and then Mumbai
• i2i – Possible as this is direct Chennai to Singapore, also connects with SMW3; owned by Airtel though
• SeaMeWe-4 – Connects directly from Chennai to Sri Lanka & Singapore and then Sri Lanka to Mumbai; owned by many including Tata and Airtel
• TIISCS/TIC – As stated earlier, direct Chennai to Singapore, Tata owned

So with BBG & i2i removed from the equation, the remaining two directly connects Chennai with Singapore where TATA has its presence. Now I understood why my queries are routed the way it was. 

Anyways, no matter which provider I choose, its more or less of the same story.

Ping statistics for 9.9.9.9:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 35ms, Maximum = 36ms, Average = 35ms
Ping statistics for 1.0.0.1:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 35ms, Maximum = 36ms, Average = 35ms
Ping statistics for 1.1.1.1:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 35ms, Maximum = 36ms, Average = 35ms
Ping statistics for 8.8.8.8:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 36ms, Maximum = 36ms, Average = 36ms

Since there is not much of a difference between the top services, I’m going with the safety net of Quad9 over the others. Whatever it is, even while I’m getting 1-2ms pings from my ISP’s DNS, sometimes even 0ms! I’m not going to use their DNS. I’m using VPN with/or DNSSEC/DNSoTLS service providers just because I can and I prefer it that way.

International Fiber Optic Cablr Landing Count:
Mumbai - 12
Chennai – 4
Cochin – 2
Thiruvananthapuram – 1
Puducherry – 1 (TBF)

As per Quad 9 - New Cities Added, I understand and support their ideology; but I secretly wish that they put up one more server for India in Chennai.

Mumbai can act for the north India while Chennai can cater to South. Anyways, I’m quite happy with where Chennai is at, in the large scheme of things.

Quad 9 DNS Server Locations

The amusing weekend of Shape of Water & Black Panther

This weekend was awesome! Let me tell you about my thoughts on the movies Shape of Water & Black Panther & something personal from my professional & personal life. I recommend watching both of the said movies wholeheartedly! And a little caution first hand, that you’d be greeted with the storyline & spoilers for Shape of Water alone. I’m giving SoW a 10/10 and BP 8/10.

Sites that support Two Factor Authentication (2FA/MFA)

   
The following are the sites that I've enabled muti-factor authentication on. I urge you to do so as well, in order to better protect yourself.

• Buffer
• Dropbox
• Evernote
• Facebook
• GitHub
• Google
• HootSuite
• IFTTT
• Microsoft
• Slack
• ProtonMail
• Twitter
• VK
• LastPass
• Zoho
• MindMeister
• Amazon
• AOL
• Snapchat
• CloudFlare
• Reddit
• TeamViewer
• Tumblr
• WordPress