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A comment on Curl those funny IPv4 addresses. Parent comment

Re:Curl those funny IPv4 addresses by tremon on Monday April 19, 2021 @09:35AM (#26862577)
It's also ambiguous. Why is 127.1 equal to 127.0.0.1 but not 127.1.0.0? Why would 127.1.1 be equal to 127.1.0.1 but not 127.0.1.1 or 127.1.1.0? Neither of those addresses can be discarded because they're base addresses, since the subnet 127/8 only has one base address: 127.0.0.0

At least IPv6 made this practice non-ambiguous by requiring a double colon (::) and mandating that at most one :: can exist in a valid address.

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Re:Curl those funny IPv4 addresses by scbrg on Monday April 19, 2021 @10:10AM (#26862927)
It's not really ambiguous. 127.X does not equal 127.0.0.X. 127.X means, the first octet is described by the first number, and the last three octets is described by the second number, and X is not limited to 0-255. Thus 127.256 is equivalent to 127.0.1.0, something that would not be possible to express with your alternative interpretations.

It doesn't just mean "fill in zeros".

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