The other side of the moon

INET_ATON() is not IPv6 compatible, so it has little value.

well, mysql itself is not IPv6 compatible, so if you need IPv6, your best bet is to use a string, don't convert to superduperbigint or whatever datatype they invent to store it.

Just be careful not to use this function (INET_ATON) in a trigger. It seems a logical thing to want to do - create a before-insert trigger that takes a dotted-quad IP and converts it automatically to unsigned INT so that you don't have to mess with it - but, alas, it doesn't work. Returns null, if I recall correctly.

inet_aton and inet_ntoa are perfectly fine to use in triggers

http://pastebin.com/m6f1d8490

Saying ipv4 has little value does not match reality.
Many many many applications still assume ipv4; so this is still very relevant.

@Blues

I would think BINARY(16) is a much better choice than VARCHAR(39) for IPv6 addresses.

@gtowney: you're right, though you'd have to deal with the complexity of converting it to/from a number in your application in that case. Two bigints - one for the network and one for the host could also work (correct me if I'm wrong).

just perfect. this will come in handy someday and i am thinking very soon... thanx

I am also pretty sure that
MYSQL -->INET_ATON() is the same as PHP-->ip2long()

and
MYSQL-->INET_NTOA() is the same as PHP-->long2ip()

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