Linux As A Network OS Dinesh G Dutt Shrijeet Mukherjee Nolan Leake Pradosh Mohapatra
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Linux As A Network OS
Dinesh G DuttShrijeet MukherjeeNolan LeakePradosh Mohapatra
09/16/13 2Linuxcon 2013
Networking circa 2008
Flickr photo from [http://www.flickr.com/photos/duncanh1/]
09/16/13 3Linuxcon 2013
Data Centers have thrown a monkey wrench in the world of networking whether it be how networks are managed, the new technologies they have brought to the fore such as SDN or network virtualization
09/16/13 4Linuxcon 2013
Modern data center networks are based around the following ideas:
New breed of applications which are L3-aware and workaround network failuresIP-based networksAutomated management
• Configuration and monitoring•Rapid spin-up and spin-down of
networks
09/16/13 5Linuxcon 2013
Operating Systems define how you manage the individual boxes and thereby the system
09/16/13 6Linuxcon 2013
Traditional Router/Switch Oses:Complex routing/switching featuresStructured as a black box:– No well-defined API
Closed development modelAntediluvian management tool chainVery slow spin-up and spin-down of networks
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Modern data centers usually run GNU/Linux as the server OS:
Well established and open APISophisticated management tool chain
• Including scriptingVibrant community fueling innovationExcellent networking support
09/16/13 8Linuxcon 2013
Networking support includes the expected and more:
09/16/13 9Linuxcon 2013
In other words: GNU/Linux is a great fit as the OS for not just servers but even routers and switches in the modern data center
09/16/13 10Linuxcon 2013
So What ? What advantages does this provide ?
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What Linux as the network OS enables: Open routing and switching platformUnified management tool chainNew ways of solving problemsNeatly sidesteps a bunch of problemsA potential to return IP networking to its roots: “rough consensus, working code”
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Open Routing/Switching implies a more participatory role for everyone to develop networking, transparency for troubleshooting and understanding
09/16/13 13Linuxcon 2013
Quagga
Kernel STP, mstpd
lldpd, open-lldp
Routing Suites
Bridging
Discovery
Monitoring Net-snmp, collectd, ganglia
Open Routing/Switching Platform
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Datacenter 1Datacenter 1
Tools to manage servers such as Chef, Puppet, Ansible etc. can also be used to manage the network
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netplug, ifplugdFlexlink
Keepalived or a script to configure virtual MAC on bridge
HSRP/VRRP
New ways of solving the problem
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With Linux as the network OS, we neatly sidestep issues that arise from the traditional router OS' being a black box:
Technologies such as netconfAPIs for programming network
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What's missing ?Hardware acceleration of the networking forwarding path
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One Way Of Hardware Accelerating
Linux KernelLinux Kernel RoutingTable
RoutingTable
ARPTableARPTable
Ethernet InterfacesEthernet
Interfaces
switchdswitchdRouting ProtocolsRouting
Protocols
CPU, RAM, Flash, etcCPU, RAM, Flash, etc
SwitchDriver
SwitchDriver
Switch Silicon
Switch Silicon
Customer ApplicationsCustomer
Applications
Switch ports show up as virtual interfaces (swp0, swp1 …)• typical tools - ifconfig, route, arp, ip, brctl, ethtool, tcpdump, etc
Kernel FIB/ARP table are synchronized with HW• userspace can send/receive packets and insert routes normally
Advanced operations use specialized APIs• expose hardware acceleration beyond stock Linux routing/bridging
09/16/13 19Linuxcon 2013
Evolving Linux further:Consistent way to map data structures to hardware
•Netlink's publish functionality not available with netfilter, for eg.
Provide mechanisms to allow commands to fail if backend hardware install fails
Linuxcon 201309/16/13 20
Linux as the embedded OS: process and memory mgmt
Embedded OS with process and memory mgmt
No real OS, while loop
Monolithic OS Third Party Real-time OS
Linux-based OS
Evolution Of Network OS
Eg: IOS, CatOS
Proprietary routingAnd switching stack
Eg: ION Eg: NX-OS, EOS Cumulus Linux
Linux OS
Linux as Network OS:Native routingand switching
Proprietary routingAnd switching stack
Proprietary routingAnd switching stack
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It's taken me all my life to learn what not to play.
- Dizzy Gillespie
09/16/13 22Linuxcon 2013
Imagine a world where every router ran GNU/Linux
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