Olive on Ubuntu (JunOS)

(Dynamips (IOS ) and Olive (JunOS) together)

http://inetpro.org/wiki/Using_QEMU_with_Olive_to_emulate_Juniper_Routers

I installed Olive on Ubuntu 8.04 64Bit using the above guide. Couple of straight forward instructions. The only thing you'd change is if you are using Xwindows to do the installation, you might not want to use the

 -curses option in the Installing Olive Section

Also you need have ssh installed on your ubuntu machine to copy the junOS image onto your guest FreeBSD.

Olive on Vista (JUNOS)

Recently I installed JunOS on vista. I followed instructions given in

http://brokenpipes.blogspot.com/2008/01/olive-is-alive.html

-The only change I had to make was to STEP 7, i.e instead of using Qemu command to boot FreeBSD from iso, which caused Qemu to crash. I used jemu.
-Make sure your FTP transfer is in binary mode.

IE version 5 Volume 1 QOS

I am on the IE version 1 volume 1 QOS (last section). My notebook is almost finished that I had to get new ones yesterday. In case you're wondering I like to have my notes written on paper. This particular volume covers a lot of Legacy QOS technologies, which I have familiarized myself with now. In addition, it also has very interesting tests to verify configurations related to QOS. I should say I have acquired the necessary skills to test certain QOS configurations, which I normally would just verify with generic commands. Also, its a great way to see things actually work the way they are supposed to.

JunOS

I was a bit bored with my labs and I decided to digress for a while. I ended up taking the course "JUNOS as a second language". I found it quite interesting.

http://www.juniper.net/us/en/training/elearning/jsl.html

Dynamips and switches IE lab Part 2

I finished all the cabling and installation of quad NICs. Luckily, Ubuntu automatically detected all the quad NICs without crying for drivers. It would have been real mess without cable ties. Remember to verify whether your dynamips router's physical interface goes to correct switchport on the real switch through the show cdp neighbors command.

Dynamips with Switches

Since I am running a full scale dynamips lab, I decided to connect dynamics to real switches. I'll be using 4x3550, with 3x quad port NICs. I will do a couple rented rack sessions to familiarize myself with features specific to 3560.

Initially when I decided to go for quad port NICs after foraying through myriad forums, I realised most of the quad NICs were PCI cards. And this posed to be a huge problem because I only have two PCI slots on my motherboard. Dismayed that I would have to resort to changing the motherboard (recently bought...no way) or go with USB NICs, which would be a pain due driver compatiblity issues with linux, I decided to give it one final try. Fortunately, I have 3 PCI express slots and quick search revealed that Intel Pro/1000 PT Server adapter would be the best choice, expensive but worth it.

So at present I have ordered 2x Dlink DFE-580Tx and 1x Intel Pro/1000 PT Server adapter. Hopefully, it should arrive next week. Meanwhile, I spent most of yesterday, changing initial config files for backbone and nonbackbone routers for IE ver4.10 VOL2, VOL3 and IE ver5 VOL1 to be compatible with my setup of dynamips. I only have couple of changes, eg: R3,R4,R5,R6 use F0/0 and F2/0 instead of E0/0 and E0/1 and the routers will be connected to real switches. I also created 2 .net files for IE ver 4 vol 2 and vol 3 labs [ie.410.vol2.net , ie.410.vol3.net]. So when I am going to do for example, lab 2 from vol 2, I do and find a replace of "X", where X is the directory containing initial configs for routers, in the cnfg parameter of the ie.410.vol2.net file.
The good thing with real switches would be the capability to directly paste the switch configs I do the labs and do most of the switching sections.

I have two more labs in IE VOL1, bridging and switching and QoS. I found most VOL1 labs to alright, but then again I havent started full scale labs.

Dynamips proccessor utilisation

As I mentioned before, I have started working on IE work books. However, as soon as I ran the complete topology (no IGP, BGPetc) , with minimal configuration on non backbone routers, CPU utilization on an average was 55% and 30% for the two dynamips processes.

Yesterday I decided to give a test once again with different idlepc values, and voila it has reduced CPU usages to 14% and 12% for the two dynamips processes respectively.

Observation
1) Rather than using only idlepc values, which dynamips states is a potentially better idlepc value (* entries), test with all the idlepc values (including un* values), one after the other to see what works best for you.
2) Remember if you have started a router, then simply telnet to it and leave at that #prompt, even if you're not configuring it.

How to find the idlepc value?
Start one router (eg:R1), get a list of possible idlepc values. Apply them one by one and observe the cpu utilisation with top or htop command in linux. With one router and a good idlepc value, on an average my cpu utilisation is approx 2% or less.

I tried with one of the idlepc values, which was not * and it happened to be the value which I found is
the best rather than dynamips * ones. I had been using only * values assuming it was the best, ignoring un * entries.

Note: I run Dynamips on Ubuntu 64bit 8.10, with Quad Core 9400 with 4GB Ram.
Tip: For IE Vol1 labs, only start devices that you require in the lab exercise.

CCIE Lab Prep

I passed the CCIE written last week. My preparation included reading all the books I mentioned before in the reading list. I have also purchased Internet Routing Architectures (Sam Halabi), left with 2 more chapters.

Some other preparation materials would include
Resolving and going through topics in Cisco Netpro Forum, GroupStudy and different CCIE blogs (especially Internetwork Expert ). I have also made it point to extensively use Google docs to make notes regarding various technologies, documenting something new or something I have learnt more through labbing.

As far as preparation for the LAB goes , I have purchased the Internetwork Expert Vol1-3 labs. For running the labs, I have dedicated a new machine (Quad Core with 4GB RAM) running Dynamips. I will later get a couple of rack rentals to do topics primarily related to Switching. I am currently going through IE Vol 1 Labs.

DMVPN resources

I was reading through various resources on DMVPN, just thought I'd post those here.

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/solutions/Enterprise/WAN_and_MAN/DMVPN_1.html
http://blog.internetworkexpert.com/2008/08/02/dmvpn-explained/
http://packetlife.net/blog/2008/jul/23/dynamic-multipoint-vpn-dmvpn/
http://www.faqs.org/rfcs/rfc2332.html

Exam Update

I finally registered for CCIE R&S written, to be held the end of next month. I am also on the last book of my reading list, Implementing IPv6. I could describe the moment as both exciting and trembling. It's the effort of several months of preparation and now there's no turning back.