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3. Run Experiments

This section walks you through the process of running experiments in TeraFlowSDN on top of a machine running MicroK8s Kubernetes platform. The guide includes the details on configuring the Python environment, some basic commands you might need, configuring the network topology, and executing different experiments.

Note that the steps followed here are likely to work regardless of the platform where TeraFlowSDN is deployed over.

Note also that this guide will keep growing with the new experiments and demonstrations that are being carried out involving the ETSI TeraFlowSDN controller.

Important: The NBIs, workflows and drivers have to be considered as experimental. The configuration and monitoring capabilities they support are limited, partially implemented, or tested only with specific laboratory equipment. Use them with care.

3.1. OFC'22 Demo

This functional test reproduces the live demonstration Demonstration of Zero-touch Device and L3-VPN Service Management Using the TeraFlow Cloud-native SDN Controller carried out at OFC'22 / Open access.

The main features demonstrated are:

  • Bootstrapping of devices
  • Monitoring of device endpoints
  • Management of L3VPN services
  • Integration with ETSI OpenSourceMANO

Functional test folder

This functional test can be found in folder ./src/tests/ofc22/.

Execute with real devices

This functional test is designed to operate both with real and emulated devices. By default, emulated devices are used; however, if you have access to real devices, you can create/modify the files ./src/tests/ofc22/tests/Objects.py and ./src/tests/ofc22/tests/Credentials.py to point to your devices, and map to your own network topology. Otherwise, you can modify the ./src/tests/ofc22/tests/descriptors_emulated.json that is designed to be uploaded through the WebUI instead of using the command line scripts. Note that the default scenario assumes devices R2 and R4 are always emulated, while devices R1, R3, and O1 can be configured as emulated or real devices.

Important: The device drivers operating with real devices, e.g., OpenConfigDriver, P4Driver, and TransportApiDriver, have to be considered as experimental. The configuration and monitoring capabilities they support are limited or partially implemented/tested. Use them with care.

Deployment and Dependencies

To run this functional test, it is assumed you have deployed a MicroK8s-based Kubernetes environment and a TeraFlowSDN controller instance as described in the Tutorial: Deployment Guide, and you configured the Python environment as described in Tutorial: Development Guide > Configure Environment > Python.

Access to the WebUI and Dashboard

When the deployment completes, you can connect to the TeraFlowSDN WebUI and Dashboards as described in Tutorial: Deployment Guide > WebUI and Grafana Dashboards

Notes:

  • the default credentials for the Grafana Dashboiard is user/pass: admin/admin123+.
  • in Grafana, you will find the L3-Monitorng in the Starred dashboards section.

Test execution

Before executing the tests, we need to prepare a few things.

First, you need to make sure that you have all the gRPC-generate code in your folder. To do so, run:

proto/generate_code_python.sh

Then, it is time to deploy TeraFlowSDN with the correct specification for this scenario. Make sure to load your deployment variables for this scenario by:

source src/tests/ofc22/deploy_specs.sh

Then, you need to deploy the components by running:

./deploy/all.sh

After the deployment is finished, you need to load the environment variables to support the execution of the tests by:

source tfs_runtime_env_vars.sh

To execute this functional test, four main steps needs to be carried out:

  1. Device bootstrapping
  2. L3VPN Service creation
  3. L3VPN Service removal
  4. Cleanup

Upon the execution of each test progresses, a report will be generated indicating PASSED / FAILED / SKIPPED. If there is some error during the execution, you should see a detailed report on the error. See the troubleshooting section if needed.

You can check the logs of the different components using the appropriate scripts/show_logs_[component].sh scripts after you execute each step.

There are two ways to execute the functional tests, running all the tests with a single script or running each test independently. In the following we start with the first option, then we comment on how to run each test independently.

Running all tests with a single script

We have a script that executes all the steps at once. It is meant for being used to test if all components involved in this scenario are working correct. To run all the functional tests, you can run:

src/tests/ofc22/run_tests.sh

The following sections explain each one of the steps.

Device bootstrapping

This step configures some basic entities (Context and Topology), the devices, and the links in the topology. The expected results are:

  • The devices to be added into the Topology.
  • The devices to be pre-configured and initialized as ENABLED by the Automation component.
  • The monitoring for the device ports (named as endpoints in TeraFlowSDN) to be activated and data collection to automatically start.
  • The links to be added to the topology.

To run this step, you can do it from the WebUI by uploading the file ./ofc22/tests/descriptors_emulated.json that contains the descriptors of the contexts, topologies, devices, and links, or by executing the script:

./src/tests/ofc22/run_test_01_bootstrap.sh

When the bootstrapping finishes, check in the Grafana L3-Monitoring Dashboard and you should see the monitoring data being plotted and updated every 5 seconds (by default). Given that there is no service configured, you should see a 0-valued flat plot.

In the WebUI, select the admin Context. Then, in the Devices tab you should see that 5 different emulated devices have been created and activated: 4 packet routers, and 1 optical line system controller. Besides, in the Services tab you should see that there is no service created. Note here that the emulated devices produce synthetic randomly-generated monitoring data and do not represent any particular services configured.

L3VPN Service creation

This step configures a new service emulating the request an OSM WIM would make by means of a Mock OSM instance.

To run this step, execute the script:

./src/tests/ofc22/run_test_02_create_service.sh

When the script finishes, check the WebUI Services tab. You should see that two services have been created, one for the optical layer and another for the packet layer. Besides, you can check the Devices tab to see the configuration rules that have been configured in each device. In the Grafana Dashboard, given that there is now a service configured, you should see the plots with the monitored data for the device. By default, device R1-EMU is selected.

L3VPN Service removal

This step deconfigures the previously created services emulating the request an OSM WIM would make by means of a Mock OSM instance.

To run this step, execute the script:

./src/tests/ofc22/run_test_03_delete_service.sh

or delete the L3NM service from the WebUI.

When the script finishes, check the WebUI Services tab. You should see that the two services have been removed. Besides, in the Devices tab you can see that the appropriate configuration rules have been deconfigured. In the Grafana Dashboard, given that there is no service configured, you should see a 0-valued flat plot again.

Cleanup

This last step performs a cleanup of the scenario removing all the TeraFlowSDN entities for completeness. To run this step, execute the script:

./src/tests/ofc22/run_test_04_cleanup.sh

When the script finishes, check the WebUI Devices tab, you should see that the devices have been removed. Besides, in the Services tab you can see that the "admin" Context has no services given that that context has been removed.

3.2. ECOC'22 Demo

This functional test reproduces the experimental assessment of Experimental Demonstration of Transport Network Slicing with SLA Using the TeraFlowSDN Controller presented at ECOC'22 / IEEEXplore.

The main features demonstrated are:

  • Disjoint DC-2-DC L2VPN Service management
  • Integration with ETSI OpenSourceMANO

Functional test folder

This functional test can be found in folder ./src/tests/ecoc22/.

Execute with real devices

This functional test has only been tested with emulated devices; however, if you have access to real devices, you can modify the files ./src/tests/ecoc22/tests/Objects.py and ./src/tests/ecoc22/tests/Credentials.py to point to your devices, and map to your network topology. Otherwise, you can modify the ./src/tests/ecoc22/tests/descriptors_emulated.json that is designed to be uploaded through the WebUI instead of using the command line scripts.

Important: The device drivers operating with real devices, e.g., OpenConfigDriver, P4Driver, and TransportApiDriver, have to be considered as experimental. The configuration and monitoring capabilities they support are limited or partially implemented/tested. Use them with care.

Deployment and Dependencies

To run this functional test, it is assumed you have deployed a MicroK8s-based Kubernetes environment and a TeraFlowSDN controller instance as described in the Tutorial: Deployment Guide, and you configured the Python environment as described in Tutorial: Development Guide > Configure Environment > Python.

Access to the WebUI

When the deployment completes, you can connect to the TeraFlowSDN WebUI as described in Tutorial: Deployment Guide > WebUI and Grafana Dashboards

Notes:

  • this experiment does not make use of Monitoring, so Grafana is not used.
  • the default credentials for the Grafana Dashboard is user/pass: admin/admin123+.
  • this functional test does not involve the Monitoring component, so no monitoring data is plotted in Grafana.

Test execution

Before executing the tests, we need to prepare a few things.

First, you need to make sure that you have all the gRPC-generate code in your folder. To do so, run:

proto/generate_code_python.sh

Second, it is time to deploy TeraFlowSDN with the correct specification for this scenario. Make sure to load your deployment variables for this scenario by:

source src/tests/ecoc22/deploy_specs.sh

Then, you need to deploy the components by running:

./deploy/all.sh

After the deployment is finished, you need to load the environment variables to support the execution of the tests by:

source tfs_runtime_env_vars.sh

To execute this functional test, four main steps needs to be carried out:

  1. Device bootstrapping
  2. L2VPN Slice and Services creation
  3. L2VPN Slice and Services removal
  4. Cleanup

Upon the execution of each test progresses, a report will be generated indicating PASSED / FAILED / SKIPPED. If there is some error during the execution, you should see a detailed report on the error. See the troubleshooting section if needed.

You can check the logs of the different components using the appropriate scripts/show_logs_[component].sh scripts after you execute each step.

Device bootstrapping

This step configures some basic entities (Context and Topology), the devices, and the links in the topology. The expected results are:

  • The devices to be added into the Topology.
  • The devices to be pre-configured and initialized as ENABLED by the Automation component.
  • The links to be added to the topology.

To run this step, you can do it from the WebUI by uploading the file ./src/tests/ecoc22/tests/descriptors_emulated.json that contains the descriptors of the contexts, topologies, devices, and links, or by executing the ./src/tests/ecoc22/run_test_01_bootstrap.sh script.

In the WebUI, select the admin Context. Then, in the Devices tab you should see that 5 different emulated devices have been created and activated: 4 packet routers, and 1 optical Open Line System (OLS) controller. Besides, in the Services tab you should see that there is no service created.

L2VPN Slice and Services creation

This step configures a new service emulating the request an OSM WIM would make by means of a Mock OSM instance.

To run this step, execute the ./src/tests/ecoc22/run_test_02_create_service.sh script.

When the script finishes, check the WebUI Slices and Services tab. You should see that, for the connectivity service requested by MockOSM, one slice has been created, three services have been created (two for the optical layer and another for the packet layer). Note that the two services for the optical layer correspond to the primary (service_uuid ending with ":0") and the backup (service_uuid ending with ":1") services. Each of the services indicates the connections and sub-services that are supporting them. Besides, you can check the Devices tab to see the configuration rules that have been configured in each device.

L2VPN Slice and Services removal

This step deconfigures the previously created slices and services emulating the request an OSM WIM would make by means of a Mock OSM instance.

To run this step, execute the ./src/tests/ecoc22/run_test_03_delete_service.sh script, or delete the slice from the WebUI.

When the script finishes, check the WebUI Slices and Services tab. You should see that the slice and the services have been removed. Besides, in the Devices tab you can see that the appropriate configuration rules have been deconfigured.

Cleanup

This last step performs a cleanup of the scenario removing all the TeraFlowSDN entities for completeness.

To run this step, execute the ./src/tests/ecoc22/run_test_04_cleanup.sh script.

When the script finishes, check the WebUI Devices tab, you should see that the devices have been removed. Besides, in the Slices and Services tab you can see that the admin Context has no services given that that context has been removed.

3.3. OECC-PSC'22 Demo (Work In Progress)

Page under construction.

The main features demonstrated are:

  • Interdomain Slices

3.4. NFV-SDN'22 Demo (Work In Progress)

Page under construction.

The main features demonstrated are:

  • DLT-based context sharing
  • DLT-based Interdomain Slices with SLAs