Abilene Observatory

Chris RobbIndiana UniversityAPAN Engineering Workshop 2004

Slides prepared by Chris Small, IU Global NOC Software Engineer

Abilene ObservatoryThe Abilene Observatory is a program to support the

collection and dissemination of network data associated with the Abilene Network . It provides Network Engineers with an operational view of the network and also provides researchers a platform to conduct experiments and collect data from a High-Performance network

Abilene ObservatoryInternet2 Page:http://abilene.internet2.edu/observatory

Overview of the project Proposal Process Data Views

ComponentsThe Observatory consists of two components:

Data Collected by equipment run by the Abilene NOC (Network Management Machines)

Data collected by separate research on co-located equipment at the Abilene Router Nodes

How to get involved Retrieve Existing Data

Deploy a Co-Located project

Make a suggestion

Retrieve Existing DataThere is a large existing amount of data collected

under the Abilene Observatory program. Some of it is available publicly through some of the links listed in this presentation. However there is some data due to its size or format, such as a stream of NetFlow data, that can only be available upon request. To gain access to this data please contact abilene@internet.edu

Current Data and Tools Netflow Owamp (One-Way Latency) Iperf Traceroute SNMP Interface Statistics Internet2 Detective Multicast Beacon NTP Stratum 2 Server Ping/Traceroute V6 Destination

Deploy a Co-Located ProjectThe Abilene Observatory has reserved space for

researchers to deploy equipment in the Abilene Observatory Rack.

The first step in deploying a co-location project is to submit a proposal to abilene@internet2.edu

Co-Location ProposalThere is some information that we be needed for

all Co-location projects. The information includes:

Description of the Project including participants and duration

Space, Network Power Requirements System Information Security

Co-Located MachinesParticipation is open to all members (university,

corporate, or affiliates) of the Internet2 project and is based on competitive proposals

Proposal information at:http://abilene.internet2.edu/observatory/proposal-process.html

Co-Location Caveats Commodity Routes not available 48V DC Power 23” Racks Address Space Security “Lights Out” Remote Operation

Co-Location ExamplePlanetLab

PlanetLab is a global overlay network for developing and accessing new network services. Designed for short-term experiments and long-term services.

Currently deployed in All Abilene nodes with two machines in each node.

Make a suggestionWe are open to suggestions.

Feel free to suggest some tool or application to run to collect data.

Observatory RackIn each Abilene Router Node there is a one rack

dedicated to the Observatory project.The rack is dedicated for: Abilene NOC Administrated Network Management

Machines (NMS) Co-located Machines DC Power Controllers for Observatory machines

No Routing equipment is in the Observatory Rack

Observatory Rack (cont)Each Observatory Rack contains at least:

4 NMS Machines

One 8 Port DC Power Controler

Some Racks contain additional Co-Located machines

Rack Front View

Rack Rear View

NMS MachinesNMS Machine Specs 2x 1.26 Ghz Xeons FreeBSD (Linux as option) 1 GB Memory 2x18GB SCSI Disks GigE Fiber (NMS1 and 2) or FastE connected DC Powered

Advanced ServicesSince the NMS Machines are directly on the

Abilene Backbone there are many advantages to test “Advanced” Services

Native V6 Native V4 and V6 Multicast 1Gb ports (NMS1) directly connected to the

backbone 9000 MTU (NMS1)

Observatory Layout

NMS InfrastructureNMS Infrastructure Page:http://loadrunner.uits.iu.edu/~neteng/nms

Links to currently running services on each machine

Alerts related to NMS machines System Performance statistics Maps and Diagrams

MonitoringThe state of the NMS machines are closely

monitored.

Nagios/AlertMon monitor and display alerts if any machine or service is down

Ganglia Cluster Toolkit is used for system (load,mem,disk usage, etc..) monitoring

Data and Tools In-Depth Netflow Owamp (One-Way Latency) Iperf SNMP Interface Statistics Internet2 Detective Multicast Beacon NTP Stratum 2 Server Ping/Traceroute V6 Destination

NetFlowSampled (100:1) Netflow is sent from all Abilene

Routers to one of the local NMS machines. The flows are sent to researchers and also cashed locally and retrieved to a central storage using rsync.

The Netflow records are anatomized by masking the low-order 11 bits of the IP address. Unanatomized data is not stored.

Netflow ReportsThere are two widely available reports generated

from the raw data

The Internet2 Weekly Netflow Report: http://netflow.internet2.edu/weekly

The Nightly reports at ITEC-Ohio: http://www.itec.oar.net/abilene-netflow

Netflow Data Netflow Data is available ether as a direct feed from

the NMS Machines or as a download from the centralized storage area at the Ohio ITEC

Please contact abilene@internet2.edu to obtain more information if you want access to the raw data

NetFlow UsersSome of the users of Netflow data WAIL: The Wisconsin Advanced Internet

Laboratory Network Research Lab at Case Western Reserve Kent State University Computer Science Dept Boston University, Dept of Computer Science

and Department of Mathematics and Statistics MINDS Project, Univ. of Minnesota

OwampOne-Way Latency Measurements using a mesh of

nodes in each Abilene Router Node.

Owamp:http://owamp.internet2.edu

OwampOwamp tests one-way latency between all NMS4

machines using both IPv4 and IOv6. NMS4 are synchronized with Praecis Ct CDMA Clocks connected to each NMS4 machine.

Data is collected from each machine and processed in a centralized database.

IPerfIPerf is used to measure TCP and UDP performance

on the Abilene Backbone and to Connectors and Peers

Both Automated and Manual IPerf tests are run from the NMS1 machine. NMS1s have GigE Connections to the Backbone T640s and have a 9000 MTU

Scheduled tests will be run and collected. These will give a baseline on the performance of large data flows.

SNMP Interface StatisticsSNMP Collection is done in a distributed way on the

NMS machines. Data for local routers and switches are captured and copied back to a central repository.

The data collected is a Hi-Resolution (10 sec) capture of interface and environmental statistics

In addition a SNMP router proxy similar to the Abilene router proxy is in the works to allow access to query SNMP variables on the router

Internet2 DetectiveThe Internet2 Detective is an application that

provides information on the status and capabilities of a users current network connection.

It currently shows: Connectivity to a Internet 2 backbone network Estimate of available bandwidth Multicast connectivity

Internet 2 Detective ServerThe Internet2 Detective users the Observatory

framework.

A modified echo server and IPerf server is used to provide the connectivity and performance information to each client.

More information is available at:http://detective.internet2.edu

Multicast Beacon Mesh of all Abilene Router Nodes, running on

NMS2s Modified version of NLANR Multicast Beacon Saves data into RRD Database Graphs of Delay, Loss and Jitter statistics Multicast Group 233.1.2.3

Located at:http://loadrunner.uits.iu.edu/~neteng/nms/beacon

NTP ServiceThe NMS machines provide public NTP service to the

community2 Servers are available: ntp-e.abilene.ucaid.edu located in New York ntp-w.abilene.ucaid.edu located in Sunnyvale

These servers use a mesh of stratum 1 servers for their time. These are located on each of the NMS4 machines. The stratum 1 servers receive their time from CDMA reception

Stratum 1 service may be available for private peering

AcknowledgmentsThe applications and administration of the Abilene

Observatory is the work of a large group of people:

Jeff Boote, Eric Boyd , Prasad Calyam, Mark

Fullmer, Chris Heermann, Russ Hobby, John Moore, Bob Riddle, Dan Pritts, Stanislav Shalunov, Richard Summerhill, Matt Zekauskas and the entire Abilene NOC