Performance Update

Eric Boyd

Director of Performance Architecture

and Technologies

Internet2

Network support of Science

• Science is a global community• Networks links scientists• Collaborative research occurs across network

boundaries• For the scientist, the value of the network is the achieved network performance

• Scientists should not have to focus on the network; good end-to-end performance should be a given

Large Hadron Collider

• International Physics facility located in CERN Switzerland• Major US involvement

• 2 major US data repositories (PetaBytes/year)• 17 US Institutions provide data analysis and storage• 68 Universities and National Laboratories with scientists

looking at the data• Dedicated transatlantic networks connect US to CERN• Advanced network services required over existing campus,

connector/regional, and national networks

Achieving Good End-to-End Performance

• Internet2 consists of:• Campuses• Regional networks• Internet2 backbone network

• Our members care about connecting with:• Other members• Government labs & networks• International partners

• The Internet2 community cares about making all of this work

Identifying the Problem

Applications Developer

System Administrator

LAN Administrator

CampusNetworking

Gigapop Gigapop

Backbone

CampusNetworking

LAN Administrator

System Administrator

Applications Developer

How do you solvea problem along a path?

Hey, this is not working right!

The computerIs working OK

Talk to the other guys

Everything isAOK

No othercomplaints

The network is lightly loaded

All the lights are green

We don’t see anything wrong

Looks fine

Others are getting in ok

Not our problem

Status Quo

• Performance is excellent across backbone networks• Performance is a problem end-to-end• Problems are concentrated towards the edge and in

network transitions• We need to:

• Diagnose: Understand limits of performance• Address: Work with members and application

communities to address those performance issues

Vision: Performance Information is …

• Available• People can find it (Discovery)• “Community of trust” allows access across

administrative domain boundaries (AA)

• Ubiquitous• Widely deployed (Paths of interest covered)• Reliable (Consistently configured correctly)

• Valuable• Actionable (Analysis suggests course of action)• Automatable (Applications act on data)

e-VLBI Network

eVLBI Result

• Use of integrated network monitoring helped to enable identification of bottleneck (hardware fault)

• Automated monitoring allowed view of network throughput variation over time

• Highlights route changes, network outages• Automated monitoring also helps to highlight any

throughput issues at end points:• E.g. Network Interface Card failures, Untuned TCP

Stacks• Integrated monitoring provides overall view of network

behavior at a glance

Goal: No more mystery …

• Increase network awareness• Set user expectations accurately

• Reduce diagnostic costs• Performance problems noticed early • Performance problems addressed efficiently• Network engineers can see & act outside their turf

• Transform application design• Incorporate network intuition into application

behavior

Strategy: Build & Empower the Community

Decouple the Problem Space:• Analysis and Visualization• Performance Data Sharing• Performance Data

GenerationGrow the Footprint:

• Clean APIs and protocols between each layer

• Widespread deployment of measurement infrastructure

• Widespread deployment of common performance measurement tools

Analysis & Visualization

Measurement Infrastructure

Performance Tools Performance

Tools

Analysis & Visualization

Measurement Infrastructure

API

API

Tactics: Leverage position

• Internet2 is leveraged to help provide diagnostic information for “backbone” portion of problem

• Create *some* diagnostic tools• Make Abilene data as public as is reasonable• Work on efforts to more widely make performance data

available (perfSONAR)• Contribute to ‘base’ perfSONAR development• Integrate ‘our’ diagnostic tools as ‘good’ example of

perfSONAR services

From the scientist’s perspective

On behalf of the scientist, network engineer or application can easily/automatically:

• Discover additional monitoring resources• Authenticate locally• Authorized to use remote network resources to a

limited extent• Acquire performance monitoring data from remote

sites via standard protocol• Innovate where needed

• Customize the analysis and visualization

Internet2 End-to-End Performance Initiative (E2Epi)

• Includes:• Internet2 staff• Internet2 members• Federal partners• International partners

• Building:• Performance monitoring tools• Performance middleware frameworks• Performance improvement tools

Support for E2Epi

• Funded out of network revenues• Partnerships

• Leveraging GÉANT2, ESnet, and RNP resources through consortium leadership

• Grants• NSF Apps - Targeted Assistance and Instrumentation for Internet2

Applications• NSF SGER - Leveraging Internet2 Facilities for the Network

Research Community• NSF SGER2 - Network Measurement for International Connections• NSF BTG - Bridging the Gap: End-to-End Networking for Landmark

Applications• NLM Pilot - User Experience with the High Performance Internet

Infrastructure: Critical Incidents of Success and Failure• NLM NDT - Enhancing the Web 100-based Network Diagnostic Tool

Performance Tools

• Diagnosis• Throughput (BWCTL)• One-Way Delay (OWAMP)• Top 10 Problems in First Mile (NDT)

• Solutions• Alternate congestion control (VFER)• Partition the session (Phoebus)

Network Performance Toolkit (NPToolkit)

• Knoppix (v5.0) based Live-CD• Automatically starts 4 E2E performance tools

with usable default configurations• BWCTL• NDT• NPAD• OWAMP

• Easy customization scripts allows admin tailor system to site needs

Network Diagnostic Tool (NDT)

• New Simple Firewall Test added• Google Summer of Code project• Detects blocked ephemeral ports on server and

client• New IPv6 address support• General code cleanup• Virginia Tech contribution

• Client’s location can be plotted on map

OWAMP: One-Way Active Measurement Protocol

• What is it?• Measures one-way latency: 1-way ping• Control connection used to broker test

request based upon policy restrictions and available resources. (Bandwidth/disk limits)

• Specification• http://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc4656.txt

OWAMP Flow Diagram

Server

owpingclient

[Control]

owampd[Resource Broker]

owampd[Control]

OWD TestEndpoint

OWD TestEndpoint

Client

What’s New? (1)

• Protocol status: RFC 4656• IANA allocated port: 861• Authentication/Authorization changes

• Uses HMAC-SHA1 for message validation• Uses PBKDF2 for AES session key creation

• keys are now session specific and dynamically generated from passphrases.

What’s New? (2)

• Powstream is now a full supported application with documentation

• As always - more bug fixes and ports• Details in the distribution

Availability

• 3.0a release available• Source tarball

• Supported release out in the next month after more extensive testing on Abilene measurement hosts

• Supported releases will also be provided as RPM’s with many thanks to GA-TECH

Bulk Transport: Killer App

• Q: What do we need fat pipes for?• A: Bulk Transport

• Flavors:• Straightforward huge file transfer• Interactive high throughput• Instrument data transfer

• Poor Performance (~3 Mb/s performance where we should have ~60-100 Mb/s)

• #1 Reason for poor performance: Transport Protocols

VFER – Bulk Transport Tool

• Command-line remote copy tool• SCP-style interface

• Easy to use on today’s advanced networks• Download, make, install

• Portable (no kernel mods)

• Out-of-the-box performance

• Tolerate minor non-congestive packet loss

• Both static file transfer and interactive applications

• Runs over UDP

• TCP-friendly

VFER – Current Status

• Alpha release v0.98 (http://vfer.internet2.edu)

• Working, not polished, delay-based congestion control

• SSH-based security

Network Performance Measurement Workshops

• Example Course Materials:• http://e2epi.internet2.edu/npw/presentations.html

Goals:• Grow installed base of BWCTL/Iperf, OWAMP, and NDT at

GigaPoP and regional campuses.• http://e2epi.internet2.edu/pipes/pmp/pmp-dir.html

• Begin integration into IT support processes.• Create an installed base for perfSONAR deployment.• Teach Internet2 community to use performance tools.

Bridging the Gap

• Multi-discipline team addressing 2 major issues• Reset user expectations

• 10 Mbytes per second is ‘acceptable’• Problem resolution takes too long

• Better tools and self-guided documentation to improve troubleshooting

• Documentation that can be used by both novice and expert

Getting There: Build & Empower the Community

Decouple the Problem Space:• Analysis and Visualization• Performance Data Sharing• Performance Data

GenerationGrow the Footprint:

• Clean APIs and protocols between each layer

• Widespread deployment of measurement infrastructure

• Widespread deployment of common performance measurement tools

Analysis & Visualization

Measurement Infrastructure

Performance Tools Performance

Tools

Analysis & Visualization

Measurement Infrastructure

API

API

What is perfSONAR?

• Performance Middleware• perfSONAR is an international consortium in

which Internet2 is a founder and leading participant

• perfSONAR is a set of protocol standards for interoperability between measurement and monitoring systems

• perfSONAR is a set of open source web services that can be mixed-and-matched and extended to create a performance monitoring framework

perfSONAR Design Goals

• Standards-based• Modular• Decentralized• Locally controlled• Open Source• Extensible• Applicable to multiple generations of network

monitoring systems• Grows “beyond our control”• Customized for individual science disciplines

perfSONAR Integrates

• Network measurement tools• Network measurement archives• Discovery• Authentication and authorization• Data manipulation• Resource protection• Topology

perfSONAR Credits•perfSONAR is a joint effort:

• ESnet• GÉANT2 JRA1• Internet2• RNP

•ESnet includes:• ESnet/LBL staff• Fermilab

•Internet2 includes:• University of Delaware• Georgia Tech• SLAC• Internet2 staff

•GÉANT2 JRA1 includes:• Arnes• Belnet• Carnet• Cesnet• CYNet• DANTE• DFN• FCCN• GRNet• GARR• ISTF• PSNC• Nordunet (Uninett)• Renater• RedIRIS• Surfnet• SWITCH

perfSONAR Adoption

•R&E Networks• Internet2• ESnet• GÉANT2• European NRENs• RNP

•Application Communities• LHC• GLORIAD Distributed

Virtual NOC• Roll-out to other

application communities in 2007

•Distributed Development• Individual projects (10

before first release) write components that integrate into the overall framework

• Individual communities (5 before first release) write their own analysis and visualization software

More Information

• Eric Boyd• eboyd@internet2.edu• 734-352-7032

• http://e2epi.internet2.edu/• http://www.perfsonar.net/