Abilene Observatory Chris Robb Indiana University APAN Engineering Workshop 2004 Slides prepared by Chris Small, IU Global NOC Software Engineer

Abilene Observatory The 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 Observatory Internet2 Page:  Overview of the project  Proposal Process  Data Views

Components The 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 Data There 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

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 Project The 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

Co-Location Proposal There 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 Machines Participation is open to all members (university, corporate, or affiliates) of the Internet2 project and is based on competitive proposals Proposal information at: process.html

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

Co-Location Example PlanetLab 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 suggestion We are open to suggestions. Feel free to suggest some tool or application to run to collect data.

Observatory Rack In 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 Machines NMS 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 Services Since 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 Infrastructure NMS Infrastructure Page:  Links to currently running services on each machine  Alerts related to NMS machines  System Performance statistics  Maps and Diagrams

Monitoring The state of the NMS machines are closely monitored. Nagios/AlertMonNagios/AlertMon monitor and display alerts if any machine or service is down Ganglia Cluster Toolkit 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

NetFlow Sampled (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 Reports There are two widely available reports generated from the raw data  The Internet2 Weekly Netflow Report:  The Nightly reports at ITEC-Ohio:

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 to obtain more information if you want access to the raw data

NetFlow Users Some 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

Owamp One-Way Latency Measurements using a mesh of nodes in each Abilene Router Node. Owamp:

Owamp Owamp 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.

IPerf IPerf 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 Statistics SNMP 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 Detective The 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 Server The 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:

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  Located at:

NTP Service The NMS machines provide public NTP service to the community 2 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

Acknowledgments The applications and administration of the Abilene Observatory is the work of a large group of people: Jeff BooteJeff 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 NOCEric Boyd Prasad CalyamChris HeermannRuss HobbyBob RiddleDan PrittsStanislav ShalunovRichard SummerhillMatt ZekauskasAbilene NOC