July 19, 2004Joint Techs – Columbus, OH Network Performance Advisor Tanya M. Brethour NLANR/DAST

July 19, 2004Joint Techs – Columbus, OH Measures, displays, and analyzes network metrics Uses existing diagnostic tools: –ping, traceroute, Iperf, and Web100 –integrates them into a common framework Attempts to emulate a junior-level network engineer: –Allows users to troubleshoot their own networking problems –Advises users on course of action, including “do nothing—your network performance is as good as possible” Additional tools and analyses are simple to add Network Performance Advisor

July 19, 2004Joint Techs – Columbus, OH Performance Data Collector (PDC) Gathers network performance data Performance Data Historical Archiver (PDHA) Archives network performance data Analysis Engine Analyzes network data Provide plain text advice to solve problems or increase performance GUI Expert Interface: table & tree of metrics Map Interface: graphical display of network Analysis Interface: interact with Analysis Engine All components written in Java and use XML-RPC Overview

July 19, 2004Joint Techs – Columbus, OH Designed to be stand-alone, extensible, and portable Elegantly handles platform differences and unavailability of any given measurement Overview of Features in Alpha 1.0 Release: –Uses bundles to facilitate integration of performance data measurement tools A collection of scripts or Java classes that describe: –How to invoke a measurement tool –What metrics the measurement tool measures –How to parse the measurement tool's output –Implements an XML-RPC interface getAllMetrics: returns the list of metrics that may be measured getMeasurement, getMeasurements, getAllMeasurements: returns an individual, a list, or all measurements given a remote host Performance Data Collector

July 19, 2004Joint Techs – Columbus, OH Overview of Features in Alpha 1.0 Release: –All requests are fulfilled immediately without any caching –Activation Allows cooperation of both ends through a mechanism called activation (i.e. for tools such as Iperf) –Security Using SSL and username/password (more to come) –Autoupdating Periodically updates the bundles (automatically) User can set how often to check for updates All system bundles updated Tool to update bundles on demand PDC Features

July 19, 2004Joint Techs – Columbus, OH Alpha 1.1 Release Features (July 2004) –NMWG Response Schema Full Java class support for reading and writing in the schema –Bundle support for NMWG Response Schema –Several bug fixes Future development of PDC –Using the request and discovery schemas –Report cost of metrics –Adding bundles –Investigate moving from RPC/literal to fully document/literal PDC Features

July 19, 2004Joint Techs – Columbus, OH Short to medium-term storage of PDC measurements Initial Release Features: –Act as a caching proxy for the PDC –Utilizes an XML-RPC interface to retrieve data Clients can retrieve old measurement results and the latest measurement results Clients can force PDHA to request new measurements from PDC –To retrieve archived measurements specify an interval: returns all measurements taken during the specified interval list of timestamps: returns all measurements that match a timestamp in the list, with some amount of error allowed. –Allow different performance measurements to have different "lifetimes“ –Stores data on disk in XML file Performance Data Historical Archiver

July 19, 2004Joint Techs – Columbus, OH PDHA Initial release September 2004 –Includes all features mentioned Future Development: –Allow customization of how often, and how much historical performance data is stored and ways to manage this data. –Allow the retrieval of historical data by date and time from third party databases

July 19, 2004Joint Techs – Columbus, OH Analyze the metrics for a specific end-to-end path and give advice to solve any performance or connectivity problems Features: –“Test Definition Files” (TDFs) similar to PDC’s ADFs Redesigned! TDFs consist of –detection Rules –synthetic metrics file –problem descriptions, and solutions Synthetic Metrics –binary Operations on metrics –may be written in any scripting language (and eventually Java) –Constructs decision trees to efficiently determine problems Analysis Engine

July 19, 2004Joint Techs – Columbus, OH Analysis Engine Current Status –Currently writing a set of Test Definition Files for initial release. Example TDFS include: Duplex mismatch, incorrect buffer sizes, incorrect settings, congestion, general connectivity issues. Initial public release September 2004 Future Development: –More TDFs (design of the TDFs will continue to evolve) –Sort trees by updated cost and probability –Relate TDFs to each other –Modify AE to use historical data –Engage the network engineering community to obtain more analysis test cases

July 19, 2004Joint Techs – Columbus, OH Three main graphical displays –Expert GUI: Displays all metrics uses a tree to organize metrics uses a table to display metrics and corresponding information –Analysis GUI: Displays advice reported from the analysis engine simple text display –Map GUI: Visually display of the network and trouble spots users will be able to click on the map to view measurements for specific areas along the path Advisor GUI

July 19, 2004Joint Techs – Columbus, OH Advisor GUI Current Status: –Expert GUI alpha version complete and released Has been updated for display NMWG schema additional information. –Simple Analysis Engine GUI completed (will be revised for September release) –No development work on Map GUI at this time.

July 19, 2004Joint Techs – Columbus, OH Releases Summary of release schedule –July 2004: Alpha 1.1 release Includes NMWG response schema and other changes –September 2004: Alpha 1.2 release Focus on fixes to the AE and PDHA since their initial release Additional tests added to the Analysis Engine

July 19, 2004Joint Techs – Columbus, OH Join us! We need your help! –Join our mailing list (advisor-users) –Download the 1.1 release at the end of the month or the 1.2 release at the end of August. –Write bundles for your favorite network diagnostic tools –Submit bug reports –Write TDFs and stress our new design –Tell us what we are doing right or wrong!