[ixpmanager] Informational community on route server for physical port location

[André Grüneberg]

Hi Barry,

On Tue, 30 Oct 2018 at 21:24, Barry O'Donovan <barry.odonovan at inex.ie>
wrote:

> Hi André,
>
> > We are currently considering how to best generate our RSs configuration
> > using IXPManager.
>
> There's documentation for this at:
> https://docs.ixpmanager.org/features/route-servers/


I know. Unfortunately the document doesn't tell me what kind of information
I may expect to be available in the template generation. Luckily one can
reverse engineer the code.


> > We would like to add some informational communities
> > that indicate the physical location of a port. I.e. we would need the
> > switch name the physical port is connected to.
> I have to confess, I'm struggling to see the value in this. What are the
> use cases that people would use to filter in this information?
>

Hard value: For two peers with multiple connections it might be valuable to
direct traffic to a topologically closer port (VIX is even basing its port
prices on this, see https://www.vix.at/vix_bgp.html?&L=1).
Softer values: So far we provide site information in our route servers AND
other IXPs (e.g. VIX, DE-CIX) are doing the same.
Soft value: For a more complex IXP it's valuable information in the looking
glass.
Far thinking: I'd like to have as much structured information as possbile
available in the template process (or an alternative API) -- to facilitate
the integration of systems that are not yet foreseen by the developer. E.g.
I am evaluating to generate the ARouteServer config using IXPM templates,
because I see some features that I am missing from IXPM RS templates.

BTW: Are there plans to support dual-stack route servers in the templating
mechanism? Bird 2.0 is a move in that direction, OpenBGPD is dual-stack
practically forever, not to mention GoBGP. (I know I can generate two
pieces of config and glue them together)

BR,
André

PS: I won't be at EuroIX myself, but my colleagues might do the proxy work.
;)

-- 
André Grüneberg, CTO
andre.grueneberg at bcix.de

Tel: +49 30 209663993

BCIX e.V.
Stromstrasse 5
10555 Berlin - Germany
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