Topology Address Pools
Lab topology transformation code assigns IPv4 and IPv6 subnets (prefixes) to individual links and loopback interfaces from address pools. Node addresses are then assigned from the prefixes assigned to individual links. Instead of address pools, you can define individual named prefixes in the prefix topology dictionary, and use the prefix names to number links and VLANs
Tip
You can assign a static prefix to a link with a prefix link attribute and a static IP address to an interface with an ipv4 or ipv6 attribute of node-on-link data. For more details, see static link addressing.
netlab use multiple predefined address pools:
mgmt pool: Management IPv4 and MAC addresses. IPv6 addresses are assigned if specified, but not used at the moment.
loopback pool: Loopback IPv4 and IPv6 addresses.
lan pool: IPv4 and IPv6 addresses used all links apart from P2P links (links with more or less than two nodes attached to them), or links with type set to lan.
p2p pool: IPv4 and IPv6 addresses used on point-to-point links
router_id pool is used to allocate BGP router IDs in IPv6-only networks.
l2only pool has no IPv4 or IPv6 addresses. You can use it to create L2-only links. See layer-2-only pools and Using l2only Address Pool for details.
vrf_loopback pool: IPv4 and IPv6 prefixes used on optional VRF loopback interfaces.
You can specify additional address pools, and use them with the pool link attribute.
Default IPv4 address pools are defined in system settings:
addressing:
loopback:
ipv4: 10.0.0.0/24
router_id:
ipv4: 10.0.0.0/24
prefix: 32
lan:
ipv4: 172.16.0.0/16
p2p:
ipv4: 10.1.0.0/16
mgmt:
ipv4: 192.168.121.0/24
start: 100
mac: 08-4F-A9-00-00-00
l2only:
vrf_loopback:
ipv4: 10.2.0.0/24
prefix: 32
You can override or augment them in topology addressing element. You can also override individual defaults.addressing components.
Dual-Stack Support
Every address pool could have an IPv4 and an IPv6 prefix, supporting IPv4-only, dual-stack or IPv6-only deployments. Pool address space is specified in ipv4 or ipv6 CIDR prefix. Size of individual IPv4 address allocations is specified with the prefix parameter. netlab uses /64 IPv6 prefixes unless you change the prefix size with prefix6 attribute.
Specifying Address Pools
Address pools could be specified:
In addressing or defaults.addressing part of topology YAML file
In addressing part of local or global defaults file.
Tip
Local (or user) defaults file can be overwritten with
--defaultsoption of netlab create or netlab up command.Global defaults file is
topology-defaults.ymlincluded in netlab package.
Each address pool specification is a dictionary of address pools. Individual address pools are specified with these parameters:
ipv4 – IPv4 CIDR prefix or true for unnumbered IPv4 links
ipv6 – IPv6 CIDR prefix or true for LLA-only IPv6 links.
unnumbered – unnumbered address pool. Interfaces attached to nodes based on this address pool will have IPv4 and/or IPv6 enabled based on the protocols enabled on node’s loopback interface.
prefix – IPv4 subnet allocation size.
prefix6 – Optional IPv6 subnet allocation size. netlab creates /64 IPv6 subnets when the prefix6 address pool parameter is not specified.
start – first subnet or first IP address offset. Used primarily with loopback pools to ensure the first address assignment gets the x.x.x.1/32 IP address, and with mgmt pool to specify the first management IP address.
allocation – address allocation policy (
id_based,sequential,p2porloopback).
Notes:
Default IPv4 subnet allocation size is 32 for
loopbackpool, 24 forlanpool and 30 forp2ppool. All other pools must specify the prefix parameter whenever the ipv4 parameter is specified.Default IPv6 subnet allocation is /64. You can change this behavior with the prefix6 pool parameter.
IPv4 loopback pool starts at .1 (start parameter is assumed to be 1)
IPv6 loopback pool starts at the second subnet to make loopback IPv6 address similar to its IPv4 counterpart.
Address Pool Configuration Example
This is the default addressing configuration from global topology-defaults.yml:
addressing:
loopback:
ipv4: 10.0.0.0/24
lan:
ipv4: 172.16.0.0/16
p2p:
ipv4: 10.1.0.0/16
mgmt:
ipv4: 192.168.121.0/24
start: 100
mac: 08-4F-A9-00-00-00
It specifies IPv4-only addressing scheme
Loopback IP addresses are assigned from 10.0.0.0/24 CIDR block. The first assigned address is 10.0.0.1/32 (see notes above for details).
LAN IP addresses are assigned from 172.16.0.0/16 CIDR block. Subnet prefix is /24 (see notes above for details).
P2P IP addresses are /30 subnets from 10.1.0.0/16 CIDR block.
Management IP addresses are assigned from 192.168.121.0/24 CIDR block. The first IP address is 192.168.121.101 (start offset plus node ID)
MAC addresses of management interfaces start with 08-4F-A9. The last byte of the MAC address is the node ID.
Unnumbered Interface Support
netlab supports unnumbered IPv4 and IPv6 interfaces:
Unnumbered IPv4 interfaces are not supported on all platforms and use loopback address as the proxy address of the unnumbered interface.
Unnumbered IPv6 interfaces use only LLA IPv6 address – IPv6 is enabled on an interface, but no static IPv6 address is assigned to it.
You can create unnumbered interfaces in two ways:
Create a custom pool with no ipv4 or ipv6 attribute and set unnumbered attribute true. Interfaces using this address pool will get IPv4 and/or IPv6 enabled based on protocols enabled on the loopback interface.
Use ipv4: true or ipv6: true instead of specifying an IPv4 or IPv6 prefix for the address pool. See Specifying Address Pools section for details.
For more details, see Unnumbered Interface Example below.
Layer-2-only Pools
An address pool with no attributes is a layer-2-only pool. Links using such a pool have no IPv4/IPv6 prefix, and interfaces attached to such links get no IPv4/IPv6 address assigned from the on-link prefix.
netlab has predefined l2only pool that you can use to create layer-2-only links, for example:
# CLNS lab
#
nodes: [ r1, r2, r3 ]
links:
- r1:
r2:
r3:
pool: l2only
Merging Defaults
Numerous default address pool configurations are merged during the topology processing:
Local defaults and global defaults are deep-merged with defaults dictionary in topology file
defaults.addressing topology section is deep-merged with addressing topology section
Legacy parameters (release 0.1 syntax) from the defaults topology section are deep-merged with the addressing section (making them least-preferred).
For more information on deep merging, please read the topology defaults document.
Example
The following address configuration in lab topology file…
addressing:
loopback:
ipv6: 2001:db8:0::/48
lan:
ipv4: 10.2.0.0/16
ipv6: 2001:db8:1::/48
prefix: 26
… results in the following address pools when combined with the global defaults (see above):
lan:
ipv4: 10.2.0.0/16
ipv6: 2001:db8:1::/48
prefix: 26
loopback:
ipv4: 10.0.0.0/24
ipv6: 2001:db8:0::/48
prefix: 32
mgmt:
ipv4: 192.168.121.0/24
mac: 08-4F-A9-00-00-00
start: 100
p2p:
ipv4: 10.1.0.0/16
prefix: 30
Unnumbered Interface Example
The following topology file creates a LAN and an unnumbered P2P link between a pair of Cisco CSR1000v routers:
addressing:
core:
unnumbered: true
defaults:
device: csr
nodes:
- r1
- r2
links:
- name: Unnumbered link between R1 and R2
r1:
r2:
pool: core
- name: LAN link between R1 and R2
r1:
r2:
type: lan
The topology results in the following Ansible inventory data for R1 (please note ipv4: true attribute and lack of IPv4/IPv6 addresses on the first link).
---
af:
ipv4: true
box: cisco/csr1000v
device: csr
id: 1
interfaces:
- ifindex: 2
ifname: GigabitEthernet2
ipv4: true
linkindex: 1
name: Unnumbered link between R1 and R2
neighbors:
- ifname: GigabitEthernet2
ipv4: true
node: r2
pool: core
type: p2p
- bridge: X_2
ifindex: 3
ifname: GigabitEthernet3
ipv4: 172.16.0.1/24
linkindex: 2
name: LAN link between R1 and R2
neighbors:
- ifname: GigabitEthernet3
ipv4: 172.16.0.2/24
node: r2
type: lan
loopback:
ipv4: 10.0.0.1/32
mgmt:
ifname: GigabitEthernet1
ipv4: 192.168.121.101
mac: 08-4F-A9-00-00-01
name: r1