As your networks grow, you’ll want ways to segregate and manage them. Cisco routers are staples for this purpose, but Linux, together with GNU Zebra, can make a good substitute. Here’s how to get up and running with Zebra.
Last month’s feature, “Strategies for Managing Growing Networks,” presented the general principles of dynamic routing, described internal and external routing protocols such as OSPF, RIP, and BGP, and explained how dynamic routing can be used build extensible and flexible networks that respond quickly and automatically to changes in network topology and traffic. Of course, protocols are useless without hardware and software to animate them. Routers from Cisco, Juniper, and other vendors can fit the bill. But there is an alternative to commercial products. Enter PC hardware, the Linux operating system, and GNU Zebra, an open source project that turns a run-of-the-mill Linux machine into a capable — and interoperable — network router. This month, let’s run with the Zebra — and give Cisco a run for its money.
The Black and White on Zebra
GNU Zebra (http://www.zebra.org) is TCP/IP routing software that supports an extensive list of routing protocols, including BGP-4, BGP-4+, OSPFv2, OSPFv3, RIPv1, RIPv2, and RIPng. Distributed under the GNU General Public License (GPL), Zebra runs on Linux as well as other Unix variants. Zebra takes a modular approach to the protocols that it manages. Protocols can be enabled or disabled as network requirements dictate. Accordingly, Zebra is made of several components. The main application, zebra, interacts with the Linux kernel routing table and acts as a routing manager, controlling the other protocol components. Each protocol is implemented via individual routing engines, bgpd, ospf6d, ospfd, ripd, and ripngd.
Zebra’s modular structure…
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