PROTOCOLS
IxNetwork emulates a wide variety of protocols using Ixia's CPU-based test port. Each test port supports an independent multi-core CPU running protocol emulations under a Linux operating system. Using the IxNetwork test application, each Ixia test port is capable of emulating thousands of routers or bridges with millions of reachable networks and hosts. Users can easily scale the size of emulated topologies by adding additional test ports. Combined with line-rate traffic generation and QoS measurement capabilities, the CPU-based load modules verify advertised topologies and networks for reachability and QoS performance.
| TECHNOLOGY |
PROTOCOL |
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Routing and Switching
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BGP-4, BGP+, OSPFv2/v3, ISISv4/v6, EIGRP, EIGRPv6, RIP, RIPng, BFD, IGMPv1/v2/v3, MLDv1/v2, PIM-SM/SSM, PIM-BSR, STP/RSTP, MSTP, PVST+/RPVST+, Link Aggregation (LACP), LLDP
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Software Defined Network
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VXLAN, EVPN VXLAN, OpenFlow, ISIS Segment Routing, OSPF Segment Routing, BGP Segment Routing, BGP Link State (BGP-LS), PCEP, OVSDB, GENEVE
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MPLS
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RSVP-TE, RSVP-TE P2MP, LDP/LDPv6, mLDP, PWE, VPLS-LDP, VPLS-BGP, BGP auto-discovery with LDP FEC 129 support, L3 MPLS VPN/6VPE, 6PE, BGP RT-Constraint, BGP Labeled Unicast, L3 Inter-AS VPN Options (A, B, C), MPLS-TP, MPLS OAM, Multicast VPN (GRE, mLDP, RSVP-TE P2MP), EVPN, PBB-EVPN
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Broadband and Authentication
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PPPoX, DHCPv4, DHCPv6, L2TPv2, Radius attributes for L2TP, ANCP, IPv6 Autoconfiguration (SLAAC), IGMPv1/v2/v3, MLDv1/v2, IPTV, AMT, 802.1x, WebAuth, Cisco NAC
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Industrial Ethernet
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Link OAM IEEE 802.3ah, CFM IEEE 802.1ag, Service OAM ITUT-Y.1731, PBT/PBB-TE, Sync-E ESMC, PTP IEEE 1588 with G.8265.1 Telecom Profile, ELMI, SRP IEEE 802.1 Qat, gPTP IEEE 802.1as, Layer 2 AVB Transport Protocols IEEE 1722
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Data Center Ethernet
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FCoE/FIP, Priority Flow Control IEEE 802.1Qbb (PFC), LLDP/DCBX, VNTAG/VIC, TRILL, TRILL OAM, SPBM, Cisco FabricPath, VEPA
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TRAFFIC
IxNetwork supports hardware-based traffic generation and measurement that can ensure highest precision and performance. The sophisticated traffic generator is also tightly integrated with the control-plane protocols.
| TRAFFIC GENERATOR |
SPECIFICATION |
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Configuration
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Advanced Traffic Wizard – steps by steps wizard assisted traffic configuration
Quick FlowGroup – granular control of packet sequence and variations
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Scale
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- Generate up to 4 million trackable flows
- Configure up to 16,000 unique Flow Groups – each supporting a unique transmit profile
- Up to 4,096 hardware streams per-port
- Learn and bind up to 4 million MPLS labels
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| TRAFFIC GENERATOR |
SPECIFICATION |
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Dynamic Controls
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- Change frame rate and frame size on the fly
- Change pre-defined packet header field on the fly
- Update MPLS and PPP traffic dynamically, without having to stop and restart traffic
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Traffic Types
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IPv4, IPv6, MPLS multi-labels, Ethernet, VLAN, provider bridges (Q-in-Q), provider backbone bridges (MAC-in-MAC), frame relay, ATM, PPP, HDLC, L2 MPLS VPN (including FR and ATM to Ethernet PWE3 Internetworking), L3 MPLS VPN, VPLS, 6PE, 6VPE, multicast, multicast VPN
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Source/Dest Ports Mapping
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One–to-one, many-to-many, fully meshed
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Routes Mapping between Peer Ports
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One-to-one, fully meshed
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Flow Grouping
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Build flow groups based on packet content (e.g., QoS or VLAN ID)
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Traffic Profile
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Frame size: Fixed, increment, random, IMIX, custom IMIX, Quad Gaussian distribution, auto
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Rate: Percent line rate, packets/sec, L2 bit rate (bps, Bps, KBps, MBps)
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Payload pattern: Increment byte/word, decrement byte/word, random, custom
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QoS: TOS, DSCP, IPv6 traffic classes, 802.1p, MPLS EXP
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Dynamic: Traffic supports gratuitous ARP - auto Re-ARP on cable re-connect
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Dynamic Fields
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Pre-defined packet header field, MPLS, and PPP - update corresponding traffic packets on the fly when control plane information changes
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Packet Error Injection
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Bad CRC, No CRC
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Per-Flow Traffic Tracking
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Single or multi-field tracking of any field including: QoS (TOS/DSCP), VLAN, source MAC address, destination MAC address, source IP address, destination IP address, MPLS label, MPLS flow descriptor, streams, Src/Dst IP pair, Src/Dst MAC pair, custom packet tracking
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Real-Time Flow Filtering and Flow Detective
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Real-time filtering of flows based on tracking settings with user defined criteria. Single out best/worst performing flows based on Rx count, min/max/average latency, timestamp, real-time packet loss using sequence, identify dead flows
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| TRAFFIC GENERATOR |
SPECIFICATION |
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Packet Editor
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Edit packet header fields and payload
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Header field value editing: Increment, decrement, list, user defined, default, link/unlink with other header fields
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Add tracking: Track user defined traffic flows
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Payload editing: Increment byte/word, decrement byte/word, repeat, fixed, user defined
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Custom editing: Add or insert additional layers of protocols
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| MEASUREMENT |
SPECIFICATION |
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Loss
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Track Tx frames, Rx expected frames, Rx frames, Rx bytes frame delta loss %
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Rate
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Tx frame rate, Rx frame rate, Rx rate (bps, Bps, Kbps, Mbps)
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Latency
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Store and forward, cut-through, MEF frame delay, forwarding delay
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Delay Variation (Jitter)
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Delay variation measurement (jitter) minimum, average, maximum
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Inter-Arrival Time
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Inter-arrival minimum, average, maximum
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Sequence
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Small error, big error, reverse error, last sequence number, duplicate frames, sequence gaps
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Time Stamps
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First and last timestamp per flow
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TrueView™ Convergence
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Control plane and data plane integrated time stamping for calculating convergence measurements
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Packet Loss Duration
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Estimated time without received packets calculated by frames delta at the expected Rx rate
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Misdirected Packets
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Per-port based count of packets not expected on a Rx port
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Late Packets
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Per-flow count of packets that arrived late; user-defined threshold for late packets
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Re-Ordered Packets
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Per-flow count of packets that were received out of order
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Duplicate Packets
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Per-flow count of duplicate packets that were received
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In-Order Packets
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Per-flow count of packets that were received in order
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Test Results—Statistics viewer
The IxNetwork statistics viewer is a powerful tool for viewing and analyzing real-time results and generating test reports.
- Aggregate statistics are displayed hierarchically, with the ability to drill-down to group-level and flow-level statistics.
- Different modes to view traffic statistics – Instantaneous, Cumulative, or both
- CSV files can be used to capture a single results view or, at the global level, to capture all results in real-time. An integrated CSV viewer is provided to view large-result files.
Statistics Viewer
| FUNCTION |
STATISTICS |
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Global Protocol
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Port-level protocol counters |
| Port |
Port mode, speed, frame and data rate, OAM statistics, misdirected |
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Tx-Rx Frame Ratw
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Tx-Rx frame rate graph
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Port CPU
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Port CPU utilization and statistics
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| Data Plane Port |
Port-based frame counts and rate excluding control-plane traffic |
| Traffic Item |
Statistics provide an aggregate of all the flows in the traffic item |
| User Defined |
User-defined view is used for drill-down to user-defined tracking options |
| Flow Statistics |
Flow-level measurements |
| Flow Detective |
Filtering and sorting based results |
Resource Manager
Often expertise for different protocols lies within different members of a testing team. A common pain-point for our customers was the lack of a collaboration tool to aid them in incrementally building configurations. With the Resource Manager, users can now piece-meal their configurations together. The Resource Manager allows users to save different pieces of their configurations, like protocols and traffic elements, and then build a configuration by re-using saved elements in their current configuration.
Resource Manager
It also allows users to clearly see changes made to their resources/configurations by using a “diff” functionality within the application. Using the Resource Manager is a powerful way to collaborate and quickly build expertise with a team.
Reports
Building a test-results report requires test data. IxReporter introduces a new database, referred to in the application as an “object model.” The object model is populated by a testing application (like IxNetwork) with the test configuration parameters and the test results. All of these “objects” can be included in a report, usually in a table or chart. With this powerful concept, tables and charts can be created which combine statistics and configuration information as well as have multiple protocols.
Automation
IxNetwork provides powerful GUI-based automation with Test Composer and QuickTest. It also has a robust feature set for GUI-to-script and API-based automation. IxNetwork’s automation is simplicity at its best. Test scenarios are set up using IxNetwork’s step-by-step GUI, and then a single button-press generates a TCL test script. Scripts may be modified and combined in any fashion. When the script is run, the IxNetwork GUI watches the execution – providing real-time statistics and state information.
| Types |
Test Requirement |
Detail |
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QuickTest
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Scalability
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- Standards-based IETF RFC test methodologies, as well as a custom mode for user-defined performance tests
- Easy-to-use, configurable, pre-packaged tests
- Generate detailed reports of results
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Macro Recorder
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Functionality
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- “Click-thru automation” means no more scripting
- Rapid capture of manual test cases
- Capture steps that cause a failure for reproducibility
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Test Composer and Tweakables
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Regression
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- GUI-based solution to automate test actions
- Detailed control over test execution without Tcl expertise
- Complete access to the Tcl API with easy UI
- Edit “Macro Recorded” steps for customization of GUI captured events
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ScriptGen
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Regression
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- Provides an easy, one-click GUI-to-script generation
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| Low-Level and High-level APIs |
Functionality and regression |
- For Tcl scripting experts
- One-click GUI to Tcl script conversion available (Scriptgen)
- Complete access to and control over test configuration
- Tcl, Perl, Python, Ruby, REST API
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QuickTest end-to-end wizards
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QUICKTEST
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TESTS
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RFC 2544 Tests
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Throughput and latency, frame loss, back-to-back
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RFC 2889 Tests
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Address Cache, Address Rate, Broadcast Rate, Congestion Control, Frame Error Filtering, Fully Meshed, Many to One, One to Many, Partially Meshed
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RFC 3918 Tests
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Aggregated Multicast Throughput, Burdened Group Join Delay, Burdened Multicast Latency, Forwarding Latency, Group Join/Leave delay, Mixed Class throughput, Multicast Group Capacity, Multicast Group Pattern Verification, Scaled Group Forwarding
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IEEE 1588v2 (PTP)
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Best Master Selection, Transparent Clock Correction Factor Error, Slave Scalability
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ITU-T Y.1564 Service Activation
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Service Configuration, Service Performance
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Asymmetric Data Performance
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Throughput/Latency, Frame Loss
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IPTV
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Channel Zapping
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Converged Data Center
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FCoE Max No Drop Throughput, FCoE Max No Pause Throughput, Cloud Performance
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Broadband Control Plane Tests
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Session setup rate and session capacity tests for PPP/L2TPv2, 802.1x, and NAC
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OpenFlow
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Failover Performance, L2 Address Learning, L3 Address Learning, Switch Flow Table Capacity
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Custom Tests
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Continuous run, fixed duration run, incremental, throughput (binary search)
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User-Defined Tests
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Tests defined in Test Composer
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Quicktest – web edition
With the release of Native IxOS chassis (XGS2/12 HSL with Linux OS), RFC 2544 QuickTest can be initiated with a web browser. The new HTML5 web-based GUI eliminates the need to install IxNetwork client on Windows. The result is an all-Linux test platform that consumes a smaller memory footprint, starts/loads faster, and executes quicker.
Built-In Data Capture and Analysis
Internet protocols are complex – multi-protocol emulations even more so. IxNetwork includes a built-in tool that captures control-plane traffic along with line-rate data-plane traffic, merging both into a single capture file. The optional Analyzer module is a sophisticated network analyzer, with the ability to display protocol ladder diagrams. IxNetwork allows you to trigger and filter control and data plane packet captures based on user-defined packet field.
Impairment
IxNetwork supports a list of ImpairNet® modules that emulate real-life network impairments. Testing a variety of applications that run over WAN networks, ImpairNet offers unparalleled scaling, ease-of-use, and measurement accuracy. Refer to Ixia web site for ImpairNet data sheet.
