LWN: Comments on "The rise of Linux-based networking hardware"

The rise of Linux-based networking hardware

jebba — Wed, 26 Apr 2017 00:34:58 +0000

Broadcom's drivers aren't even Open Source Software, let alone Open Source Hardware, unfortunately:

https://github.com/Broadcom-Switch/OpenNSL/blob/master/Le...

The rise of Linux-based networking hardware

cry_regarder — Thu, 20 Apr 2017 14:49:25 +0000

TOR switches aren't all so boring anymore. Check out:
https://engineering.linkedin.com/blog/2016/02/falco-decou...

The rise of Linux-based networking hardware

ThomasBellman — Thu, 20 Apr 2017 11:33:20 +0000

Juniper also runs Linux on some of their switches and routers. But they mostly use that as a virtualization platform, and run FreeBSD inside a KVM guest, and inside that FreeBSD VM, they run their own proprietary routing and switching daemons and configuration CLI. And of course, all the actual packet forwarding (both at layer 2 and layer 3) is performed by proprietary ASICs (e.g. their own Trio chip in MX routers, Broadcom Trident II and Tomahawk on QFX5100 and QFX5200 switches). The stuff inside the FreeBSD machine only handles packets directed to the router/switch itself.

Those Broadcom chips are also what is used in the Facebook Open Compute switches, including that Backpack switch referenced in the main article. Calling those switches "open source hardware" is stretching things a bit, imho, since all the interresting stuff is in those chips, and most information about them are covered by NDAs. I have gotten the impression that even the large switch vendors are only given a library in binary form for configuring the chip, not specifications for the protocol actually used to communicate with the chip.

The rise of Linux-based networking hardware

GhePeU — Thu, 20 Apr 2017 09:00:37 +0000

I'm surely going to read more about all the frameworks mentioned, but I mostly wanted to say how much I liked the whole series. I've worked in system administration and networking for almost a decade too and in recent years I've been spending most of my time on the networking side so reading more about new Linux developments in this sector was very interesting. Thank you very much for this.

The rise of Linux-based networking hardware

SEJeff — Wed, 19 Apr 2017 21:06:40 +0000

Turns out they did a great writeup on it that would alone be worthy of a LWN article: https://eos.arista.com/linux-as-a-switch-operating-system...

The rise of Linux-based networking hardware

SEJeff — Wed, 19 Apr 2017 21:05:21 +0000

Arista switches run a modified (custom kernel and ultra minimal operating system) based on Fedora Linux the last time I ripped apart the root filesystem of one (~6 years ago) with dual socket AMD Athlons. All of the real userspace stuff is python and the actual magic of Arista switches is 100% in asics.

Note that these are fairly high end low latency 10G switches, not your normal boring TOR switch.