Spine and Leaf Practical Applications, eBGP
Tags: bgp, datacenternetworking, ebgp, routingswitching
Published: 2020-03-08 00:42:17

---
title: Spine and Leaf Practical Applications, eBGP
published: true
date: 2019-06-08 18:50:00 UTC
tags: BGP,Datacenter Networking,eBGP,Routing & Switching 
canonical_url: 
---

## Overview
First off, here's the reference diagram ([YAML](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ngschmidt/labfabric-diagram/master/ebgp-clos-fabric.yml)):  

[![](https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-7bOB2_FI1u8/XPviMfs2akI/AAAAAAAAAok/OhUid4BIueEqD4fsDWBtuDgbEizHsxujQCLcBGAs/s640/eBGP%2BClos%2BFabric%2B%25281%2529.png)](https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-7bOB2_FI1u8/XPviMfs2akI/AAAAAAAAAok/OhUid4BIueEqD4fsDWBtuDgbEizHsxujQCLcBGAs/s1600/eBGP%2BClos%2BFabric%2B%25281%2529.png)

### Assumptions about difficulty
Most people I've met outside of the carrier space are pretty intimidated by BGP, as it is truly impressive in scope. Here, we're going to break-out BGP usage into two categories:  
  
  

- iBGP: This is where all nodes have the same Autonomous system number. A great deal of complexity exists with this deployment model, because BGP's primary loop prevention mechanism is a string with all of the autonomous system numbers to that route, counting each entry as a "hop" as it were.
- eBGP: Every single device has its own ASN. Loops are easy to prevent by simply reading the AS-Path.

**eBGP is not very difficult to learn.**

  

This is worthwhile, because BGP has a pretty substantial strength within data center networks, and that is an emphasis on reliability.

  

I'm not going to be doing a deep-dive on BGP here - but can recommend some truly excellent resources on the subject:

- [BGP: Building Reliable Networks with the Border Gateway Protocol, by Iljitsch van Beijnum](http://shop.oreilly.com/product/9780596002541.do)
- Pretty much anything [written by Narbik Kocharians](http://www.ciscopress.com/authors/bio/2e519d25-8cf7-4653-a91e-ba968f25115c)

### How is BGP different from IGPs like OSPF, EIGRP?

First, we must examine some key differences between BGP and IGPs:

- IGPs are multicast-based, and dynamically generate peers. BGP is TCP-based and needs statically defined peers (note: you can define a [dynamic range](https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/td/docs/ios-xml/ios/iproute_bgp/configuration/xe-3sg/irg-xe-3sg-book/irg-dynamic-neighbor.html), which in a future example will be truly valuable)
- EIGRP has one area, OSPF generally supports up to 16 without getting specific hardware. BGP supports 65,536 with 2-byte ASNs, or 4,294,967,295
- IGPs are designed to trust their routing protocol peers to prevent loops, while BGP is designed to control route advertisement
- IGPs (other than IS-IS, of course) only support IP-based address families, while MP-BGP can support any number of units defined as "Network Layer Reachability Information," making it extensible in numerous ways like [EVPN](https://blog.ipspace.net/2018/05/what-is-evpn.html) or [Segment Routing](https://www.segment-routing.net/), or even [MPLS](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiprotocol_Label_Switching). The key thematic point here is that BGP behaves more like a distributed database than a routing protocol would normally.
- IGPs value fast reconvergence, while BGP values **reliable**  reconvergence. It's slow moving, but is extremely change-friendly.

### Applying Concepts

In a controlled environment, like a Clos fabric, eBGP is pretty easy to setup, troubleshoot, and maintain. So let's get started!

  

First, we configure the spines with the appropriate AS and neighbors. It looks like there's a lot going on here, but that's simply because we're running **two** address-families: IPv4 and IPv6:

  

```
bgp-as65000-s0#conf tEnter configuration commands, one per line. End with CNTL/Z.bgp-as65000-s0(config)#router bgp 65000 bgp log-neighbor-changes neighbor 10.6.240.1 remote-as 64900 neighbor 10.6.240.1 update-source FastEthernet0/24 neighbor 10.6.240.3 remote-as 64901 neighbor 10.6.240.3 update-source FastEthernet0/22 neighbor FD00:6:240::2 remote-as 64900 neighbor FD00:6:240::2 update-source FastEthernet0/24 neighbor FD00:6:240::6 remote-as 64901 neighbor FD00:6:240::6 update-source FastEthernet0/22 maximum-paths 2 ! address-family ipv4 neighbor 10.6.240.1 activate neighbor 10.6.240.3 activate no neighbor FD00:6:240::2 activate no neighbor FD00:6:240::6 activate maximum-paths 2 no auto-summary no synchronization exit-address-family ! address-family ipv6 neighbor FD00:6:240::2 activate neighbor FD00:6:240::6 activate exit-address-familybgp-as65001-s1#conf tEnter configuration commands, one per line. End with CNTL/Z.bgp-as65001-s1(config)#router bgp 65001 bgp log-neighbor-changes neighbor 10.6.241.1 remote-as 64900 neighbor 10.6.241.1 update-source FastEthernet0/21 neighbor 10.6.241.3 remote-as 64901 neighbor 10.6.241.3 update-source FastEthernet0/23 neighbor FD00:6:241::2 remote-as 64900 neighbor FD00:6:241::2 update-source FastEthernet0/21 neighbor FD00:6:241::6 remote-as 64901 neighbor FD00:6:241::6 update-source FastEthernet0/23 maximum-paths 2 ! address-family ipv4 neighbor 10.6.241.1 activate neighbor 10.6.241.3 activate no neighbor FD00:6:241::2 activate no neighbor FD00:6:241::6 activate maximum-paths 2 no auto-summary no synchronization exit-address-family ! address-family ipv6 neighbor FD00:6:241::2 activate neighbor FD00:6:241::6 activate exit-address-family
```
  
And then the leafs:   

```
bgp-as64900-l0#conf tEnter configuration commands, one per line. End with CNTL/Z.bgp-as64900-l0(config)#router bgp 64900 bgp log-neighbor-changes neighbor 10.6.240.0 remote-as 65000 neighbor 10.6.240.0 update-source FastEthernet1/0/24 neighbor 10.6.241.0 remote-as 65001 neighbor 10.6.241.0 update-source FastEthernet1/0/21 neighbor FD00:6:240::1 remote-as 65000 neighbor FD00:6:240::1 update-source FastEthernet1/0/24 neighbor FD00:6:241::1 remote-as 65001 neighbor FD00:6:241::1 update-source FastEthernet1/0/21 maximum-paths 2 ! address-family ipv4 neighbor 10.6.240.0 activate neighbor 10.6.241.0 activate no neighbor FD00:6:240::1 activate no neighbor FD00:6:241::1 activate maximum-paths 2 no auto-summary no synchronization exit-address-family ! address-family ipv6 neighbor FD00:6:240::1 activate neighbor FD00:6:241::1 activate exit-address-familybgp-as64901-l1#conf tEnter configuration commands, one per line. End with CNTL/Z.bgp-as64901-l1(config)#router bgp 64901 bgp log-neighbor-changes neighbor 10.6.240.2 remote-as 65000 neighbor 10.6.240.2 update-source FastEthernet0/22 neighbor 10.6.241.2 remote-as 65001 neighbor 10.6.241.2 update-source FastEthernet0/23 neighbor FD00:6:240::5 remote-as 65000 neighbor FD00:6:240::5 update-source FastEthernet0/22 neighbor FD00:6:241::5 remote-as 65001 neighbor FD00:6:241::5 update-source FastEthernet0/23 maximum-paths 2 ! address-family ipv4 neighbor 10.6.240.2 activate neighbor 10.6.241.2 activate no neighbor FD00:6:240::5 activate no neighbor FD00:6:241::5 activate maximum-paths 2 no auto-summary no synchronization exit-address-family ! address-family ipv6 neighbor FD00:6:240::5 activate neighbor FD00:6:241::5 activate exit-address-family
```
  
We can now verify that all peers are up with both stacks:   

```
bgp-as65000-s0#show ip bgp sumBGP router identifier 10.6.0.240, local AS number 65000BGP table version is 1, main routing table version 1Neighbor V AS MsgRcvd MsgSent TblVer InQ OutQ Up/Down State/PfxRcd10.6.240.1 4 64900 23 23 1 0 0 00:20:39 010.6.240.3 4 64901 19 18 1 0 0 00:17:04 0bgp-as65000-s0#show bgp ipv6 unicast summaryBGP router identifier 10.6.0.240, local AS number 65000BGP table version is 1, main routing table version 1Neighbor V AS MsgRcvd MsgSent TblVer InQ OutQ Up/Down State/PfxRcdFD00:6:240::2 4 64900 13 12 1 0 0 00:10:17 0FD00:6:240::6 4 64901 9 9 1 0 0 00:06:30 0
```
We do still have a problem - there are no prefixes received! Let's fix that by adding network statements to all relevant devices. In the demo equipment, the network statement must be an exact match to advertise.   
Network statements are not required for interfaces, as in this case, multicast is not used for peer discovery:   

```
bgp-as64900-l0(config)#router bgp 64900bgp-as64900-l0(config-router)#address-family ipv4bgp-as64900-l0(config-router-af)#network 10.6.0.0 mask 255.255.255.255
```
After this is completed, we'll see more routes - note that the above step must be repeated on the spines for all applicable networks, to ensure end to end reachability. This hardware does not appear to support ECMP for IPv6.  

```
bgp-as64900-l0#show ip bgp sumBGP router identifier 10.6.0.0, local AS number 64900BGP table version is 13, main routing table version 138 network entries using 936 bytes of memory9 path entries using 468 bytes of memory8/4 BGP path/bestpath attribute entries using 1120 bytes of memory6 BGP AS-PATH entries using 144 bytes of memory0 BGP route-map cache entries using 0 bytes of memory0 BGP filter-list cache entries using 0 bytes of memoryBGP using 2668 total bytes of memoryBGP activity 16/0 prefixes, 22/1 paths, scan interval 60 secsNeighbor V AS MsgRcvd MsgSent TblVer InQ OutQ Up/Down State/PfxRcd10.6.240.0 4 65000 47 47 13 0 0 00:40:51 410.6.241.0 4 65001 47 45 13 0 0 00:40:03 4bgp-as64900-l0#show bgp ipv6 unicast summaryBGP router identifier 10.6.0.0, local AS number 64900BGP table version is 10, main routing table version 108 network entries using 1128 bytes of memory12 path entries using 912 bytes of memory8/4 BGP path/bestpath attribute entries using 1120 bytes of memory6 BGP AS-PATH entries using 144 bytes of memory0 BGP route-map cache entries using 0 bytes of memory0 BGP filter-list cache entries using 0 bytes of memoryBGP using 3304 total bytes of memoryBGP activity 16/0 prefixes, 22/1 paths, scan interval 60 secsNeighbor V AS MsgRcvd MsgSent TblVer InQ OutQ Up/Down State/PfxRcdFD00:6:240::1 4 65000 44 43 10 0 0 00:37:56 5FD00:6:241::1 4 65001 43 43 10 0 0 00:37:18 6bgp-as64900-l0#show ipv6 roIPv6 Routing Table - Default - 11 entriesCodes: C - Connected, L - Local, S - Static, U - Per-user Static route B - BGP, R - RIP, D - EIGRP, EX - EIGRP external ND - Neighbor Discovery O - OSPF Intra, OI - OSPF Inter, OE1 - OSPF ext 1, OE2 - OSPF ext 2 ON1 - OSPF NSSA ext 1, ON2 - OSPF NSSA ext 2LC FD00:6::/128 [0/0] via Loopback0, receiveB FD00:6::1/128 [20/0] via FE80::216:C8FF:FE04:4742, FastEthernet1/0/24B FD00:6::240/128 [20/0] via FE80::216:C8FF:FE04:4742, FastEthernet1/0/24B FD00:6::241/128 [20/0] via FE80::223:4FF:FE42:F3C1, FastEthernet1/0/21C FD00:6:240::/126 [0/0] via FastEthernet1/0/24, directly connectedL FD00:6:240::2/128 [0/0] via FastEthernet1/0/24, receiveB FD00:6:240::4/126 [20/0] via FE80::216:C8FF:FE04:4742, FastEthernet1/0/24C FD00:6:241::/126 [0/0] via FastEthernet1/0/21, directly connectedL FD00:6:241::2/128 [0/0] via FastEthernet1/0/21, receiveB FD00:6:241::4/126 [20/0] via FE80::223:4FF:FE42:F3C1, FastEthernet1/0/21L FF00::/8 [0/0] via Null0, receivebgp-as64900-l0#show ip roCodes: C - connected, S - static, R - RIP, M - mobile, B - BGP D - EIGRP, EX - EIGRP external, O - OSPF, IA - OSPF inter area N1 - OSPF NSSA external type 1, N2 - OSPF NSSA external type 2 E1 - OSPF external type 1, E2 - OSPF external type 2 i - IS-IS, su - IS-IS summary, L1 - IS-IS level-1, L2 - IS-IS level-2 ia - IS-IS inter area, * - candidate default, U - per-user static route o - ODR, P - periodic downloaded static routeGateway of last resort is not set 10.0.0.0/8 is variably subnetted, 8 subnets, 2 masksC 10.6.0.0/32 is directly connected, Loopback0B 10.6.0.1/32 [20/0] via 10.6.240.0, 00:12:49C 10.6.240.0/31 is directly connected, FastEthernet1/0/24B 10.6.0.240/32 [20/0] via 10.6.240.0, 00:10:03C 10.6.241.0/31 is directly connected, FastEthernet1/0/21B 10.6.0.241/32 [20/0] via 10.6.241.0, 00:07:40B 10.6.240.2/31 [20/0] via 10.6.240.0, 00:08:47B 10.6.241.2/31 [20/0] via 10.6.241.0, 00:07:40
```
I have posted the base configs [here.](https://github.com/ngschmidt/lab-clos-fabric-configs/tree/master/eBGP-Configs)