Two week ago I described how to create a simple VRF Lite lab with netlab VRF configuration module. Adding MPLS/VPN to the mix and creating a full-blown MPLS/VPN lab is a piece of cake. In this blog post we’ll build a simple topology with two VRFs (red and blue) and two PE-routers:

Nodes

We’ll need six nodes in the lab. Four of them will be Linux hosts, the two PE-routers will be Arista EOS devices. We’ll have to enable these configuration modules on the PE-routers:

• vrf for obvious reasons
• bgp because it’s needed to transport VPNv4 address family updates between PE-routers
• mpls to get LDP and BGP VPNv4 address family
• ospf because we’re building an IBGP design and need something to propagate loopback interface addresses.

defaults.device: eos

nodes:
  pe1:
    module: [ vrf,ospf,bgp,mpls ]
  pe2:
    module: [ vrf,ospf,bgp,mpls ]
  h1:
    device: linux
  h2:
    device: linux
  h3:
    device: linux
  h4:
    device: linux

We’ll use two VRFs, and let the tool automatically assign route distinguishers and route targets.

vrfs:
  red:
  blue:

Links

There are five links in our lab, four of them belong to VRFs, the fifth one connects PE1 and PE2:

links:
- pe1: { vrf: red }
  h1:
- pe2: { vrf: red } 
  h2:
- pe1: { vrf: blue }
  h3:
- pe2: { vrf: blue }
  h4:
- pe1-pe2

Module Parameters

All we need now is a sprinkle of unicorn dust module parameters:

• BGP AS number is set to 65000
• LDP and VPNv4 are enabled within the MPLS module

bgp.as: 65000
mpls.ldp: True
mpls.vpn: True

And that’s it. Save the topology file into an empty directory, execute netlab up and you’ll have a full-blown MPLS/VPN lab.

Sample Configuration

Don’t trust me? Here are a few printouts:

pe1#show ip bgp vrf red
BGP routing table information for VRF red
Router identifier 10.0.0.1, local AS number 65000
Route status codes: s - suppressed, * - valid, > - active, E - ECMP head, e - ECMP
                    S - Stale, c - Contributing to ECMP, b - backup, L - labeled-unicast
                    % - Pending BGP convergence
Origin codes: i - IGP, e - EGP, ? - incomplete
RPKI Origin Validation codes: V - valid, I - invalid, U - unknown
AS Path Attributes: Or-ID - Originator ID, C-LST - Cluster List, LL Nexthop - Link Local Nexthop

          Network                Next Hop              Metric  AIGP       LocPref Weight  Path
 * >      172.16.0.0/24          -                     -       -          -       0       i
 * >      172.16.1.0/24          10.0.0.2              0       -          100     0       i

pe1#show ip route vrf red | begin Gateway
Gateway of last resort is not set

 C        172.16.0.0/24 is directly connected, Ethernet1
 B I      172.16.1.0/24 [200/0] via 10.0.0.2/32, LDP tunnel index 1, label 100000
                                   via 10.1.0.2, Ethernet3, label imp-null(3)

pe1#show mpls lfib route
MPLS forwarding table (Label [metric] Vias) - 3 routes
MPLS next-hop resolution allow default route: False
...
 B3    100000   [0]
                via I, ipv4, vrf blue
 B3    100001   [0]
                via I, ipv4, vrf red
 L     116384   [1], 10.0.0.2/32
                via M, 10.1.0.2, pop
                 payload autoDecide, ttlMode uniform, apply egress-acl
                 interface Ethernet3

Finally, here are the relevant parts of PE1 configuration as generated by netlab release 1.2.1:

vrf instance blue
   rd 65000:2
!
vrf instance red
   rd 65000:1
!
!
interface Ethernet1
   description pe1 -> [h1] [stub]
   vrf red
   ip address 172.16.0.1/24
   ip ospf network point-to-point
   ip ospf area 0.0.0.0
!
interface Ethernet2
   description pe1 -> [h3] [stub]
   vrf blue
   ip address 172.16.2.1/24
   ip ospf network point-to-point
   ip ospf area 0.0.0.0
!
interface Ethernet3
   description pe1 -> pe2
   ip address 10.1.0.1/30
   mpls ldp interface
   ip ospf network point-to-point
   ip ospf area 0.0.0.0
!
interface Loopback0
   ip address 10.0.0.1/32
   mpls ldp interface
   ip ospf area 0.0.0.0
!
ip routing
ip routing vrf blue
ip routing vrf red
!
mpls ip
!
mpls ldp
   router-id 10.0.0.1
   transport-address interface Loopback0
   interface disabled default
   no shutdown
!
router bgp 65000
   router-id 10.0.0.1
   bgp advertise-inactive
   neighbor 10.0.0.2 remote-as 65000
   neighbor 10.0.0.2 next-hop-self
   neighbor 10.0.0.2 update-source Loopback0
   neighbor 10.0.0.2 description pe2
   neighbor 10.0.0.2 send-community standard extended
   !
   address-family ipv4
      neighbor 10.0.0.2 activate
      network 10.0.0.1/32
   !
   address-family vpn-ipv4
      neighbor 10.0.0.2 activate
   !
   vrf blue
      rd 65000:2
      route-target import vpn-ipv4 65000:2
      route-target export vpn-ipv4 65000:2
      router-id 10.0.0.1
      redistribute connected
      redistribute ospf
   !
   vrf red
      rd 65000:1
      route-target import vpn-ipv4 65000:1
      route-target export vpn-ipv4 65000:1
      router-id 10.0.0.1
      redistribute connected
      redistribute ospf
!
router ospf 1
   router-id 10.0.0.1
   max-lsa 12000
!
router ospf 100 vrf red
   router-id 10.0.0.1
   interface unnumbered hello mask tx 0.0.0.0
   passive-interface Ethernet1
   redistribute bgp
   max-lsa 12000
!
router ospf 101 vrf blue
   router-id 10.0.0.1
   interface unnumbered hello mask tx 0.0.0.0
   passive-interface Ethernet2
   redistribute bgp
   max-lsa 12000

Build Your Own

You’ll find the lab topology file on GitHub. To use it:

• Install netlab and your preferred lab environment. These days I find it easiest to use Arista cEOS with containerlab.
• Copy topology files into an empty directory
• Execute netlab up with the parameters described above.

Revision History

2024-08-10

MPLS data plane works in cEOS release 4.32.1F and is supported in netlab release 1.9.0. Removed a mention of cEOS data-plane quirks.