A few weeks ago, I was criticising Nokia’s unnecessary changes to the SR Linux configuration data model, so it’s only fair that I also publish a counterexample:

• On April 12th, SR Linux failed one of the netlab integration tests. We keep adding functionality to these tests as we discover edge cases we didn’t test before, so sometimes a device that passed the test before might fail the modified version.
• I opened a netlab issue, believing it might be a configuration error on our part.
• It quickly became evident that we’re dealing with an SR Linux bug, as the failure to apply routing policies was random.

I thought that was the end of the story and closed the issue, but then something truly amazing happened:

• Jeroen reached out to his Nokia contacts, and on May 1st, Roman Dodin from Nokia left a comment acknowledging the bug and telling us it has been fixed. I never experienced something similar from another networking vendor.
• On May 14th (a month after I accidentally stumbled upon the bug), I got an automated email announcing the SR Linux release 25.3.2.
• I reran the integration tests, and they all passed. The bug was gone 😳

I don’t think I’ve ever seen a major networking vendor fixing a bug and shipping a fixed release within a month of the bug being mentioned (not even reported through proper channels, let alone by a paying customer). Kudos to the Nokia SR Linux team for a phenomenal job!