Category: Junos

In 2013, large-scale cloud providers and ISPs decided they had enough of the glacial IETF process of generating YANG models used to describe device configuration and started OpenConfig – a customer-only initiative that quickly created data models covering typical use cases of the founding members (aka “What Does Google Need”).

When I started making my first wobbling steps into the Junos MPLS world, Dan (@Johansfo) Backman took time to explain the differences between Cisco IOS and Junos MPLS implementations (and some of the reasons they are so different). This is my feeble attempt at describing what I understood he told me.

For whatever reason I decided to start my Junos experience with a very simple IS-IS network – four core routers from my Building IPv6 Service Provider Core webinar. As Junosphere doesn’t support serial or POS interfaces, I migrated all links to Gigabit Ethernet and added a point-to-point GE link between PE-A and PE-B.

My Junos versus Cisco IOS: Explicit versus Implicit received a huge amount of helpful comments, some of them slightly philosophical, others highly practical – from using interfaces all combined with interface disable in routing protocol configuration, to using configuration groups (more about that fantastic concept in another post).

However, understanding what’s going on is not the same as being able to explain it in one sentence ... and Dan (@jonahsfo) Backman beautifully nailed that one.

My first Junos labbing project was an IPv6 backbone; I wanted to create a simple single-area IS-IS/BGP-free backbone running LDP and MPLS, and using 6PE for IPv6 connectivity. Needless to say, even though I read the excellent Day One books (highly recommended: Exploring IPv6, Advanced IPv6 configuration and Deploying MPLS), I stumbled on almost every step.

The comments igp2bgp and Tiziano Tofoni made to my LDP-IGP Synchronization in MPLS Networks post prompted me to look deeper into basic Junos MPLS configuration and LDP behavior. As expected, there are some significant differences between Cisco’s and Juniper’s LDP implementations (and, as is usually the case, they’re both strictly conformant with RFC 5036).

Abner (@abnerg) Germanov surprised us all at the end of Juniper’s presentation at Networking Tech Field Day when he announced Junosphere access for all the delegates – after a year of nagging, I would finally be able to touch Junos. However, instead of taking it easy and studying the excellent Junos Day One books (which I also did – if you’re new to Junos you should definitely start there; they are well worth reading), I decided to take a more geeky approach.