Packet Design's Route Explorer 3.0 Adds Root-Cause Analysis for BGP Networks; Users Can More Rapidly Diagnose and Troubleshoot BGP Problems.

PALO ALTO, Calif. -- Route Explorer 3.0, the newest version of Packet Design's route analytics system, incorporates a BGP root-cause analysis capability that lets service providers and enterprises quickly determine what triggered millions of potentially troublesome events in their BGP (Border Gateway Protocol) networks.

The new BGP root-cause analysis technology allows Route Explorer to provide an accurate view of the service provider's or enterprise's inter-domain layer 3 topology at any point in time, analyze a virtually unlimited number of BGP messages over any selected time period, and determine the causal network event(s) (e.g., a flood of a million BGP messages might be analyzed as a single peering failure). With this knowledge, organizations can more rapidly and effectively diagnose BGP problems and see how routing changes from other providers are impacting their own network.

Route Explorer 3.0 and a new BGP analysis module that includes the root-cause analysis technology will be demonstrated at the ISPCON show Nov. 3-5 at the Santa Clara (Calif.) Convention Center, booth #503. Also on display at ISPCON will be the recently introduced Route Explorer/MPLS VPN, which lets service providers monitor individual customer BGP/MPLS VPNs for proper route distribution - a major step in ensuring virtual private network reachability and privacy. Both products began shipping in late October.

BGP Root-Cause Analysis: Speeding Detection, Diagnosis of BGP Problems

"Networks based on BGP have traditionally been difficult to diagnose and troubleshoot because this 'chatty' protocol can generate thousands, even millions, of updates following a peering loss or other significant routing event," said Jeff Raice, Packet Design executive vice president of marketing and business development. "With today's large and complex networks, making sense of these events is beyond human capability. As a result, network operators are left reacting to customer complaints, when they would prefer to address issues proactively, before complaints surface."

Packet Design's new BGP Root-Cause Analysis software has two components: a BGP RIB (routing information base) visualization feature, and a dynamic root-cause analysis capability that can analyze millions of BGP events in seconds and animate those events on a topology map.

The BGP RIB visualization tool processes the data gathered by Route Explorer's BGP route analytics engine and creates a visual representation of the service provider's inter-domain BGP network, showing its peer autonomous systems (ASs) and the significant ASs connected to its peers and beyond. By showing where all BGP prefix announcements are coming from, this AS topology map allows service providers to view at a glance their routing policies (i.e., how they are connected to other providers), validate existing peering arrangements and plan future ones. It also lets them rapidly diagnose problems such as misconfigured community tags and unexpected or unwanted backdoor paths.

The root-cause analysis feature quickly analyzes huge numbers of BGP routing messages to single out the key routing events that were the source of major routing activity. Using Route Explorer's History Navigator, the user can select a time period characterized by spikes in routing events or an unusual BGP routing activity level. A statistical algorithm developed by Packet Design extracts the large-scale structure of BGP event streams, examining millions of BGP events in seconds and identifying the single or multiple events that triggered them, even if those events are several "hops" away from the user's network. Root-cause events such as peering flaps or MED (Multi Exit Discriminator) oscillations take days to find (if they are ever found); even then, the user cannot determine why they occurred. With Route Explorer, the user can select one such event and immediately see a dynamic BGP topology map showing routes being withdrawn from one AS or peer and moving to another. For example, a service provider could easily see that a peering flap between providers several hops away from its network was causing a direct peer to periodically withdraw and announce the routes. This powerful visualization technique provides quick answers to previously unanswerable questions, such as, "What happened?", "Where did it happen," and "How does it affect me?" The dynamic visualizations can be saved and emailed between service providers or by enterprises to their providers, rapidly conveying the nature of the problem and coordinating fast inter-organization problem resolution.

Route Explorer MPLS VPN: Ensuring Reachability, Privacy, Site-to-Site Policy

MPLS VPNs based on the IETF RFC 2547bis standard have been embraced by service providers as a way to give enterprise customers the flexibility of provider-managed layer 3 connectivity among their distributed sites. But, without layer 3 visibility, the providers have lacked knowledge of when service-affecting routing errors occurred and how to fix them.

Route Explorer/MPLS VPN, introduced last month, gives service providers full visibility into the layer 3 topology of individual customer VPNs, enabling them to offer enterprises more reliable VPN services. For the first time, providers can accurately visualize, in real time and without the overhead of polling, how individual VPNs are overlaid on their network infrastructure. Specifically, they can monitor 1) reachability (whether VPN prefixes are being properly distributed between a customer's sites, 2) privacy (whether there is unwanted route "leakage" between two or more VPNs), and 3) policy (whether VPN prefixes are distributed in accordance with customer requirements - e.g., hub-and-spoke versus full mesh).

By dynamically tracking VPN routing information - e.g., all provider edge (PE) routers participating in each VPN and every prefix being "advertised" from each of their customer's sites - the system automatically generates a baseline of each customer's VPN. Any deviations from the baseline can be set to trigger user-customizable alerts.

Pricing and Availability

Route Explorer 3.0 is priced from $20,000 to $100,000 (U.S. list). A fully loaded unit supports an unlimited number of routers and all four routing protocols (OSPF, IS-IS, EIGRP, and BGP with root-cause analysis). Existing systems can be upgraded with the new BGP route analysis module for $25,000. All Route Explorer platforms and modules are currently available.

About Route Explorer

Sitting in the network infrastructure as if it were a router (though it forwards no traffic), Route Explorer "listens" to IP routing-protocol exchanges, creates an accurate layer 3 topology map and analyzes routing events to let network engineers pinpoint routing problems at a glance and resolve them quickly. All routing events are logged in a local data store, from which they can be analyzed and visualized in real time, or replayed later for forensic analysis or planning purposes. Route Explorer provides a single end-to-end view of the routing topology across protocol and domain boundaries.

About Packet Design, Inc.

Packet Design, Inc., develops a family of network appliances that improves the reliability, efficiency and predictability of IP networks by providing network-layer (layer 3) visibility into them. Packet Design, Inc., was spun out in March 2003 from Packet Design, LLC, the fourth networking company started by husband-and-wife entrepreneurs Judy Estrin and Bill Carrico, who previously founded Bridge Communications, Network Computing Devices and Precept Software. After receiving seed funding from Packet Design, LLC, Packet Design, Inc., raised $14 million in Series B funding from Advanced Technology Ventures, Mayfield Fund, Allegis Capital, Masthead Venture Partners and Packet Design, LLC. For more information, visit http://www.packetdesign.com.