Arista CloudVision
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Overview:
Arista has pioneered the networking industry with its software defined cloud networking approach, built on the programmable interfaces, publish-subscribe state separation, resilient fault containment, and self-healing attributes of Arista EOS®. CloudVision extends the same architectural approach of EOS across the network for state, provisioning, change management, and visibility. This enables enterprises to move to cloud-class automation without needing any significant internal development. CloudVision is a network-wide approach for workload orchestration and workflow automation delivering a turnkey solution for cloud networking.
The CloudVision platform is a software suite of services that deliver further operational simplification of the Arista physical infrastructure. The CloudVision services fall into three primary functional areas:
- Extending EOS to a network-wide service, leveraging NetDB to provide a single network-wide database for aggregating and accessing state.
- A single network control point for physical network integration with third party controllers, orchestration solutions, security services, as well as other network services.
- A workflow automation solution designed to help customers adopt network automation via pre-built workflow models for a variety of ongoing network provisioning tasks.
With CloudVision, the physical network continues to operate in a familiar model, following the Universal Cloud Network design principles. The well-known control and data plane features continue to be distributed in each physical device. The same command-line (CLI) and API’s are available to the operator. However, CloudVision enhances the traditional operational model with a central instance of virtual EOS that provides an aggregate view of the physical network. This instance provides both a centralized network database, as well as a web-based portal for network-wide automation and visibility.
CloudVision Highlights
Cloud Automation for Everyone
Arista understands the growing need for
organizations to adopt more widely
automated, programmable, and
comprehensive management solutions for
the network to keep pace with the rapid
adoption rate of complex virtualized data
centers and high performance 10/40/100
GbE switching environments.
Arista EOS CloudVision simplifies complex time and resource intensive tasks in a turnkey software solution designed to help customers move to a more automated, cloud-like infrastructure.
EOS as a Network-Wide Service
CloudVision is built on the same open
standards-based and fully programmable
Arista EOS. With CloudVision, the EOS state
database model is expanded to a networkwide
view with NetDB, now able to maintain
the state of the entire network in a common
database. This central database abstracts the
physical network to enable network-wide
automation and visibility.
Complements the Cloud
CloudVision is Arista’s platform for physical
network integration with third party services.
This includes integration with cloud
orchestration platforms such as OpenStack,
network overlay controllers such as VMware
NSX™ , and network services solutions such
as Palo Alto Networks, F5, or ServiceNow.
Using open, standards-based APIs such as
OVSDB and JSON, CloudVision helps to both
simplify and scale this integration through
an abstracted network view and a single
point of integration. This approach allows
customers to deploy a best-of-breed cloud
networking solution.
Workfow Automation
Workflow monitoring and provisioning is
controlled centrally with pre-integrated tool
sets for provisioning, change management,
network-wide upgrades & rollback, network
monitoring, network virtualization, and
visibility services.
Features:
Centralized View of the Network. Just as EOS leverages a central state database on each individual switch, CloudVision provides a network-wide state database for real-time network state in one consolidated location. This foundation provides operational efficiency gains by moving from a manual box-bybox approach to an automated network-wide operational model.
Controller Agnostic Approach. A simplified approach for integration with third party overlay controllers is essential in today’s combined physical and virtual world. CloudVision supports a variety of overlay and orchestration controllers, including VMware NSX™, OpenStack, and any other OVSDBbased controllers. This gives customers the flexibility of choice in their orchestration and overlay approach.
Topology Abstraction. The details of the physical network topology include platform, configuration, and protocol nuances across the topology. Third party solutions often need additional software integration work to account for these details. And even subtle changes to the topology can affect the controller operation. CloudVision is an abstraction layer that simplifies the integration with controllers and third party tools, allowing them to ignore the nuanced details of the network and then focus on the things they do best.
Hardware and Software Abstraction. Does the northbound controller integrate with the new hardware platform? Or new switching feature? Which software version is certified with a northbound controller? A third party controller can be certified to work against CloudVision and not be as dependent on the hardware or software versions running in the actual network. So the controller interoperability and operations remain the same even after the network is upgraded.
Macro-Segmentation™ Services (MSS). CloudVision is a central point for services integration to the physical network through the MSS framework. With MSS, network services like security policy can be dynamically instantiated in the network in an open approach and without changing operational or administrative security models.
Simple and Scalable VXLAN. CloudVision’s VXLAN Control Service (VCS) is a plug-and-play approach for aggregating network-wide VXLAN state for efficient control plane learning as well as integration with network overlay controllers.
Scaling the Controller. Improved scale for network topology changes in a virtual environment. Typically, an OVSDB-based controller would have to talk to each hardware VTEP, which could be 100’s of switches each with a separate OVSDB connection. CloudVision aggregates the network to a single point providing a single OVSDB connection to the controller. This helps scale the performance of the controller and lets the network handle re-convergence events via EOS.
Automated Provisioning. For initial deployments through ongoing configuration changes, CloudVision reduces the time to deploy network changes and the likelihood of humaninduced errors. Simple to use ‘Configlets’ provide config modularity and consistent re-use across devices. A GUI-based ZTP server is included for automated deployments as well as zero touch device replacement and a ConfigBuilder provides a flexible method for customizing configurations.
Snapshot Views for Change Management. Stop manually comparing network state device-by-device via the CLI. Let CloudVision visually present a summarized view of the network state differences, giving the operator the ability to quickly assess and diagnose network inconsistencies across change controls.
Smart System Upgrade (SSU) with a Network-Wide Scope. Leverage underlying EOS features like SSU maintenance mode and leaf SSU combined into an automated workflow for performing software image upgrades across a group of devices. This automation helps to simplify the common and manual operational task of a software upgrade, ultimately reducing the time needed for a maintenance window.
Network Rollback. On occasion, the operator might need to quickly restore the network to a previously known state. A manual, device by device rollback can be time-consuming and error prone. CloudVision addresses this with an automated framework to rollback the network configuration and software versions to a previous point in time.
Centralized Repository. Store EOS device configurations, images and extensions in one common location for simplified network policy management.
Compliance Dashboard. To improve operational security, CloudVision provides visibility of device and container level compliance to both configuration and image standards.
Open API Integration. RESTful APIs for all CloudVision functionality that can be used for scripting as well as integration with other management platforms and workflow tools.
News Resources via Arista.com. Security vulnerability alerts, end of sale and end of life notices as well as field notices can be delivered from arista.com through the portal allowing customers a single resource for reviewing Arista notifications.
Specifications:
CloudVision Solution
The CloudVision solution is comprised of two tightly integrated components: the CloudVision eXchange and the CloudVision Portal. These two components work in conjunction to provide the platform for both orchestration and automation as follows:
- CloudVision eXchange is a EOS-based network-wide multi-function control point providing a single access point for real-time provisioning, orchestration and integration with third party controllers and services.
- CloudVision Portal is a web platform and associated historical database built to automate the workflows for a variety of network provisioning, change management, and monitoring tasks.
CloudVision eXchange Features
The following table summarizes the main features of Arista’s CloudVision eXchange.
| Feature | Description |
|---|---|
| Base Infrastructure | Runs in a VM as a virtual appliance Single node Deployment (Lab use only) Graceful reboot 3-Node cluster for high availability EOS operating environment (CLI, APIs, management features, etc.) |
| Topology Discovery | Ability to build a physical connectivity map of the network |
| VXLAN Services | VXLAN Control Services (VCS) for dynamic control plane learning of VXLAN mapping information |
| API’s | EOS command line eAPI for EOS |
| Open Virtual Switch Database (OVSDB) Services | Layer 2 hardware VTEP integration for synchronizing network topology information, MAC to VXLAN endpoints, and VXLAN ID bindings with overlay controllers. |
| OpenStack Services | Integration with OpenStack via ML2 driver plugin for provisioning of network services (VLAN, VXLAN, etc) |
| Macro-Segmentation Services * | Dynamically instantiate network services policy in the physical network |
| Partner Integration | Official support for VMware NSX, Nuage, and OpenStack integration. Other technology partner integration details available upon request. |
CloudVision Portal Features
The following table summarizes the main features of Arista’s CloudVision Portal.
| Feature | Description |
|---|---|
| Base Infrastructure | Runs in a VM as a virtual appliance Single node deployment (Lab use only) 3-node cluster for high availability |
| User Security | AAA Local Authentication AAA Role-based Authorization TACACS / RADIUS Authentication TACACS / RADIUS Role-based Authorization RBAC - Custom role definition for authorization |
| API’s | JSON-based REST APIs for the portal functionality |
| Network Provisioning - Discovery | Device inventory Manual device discovery Automatic device discovery via Zero Touch Provisioning (ZTP) Per device logs of all actions taken by the portal Zero Touch Replacement (ZTR) |
| Network Provisioning - Devices | Device connectivity status (up/down) |
| Network Provisioning - Images | Image repository Extension repository |
| Network Provisioning - Configuration | Switch configuration management via configlets (device and container level) Static configlet definition Configlet validation View differences of device proposed vs running configuration Change history tracking of configlets Automated ongoing device configuration change management Automated detection and rollback of invalid configuration changes Device config compliance checking Container-level compliance checking and Config Auto-reconcile Configlet Builder for config templating and scripting |
| Labels | Define and apply custom labels View device labels from the network provisioning page Filter network provisioning view based on device labels |
| Tap Aggregation | Integration of the Tap Aggregation GUI tool |
| Task Management | Task management pane with all pending and completed tasks Automatic task creation that must be explicitly run by the user View the logs associated with a given task |
| Change Management | Single-device software upgrades Snapshot * Network-wide Smart System Upgrade (SSU) * Network-wide Rollback * |
| Other | News feed from Arista.com |
CloudVision System Requirements:
The following describes the requirements for the hardware on which CloudVision is installed.
| CloudVision Virtual Appliance | Description |
|---|---|
| Hardware Platform Requirements | The installation of both the CloudVision eXchange and Portal should be on a single
system with the following system requirements for each VM: CloudVision eXchange:
|
| Hypervisor Requirements | VMware ESX 5.5 and above RedHat Enterprise Linux 6.5-7.0 and above |
| Client Requirements | CloudVision Portal is supported with the following web browsers:
|
| Protocols | HTTP, HTTPS, SSH, SCP, NTP |
| Software Version Requirements | CloudVision Deployments:
|
| CloudVision Physical Appliance | Description |
|---|---|
| Physical Appliance Platform
Specifications for DCA-CV-100
|
CPUs: Two Intel Xeon 8 Core, 2.4 GHz CPUs DRAM: 32 GB (Eight 4GB RDIMM) Hard Drives: Two 2TB Hot Plug Hard Drives Network Interfaces: Four port 1Gb Ethernet LOM (RJ-45) Power Supply: Dual, Hot-plug, Redundant Power Supplies (1+1), 550W Power Cord: C13 to C14, PDU Style, 12A, 2 Feet (North America) Dimensions (HxWxD): 1.75”x19”x24” (4.45cm x 48.26cm x 60.96cm) Weight: 46.5 lbs (21.1 kg) Remote management: iDRAC controller (with web UI) and IPMI |
| Physical Appliance Software Version Requirements | DCA-CV-100 includes CloudVision eXchange Server and CloudVision Portal Server.
Minimum Software Versions:
|
Documentation:
Download the Arista CloudVision Datasheet (PDF).
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