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This chapter contains the following sections:
Visibility into application traffic has traditionally been important for infrastructure operations to maintain security, troubleshooting, and compliance mechanisms, and to perform resource planning. With the technological advances and growth in cloud-based applications, it has become imperative to gain increased visibility into the network traffic. Traditional approaches to gain visibility into network traffic are expensive and rigid, making it difficult to do in large-scale deployments.
Cisco Nexus Data Broker Embedded with Cisco Nexus Switches provides a software-defined, programmable solution to aggregate copies of network traffic using Switched Port Analyzer (SPAN) or network Test Access Points (TAP) for monitoring and visibility. As opposed to traditional network taps and monitoring solutions, this packet-brokering approach offers a simple, scalable and cost-effective solution that is well suited for customers who need to monitor higher-volume and business-critical traffic for efficient use of security, compliance, and application performance monitoring tools.
The Cisco Nexus Data Broker Embedded option provides the flexibility for you to run the Cisco Nexus Data Broker software directly on a Cisco Nexus 3000, 3100, 3200, 3500, or 9000 Series switch in a single-switch deployment. This is suitable for smaller, co-located facilities where customers need only a single Cisco Nexus 3000, 3100, 3200, 3500, or 9000 Series switch for TAP/SPAN aggregation, because it eliminates the requirement to have a separate virtual machine for the Cisco Nexus Data Broker application.
If Cisco Nexus Data Broker does not work after reloading of the device in Embedded mode, you have to run the ndb_launcher.py script from the ndb directory in the GitHub repository. Before launching the script, ensure that the Cisco Nexus Data Broker is in activated mode. If it is in the deactivated mode, the script does not execute. You can use show virtual-service list CLI command to display the status of Cisco Nexus Data Broker. Use python bootflash:ndb_launcher.py -v ndb command to execute the script.
When the Python script is run, it creates a file in the virtual machine that is known as the interfaces file. It contains the details of the interfaces and the management IP address and it updates the launcher.sh file. The embndb folder is created by the Python script.
The Cisco Nexus Data Broker Embedded solution supports the following:
Support for the OpenFlow mode or the NX-API mode of operation.
Note | The OpenFlow mode and the NX-API mode are supported on both Cisco Nexus 3000 Series and Cisco Nexus 9000 Series switches. Cisco Nexus 9500 supports only NX-API mode of deployment. Cisco Nexus 3500 supports only Openflow mode of deployment. You can enable only one mode, either OpenFlow or NX-API mode, at a time. In order to start or stop the Cisco Nexus Data Broker application in embedded mode, you should activate or de-activate the ofa file. Do not use ./runxnc.sh as it is not the right way to start the application. |
Support for Layer-7 filtering for the HTTP traffic using the HTTP methods.
Support for VLAN and MPLS tag stripping.
The ability to aggregate traffic from multiple TAP or SPAN ports connected to a single switch.
Support for Q-in-Q to tag input source TAP and SPAN ports.
Symmetric hashing or symmetric load balancing.
Rules for matching monitoring traffic based on Layer 1 through Layer 4 information.
The ability to replicate and forward traffic to multiple monitoring tools.
Timestamp tagging using the Precision Time Protocol.
Packet truncation beyond a specified number of bytes to discard payload.
Security features, such as role-based access control (RBAC), and integration with an external Active Directory using RADIUS or TACACS for authentication and authorization.
End-to-end path visibility and both port and flow level statistics for troubleshooting.
Robust Representational State Transfer (REST) API and web-based GUI for all functions.
The following web browsers are supported for Cisco Nexus Data Broker Embedded:
Note | JavaScript 1.5 or a later version must be enabled in your browser. |
Cisco Nexus Data Broker is supported on Cisco Nexus 3000, 3100, 3200, 3500, and 9000 series switches. Before you deploy the software, you must do the following:
Ensure that you have administrative rights to log in to the switch.
Verify that the management interface of the switch (mgmt0) has an IP address configured by running the switch# show running-config interface mgmt0 command.
Add the VLAN range in the database that is to be used in Cisco Nexus Data Broker for tap aggregation and inline monitoring redirection to support VLAN filtering. For example, the syntax is vlan <range of VLAN IDs>. For example, the VLAN range is <1-3967>.
For running the OpenFlow and NX-API mode on the Cisco Nexus Series switches, see the following pre-requisites.
See the Cisco Nexus Data Broker software release filename matrix for more information on the software images:
Mode of Deployment |
OpenFlow |
NX-API |
N3K |
N3500 |
N9K |
File Name |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Embedded |
N |
Y |
Y |
N |
Y |
ndb1000-sw-app-emb-nxapi-3.2.0-k9.zip |
Embedded |
Y |
N |
Y |
Y |
N |
ndb1000-sw-app-emb-3.2.0-ofa_ mmemb-1.1.5-r3-n3000-SPA-k9.zip |
Embedded |
Y |
N |
Y |
N |
Y |
ndb1000-sw-app-emb-3.2.0-ofa_ mmemb-2.1.4-r2-nxos-SPA-k9.zip |