Table 3. Feature History
Feature Name
|
Release Information
|
Feature Description
|
Support for Ethernet Data Plane Loopback on Bundle Interface
|
Cisco IOS XE Cupertino 17.8.1 |
This feature enables ethernet data plane loopback on bundle
interfaces. You can also configure the feature when the router is
not physically connected and the port is in down state.
This feature is only applicable on internal or terminal loopback in
up or down state.
|
Bundle interface or a link bundle is a group of one or more ports that are aggregated
together and treated as a single link. This allows you to group multiple point-to-point
links together into one logical link and provide higher bidirectional bandwidth,
redundancy, and load balancing between two routers. A virtual interface is assigned to
the bundled link. The component links can be dynamically added and deleted from the
virtual interface. The virtual interface is treated as a single interface on which you
can configure an IP address and other software features used by the link bundle. Packets
sent to the link bundle are forwarded to one of the links in the bundle.
Bundle interfaces increase bandwidth availability, because traffic is forwarded over all
available members of the bundle. Therefore, traffic can if one of the links within a
bundle fails. can without interrupting packet flow. The ethernet dataplane loopback
feature configured on bundle interfaces provides a methodology to verify the maximum
rate of frame transmission with no frame loss.
Prior to Cisco IOS XE Cupertino 17.8.1, you could only configure ethernet data plane loopback on the physical interfaces.
Starting with Cisco IOS XE Cupertino 17.8.1, you can also configure ethernet data plane loopback feature on the bundle interfaces. But, you can only configure internal
or terminal loopback in up or down state.
This feature is only supported on Cisco RSP2 module.
Scenario: Support for Ethernet Dataplane Loopback on Link Down Port
Consider a scenario when you need to configure ethernet dataplane loopback feature before the router is physically connected.
Thus, you need to configure the feature when the port link is down. Starting with Cisco IOS XE Cupertino 17.8.1, you can configure the terminal or internal ethernet dataplane loopback feature even when the router is not physically connected
and the link is down. But, as this feature is not supported on external or facility loopback, you cannot configure external
loopback feature when the port link is down.
A port channel bundles individual interfaces into a group to provide increased bandwidth and redundancy. Previously, the internal
ethernet dataplane loopback was not supported on the port channel interface. Starting with Cisco IOS XE Cupertino 17.8.1, you can now configure internal loopback on the port channel interface even when the interface is down.