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Data Collection Using SNMP

Data collection through SNMP is a useful alternative for collecting network statistics in systems where Juniper Telemetry Interface (JTI) is not available or in multi-vendor networks. You can use these statistics for performance management.

You can collect the following statistics by using SNMP collection tasks that poll the SNMP management information base (MIB):

  • Interface statistics. See Table 1 for details.

  • LSP statistics. See Table 1 for details.

    Note:

    If the LSPs are part of a P2MP group, the P2MP group information is displayed in the P2MP Group tab in the network information table that is located at the bottom of the topology view.

  • Class of service (CoS) statistics. See Table 2 (Juniper devices) and Table 3 (Cisco devices) for details.

    Note:

    You can collect CoS statistics only for Juniper and Cisco devices.

  • Table 1 describes the specific object identifiers (OIDs) that are collected for interface statistics and LSP statistics.

    Table 1: OIDs for Interface and LSP Statistics

    OID Name

    Counter

    Vendor Type(Generic refers to all vendor devices supported in NorthStar)

    1.3.6.1.2.1.2.2.1.2

    ifDescr

    Huawei

    1.3.6.1.2.1.2.2.1.3

    ifType

    Huawei

    1.3.6.1.2.1.31.1.1.1.1

    ifName

    Generic

    1.3.6.1.2.1.31.1.1.1.6

    ifHCInOctet

    Generic

    1.3.6.1.2.1.31.1.1.1.9

    ifHCInBroadcastPkts

    Generic

    1.3.6.1.2.1.31.1.1.1.10

    ifHCOutOctets

    Generic

    1.3.6.1.2.1.31.1.1.1.13

    ifHCOutBroadcastPkts

    Generic

    1.3.6.1.4.1.2636.3.2.5.1.1

    mplsLspInfoName

    Juniper

    1.3.6.1.4.1.2636.3.2.5.1.3

    mplsLspInfoOctets

    Juniper

    Table 2 describes the specific OIDs that are collected for CoS statistics for Juniper devices.

    Table 2: OIDs for CoS Statistics - Juniper Devices

    OID Name

    Counter

    1.3.6.1.4.1.2636.3.15.3.1.2

    jnxCosFcIdToFcName

    1.3.6.1.4.1.2636.3.15.4.1.5

    jnxCosQstatQedBytes

    1.3.6.1.4.1.2636.3.15.4.1.9

    jnxCosQstatTxedBytes

    1.3.6.1.4.1.2636.3.15.4.1.23

    jnxCosQstatTotalRedDropBytes

    1.3.6.1.4.1.2636.3.15.5.1.1

    jnxCosIfIndex

    1.3.6.1.4.1.2636.3.15.5.1.2

    jnxCosIfstatFlags

    1.3.6.1.4.1.2636.3.15.7.1.5

    jnxCosIngressQstatQedBytes

    1.3.6.1.4.1.2636.3.15.7.1.9

    jnxCosIngressQstatTxedBytes

    1.3.6.1.4.1.2636.3.15.7.1.23

    jnxCosIngressQstatTotalRedDropBytes

    Table 3 describes the specific OIDs that are collected for CoS statistics for Cisco devices.

    Table 3: OIDs for CoS Statistics - Cisco Devices

    OID Name

    Table

    1.3.6.1.4.1.9.9.166.1.1.1

    CISCO-CLASS-BASED-QOS-MIB::cbQosServicePolicyTable

    1.3.6.1.4.1.9.9.166.1.6.1

    CISCO-CLASS-BASED-QOS-MIB::cbQosPolicyMapCfgTable

    1.3.6.1.4.1.9.9.166.1.5.1

    CISCO-CLASS-BASED-QOS-MIB::cbQosObjectsTable

    1.3.6.1.4.1.9.9.166.1.7.1

    CISCO-CLASS-BASED-QOS-MIB::cbQosCMCfgTable

    1.3.6.1.4.1.9.9.166.1.15.1.1.10

    CISCO-CLASS-BASED-QOS-MIB:: cbQosClassMapStats.cbQosCMPostPolicyByte64

    1.3.6.1.4.1.9.9.166.1.15.1.1.17

    CISCO-CLASS-BASED-QOS-MIB:: cbQosClassMapStats. cbQosCMDropByte64
Note:

As of Release 5.0.0, NorthStar supports Cisco Model Driven Telemetry (MDT), a potentially faster and less costly alternative for retrieving interface and LSP traffic metrics from Cisco devices. See Support for Cisco Model Driven Telemetry for more information.

Note:

NorthStar does not support collection of SR-TE LSP statistics through SNMP.

Starting in NorthStar Controller Release 6.2.1, you can use Net-SNMP CLI to collect interface statistics for routers with more than 500 interfaces. The interface statistics collection has been tested for up to 5000 interfaces per router and for up to 500,000 interfaces network wide.

Do the following by using a text editor such as vi:

  1. Enable Net-SNMP in the northstar.cfg file (/opt/northstar/data/northstar.cfg) by using the following configuration setting:

    snmp_use_netsnmp=1

  2. Set the following ElasticSearch publisher parameters in the publisher.cfg file (/opt/northstar/data/es_puiblisher/es_publisher.cfg):

    • polling_interval—Specify the frequency at which the publisher process polls Redis to collect SNMP statistics that are sent to the ElasticSearch database.

      Default: 30 seconds

      Range: 10 seconds through 60 seconds

    • batch_size—Specify the maximum number of records to be sent in a single operation to the ElasticSearch database.

      Default: 1000

      Range: 1000 through 5000

    • pool_size—Specify the maximum number of threads (in a thread pool) that can be run to collect SNMP statistics.

      Default: 10

      Range 10 through 20

The following tasks describe the collection process via SNMP.

Installation of Collectors

The collectors are installed in the same machine as the NorthStar Controller application server (single-server deployment) by the install.sh script when you install the controller itself. Once installed, you can see the collector group of processes:

Configure Devices in Device Profile and Test Connectivity

Before you can run SNMP collection, you must configure login credentials and SNMP parameters for the devices. In the web UI, from the More Options menu, navigate to Administration > Device Profile. Select a device and click Modify. Click the Access Parameters tab to enter login credentials and the SNMP Parameters tab to enter SNMP parameters.

See Device Profile and Connectivity Testing for detailed instructions on setting up devices with SNMP parameters, and also on testing SNMP connectivity to those devices.

Run Device Collection

You must run device collection before attempting to run SNMP traffic collection. This is necessary to establish the baseline network information including the interfaces and LSPs. Once device collection has been run, SNMP traffic collection tasks have the information they need to poll the interfaces and the LSPs.

See Scheduling Device Collection for Analytics.

Schedule and Run SNMP Data Collection Tasks

Note:

Completion of device profiles (Administration > Device Profile) and running device collection are prerequisites for successfully running SNMP collection.

To schedule a new SNMP collection task, navigate to Administration > Task Scheduler from the More Options menu.

  1. Click Add in the upper right corner. The Create New Task window is displayed as shown in Figure 1.

    Figure 1: Create New Task WindowCreate New Task Window

  2. Enter a name for the task and use the drop-down menu to select the task type as SNMP Traffic Collection. Click Next.

    The next window offers the opportunity to collect SNMP traffic for all devices, select devices, or groups. You can also click the Collect CoS data check box if you want to collect Class of Service data. CoS data is not collected unless you enable it by clicking the check box. Figure 2 shows this window.

    Figure 2: SNMP Collection Task, Device CollectionSNMP Collection Task, Device Collection
    Note:

    If you are using Cisco MDT for some devices, you would opt for “Selective devices” and deselect devices for which you are using Cisco MDT.

  3. Click Next to proceed to the scheduling window. The Create New Task - Schedule window is displayed as shown in Figure 3. At least two collections are necessary for the calculation of statistics. We recommend setting up automatic recurrence of the task every 10 to 20 minutes.

    Figure 3: SNMP Collection Task, SchedulingSNMP Collection Task, Scheduling

    Instead of scheduling recurrence, you can select to chain the task after an already-scheduled recurring task, so it launches as soon as the other task completes. When you select the “Chain after another task” radio button, a drop-down list of recurring tasks is displayed from which to select.

  4. Click Submit to complete the addition of the new collection task and add it to the Task List. Click a completed task in the list to display the results in the lower portion of the window. There are three tabs in the results window: Summary, Status, and History. An example of the Summary tab is shown in Figure 4. An example of the Status tab is shown in Figure 5.

    Figure 4: Collection Results for SNMP Traffic Collection Task, Summary Tab Collection Results for SNMP Traffic Collection Task, Summary Tab
    Figure 5: Collection Results for SNMP Traffic Task, Status TabCollection Results for SNMP Traffic Task, Status Tab
    Note:

    As of NorthStar Release 6.0.1, you can have multiple SNMP collection tasks, each with its own selection of devices and schedule.

By default, NorthStar only collects statistics from the following interfaces when running SNMP traffic collection:

  • Physical, logical loopback, or logical management interfaces that can be associated with nodes in NorthStar

  • Logical interfaces associated with links in NorthStar

  • Logical interfaces belonging to a VRF

The interface types that can be discovered on devices and that should be used by traffic collection can be modified by editing the include-interface-type setting using the cMGD CLI as described in Configuring NorthStar Settings Using the NorthStar CLI in the NorthStar Controller/Planner Getting Started Guide. The command calls for a space-separated list of interface types enclosed in square brackets, or a single interface type without brackets. Some examples:

The supported interface types are:

  • physical: Physical interfaces, expressed as the interface name without a dot (.) in it

  • loopback-mgmt: Loopback and management interfaces expressed as the interface name starting with lo, fxp, me, or em

  • vrf-if: Interfaces associated with a VRF

  • links-if: Interfaces on links

  • all: All interfaces

Note:

configServer publishes to all components only the interface types that you specify. The web UI and data collection only receive information about interfaces representing those interface types.

If you modify this setting, deselecting interface types that are already represented by interfaces in the NorthStar model, those existing interfaces remain in the model.

Access the Data from the NorthStar Planner

You can access the collected data from the NorthStar Planner for planning and simulation purposes. In the NorthStar Planner, navigate to Traffic > Traffic aggregation. You can aggregate the traffic by hour and create a 24-hour traffic load file for each hour, aggregating the data for that particular hour across multiple days. The resulting file can be used as input into the traffic matrix solver.

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