FW: use Bird as Route Server for Balcan-IX

[ch at kviknet.dk]

On 18/07/2022 12.50, george.nicolae at orange.com wrote:
> As you developed Bird,  that is used by most of the major players in the 
> IX market, we want to ask you for information about usage BIRD as 
> route-server in our IX. Following come in my mind at first hand
> 
> ·What hardware did we need for accommodate 2 Route Servers with Bird ,  
> taking into consideration following:
> 
> oDouble the number of prefixes and customers

TLDR; No prob.

DE-CIX runs Bird 1.6.8 at the Frankfurt IX location with ~1K connected 
BGP peers.

The typical setup is one BIRD instance per Route Server IP(v6+v4). Bird 
1.6.x is two daemons, one for v6 and one for v4. Bird >= 2.0.0 is one 
daemon for both v6 and v4.

IX.br does the same, ~1K connected BGP peers, albeit their RS setup with 
BIRD is slightly different. "Multi-bird" I found it called in this 
presentation.

http://slides.lacnic.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/multi-bird-lacnic.pdf

Multiple BIRD instances running a full-mesh topology between all 
instances. And load-sharing BGP connections from IX connected networks 
between all the BIRD instances. Benefits from core count. As each 
instance is it's own process.
E.g. could have a config in place so that each BIRD instance does not 
run on the same core. Preventing competition for clock cycles on the 
same CPU core.

> oWe use the hardware for Route Servers and if possible for other tools 
> that is related  as reporting ,  looking glass and others if are 
> available. Did you know about integrations of your software with other 
> reporting/configuration tools ?

Alice LG as the looking glass, is an option.

https://github.com/alice-lg/alice-lg

> oWe have an mixed environment and we need to make customization of the 
> service
> 
> ·Is bird Software free?  Do you developed other tools related  to usage 
> of this software as Route Server.

TLDR; Yes

https://www.bizety.com/2018/09/04/bgp-open-source-tools-quagga-vs-bird-vs-exabgp/

"CZ.NIC provides a support programme for BIRD, with prices ranging from 
5,000 to 50,000 Euro per year. Current customers are primarily IXPs and 
large CDN/cloud providers. These fees cover all development costs."

It's free to use the software. There do exist a support program to 
support the continued development of the project.

https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/collection/open-source-observatory-osor/document/bird-manages-routing-worlds-largest-internet-exchanges-bird

> ·What are requirements regarding Operating System and Hypervisor

TLDR; Linux based OS (my choice) and Full Kernel Virtualization (e.g. 
KVM/QEMU based VM)

Standard virtualization will do. With adequate HW resources allocated to 
the VM. Your main concern will of course be Memory and CPU resources as 
the number of peers and prefixes growing over time (this is a long-term 
consideration). Note, if selecting BIRD, it is a single-threaded daemon, 
and clock speed versus core count should be considered, when selecting 
what HW and operational model (the single BIRD per RS or similar to 
IX.br's multi-bird setup).

> Also we appreciate any info regarding Bird and also comparison with 
> other alternatives for this role.
>