1. Why SURFsara is happy with Open Networking switches
Erik Ruiter SURFsara
TNC17 – Linz May 2017

2. What is Open networking?
Decoupling of network operating system and hardware
Similar to the rise of Linux and Windows with the IBM compatible PC
Driven by cheap top-of-rack switches in big datacentres (eg Facebook Wedge / Backpack)

3. What is Open networking?
Open networking vendors
Corsa
Dell
Edge-Core
MBroadcom Helix4
Mellanox
Penguin
Pica8
Quanta
Open networking OSes
Big Switch
Cumulus Linux
Dell OS 10
MLNX-OS
Pluribus
SONiC
Switchdev driver + Linux
Network Processors
Broadcom
Apollo
Firebolt
Helix
Tomahawk
Trident
Triumph
Mellanox Spectrum
Cavium

4. How does SURFsara use bare metal switches?
ToR management switches / EoR aggregation switches
All switches are operated using Cumulus Linux + Ansible
Currently only using L2 features
Future features implementation:
Routing (Q3)
Cloud platform integration (Q4)
BGP-EVPN (2018)

5. How does SURFsara use bare metal switches?

6. Why are we happy: Freedom of Choice: Vendor / OS
Rich feature set: Almost as complete as traditional (Eg. MLAG, VRF, VxLAN)
Flexible operation: Operate as linux box, Use config management, or classic CLI
Cheaper: 40%-60% TCO reduction (except for 1gbps switches)

7. Keep in mind Engineers might need a somewhat different skillset
depending on use case:
configuration management -> Ansible / Puppet, GIT
Linux OS knowledge -> Cumulus / switchdev
Time investment required to get settled
Using configuration management is powerful
Make sure support is arranged between HW and SW vendors

8. Erik Ruiter
THANK YOU!