1. NETCONF Configuration I/F Advertisement by WSDL and XSD
NETCONF Configuration I/F Advertisement with WSDL and XSD
70th IETF netconf WG
2007/11/15
Hideki Okita (Hitachi)
Tomoyuki Iijima (ALAXALA Networks)
Yoshifumi Atarashi (ALAXALA Networks)
Ray S. Atarashi (IIJ)
NETCONF Configuration I/F Advertisement by WSDL and XSD
Hideki Okita, Tomoyuki Iijima, Yoshifumi Atarashi, Ray S. Atarashi

2. netconf WG re-charter 3. Schema advertisement:
Currently the NETCONF protocol is able to advertise which protocol features are supported on a particular netconf-capable device. However, there is currently no way to discover which XML Schema are supported on the device. The NETCONF working group will produce a standards-track RFC with mechanisms making this discovery possible.
This item may be merged with "NETCONF monitoring" into a single document.
(The initial draft will be based on draft-scott-netconf-schema-query-00.txt barring additional contributions from the community.)

3. NETCONF Protocol Overview
Configuration datamodel
Notification
datamodel
VLAN
Diff-Serv
ACL
Datamodel description language
XSD
RelaxNG
Yang
Configuration protocol
Notification Protocol
-11
Basic
Operation
RFC4741
Fine-grain
locking
Monitoring
Advertisement
Transport protocol mapping
SSH
Mapping
RFC4742
SOAP
Mapping
RFC4743
BEEP
Mapping
RFC4744

4. NETCONF datamodel users
There are several types of NETCONF datamodel users:
Network device developers
Network operators
NMS developers
IT System developers
IT System operators
They have respective requirements.
We focus on NMS developer’s requirement.

5. Requirement from NMS developers
To advertise NETCONF device configuration interface as Remote Procedure
To incorporate remote procedure into the NMS developer’s development environment.
hello
rpc
get
get-config
edit-config
lock
Configuration I/F information
Network Device
NMS developers
Development Environment

6. Approach Follow existing RPC-base programming.
Example programming sequence are
Know how to get RPC information
Get actual RPC information from the place and the method.
RPC definition (name, input type, output type)
Type definition
Generate stub classes on their development environment from the RPC information.
Major development environment, Java and .NET support officially WSDL and XSD and automate stub generation.
RelaxNG provides plug-ins for these environments.
Write original code with the stub classes.
We need to standardize following methods.
How to get RPC information (configuration I/F information)
Type definition description method
RPC definition description method

7. Proposal Target Solution How to get configuration I/F information
HTTP access with Fixed URL
Type definition description method
XSD (or RelaxNG, Schematron?)
RPC definition description method
WSDL

8. How to get configuration I/F information
Proposal
HTTP access to configuration I/F information
GET method implementation does not require much resource to your device.
Standardization of fixed URL like
By this proposal, we do not need to advertise meta-info
HTTP GET Request
HTTP Reply
Network Device
NMS developers
Development Environment
Configuration I/F information

9. Meta-info advertisement model
Example Method
Pros
Cons
Offline
Fixed URL and HTTP
Implementation cost
Extensibility
Online
Original RPC (get-schema) ?
NETCONF stack implementation cost
Broker
UDDI
UDDI stack implementation cost

10. Type definition by XSD Example configuration data XML document
Each element or a vendor specific type can be defined by specific XSD.
<config>
<interface>
</interface>
<vlan>
</vlan>
<acl>
</acl>
<diffserv>
</diffserv>
</config>
config
interface
vlan
acl
acl
diffserv id
name
type id
name
ports id
name
flow id
name
flow id
name
flow
XSD
XSD
XSD
XSD
XSD
XSD defines only the type definition in transferred message

11. RPC definition by WSDL WSDL can define RPC interface.
portType element in a WSDL file defines RPC interface.
RFC4743 defines <hello> and <rpc>.
It define
Method name
Input Type
Output Type
Vendor specific RPCs can be added.
If you need additional semantic description, you can use other semantic description language like OWL.
Types definition
XSD
Message definition
helloRequest, helloResponce
rpcRequest, rpcResponce
portType definition
<hello> <rpc>
Binding definition
Service definition
Contents of a WSDL file

12. Summary We focus on NMS developers’ requirements.
The requirement is to advertise the NW device’s configuration I/F information to NMS development environment.
We propose combination of following methods.
Fixed URL and HTTP
XSD for type definition
WSDL for RPC interface definition
Compared to other solution, NMS developers can minimize their implementation cost by this proposal.

13. Thank you.

14. Future NETCONF world Career NMS Enterprise NMS Router Firewall deviceIP
ACL
Switch
NETCONF
Switch
VRRP
VLAN
VLAN
Dot1X
IPFIX Collector
IPFIX
NETCONF
Home Gateway
WLAN AP
AAA
CALLHOME? IP
Set Top Box
NETCONF
VLAN

15. XSD + Yang Each area has each preferable solution Model by Yang
Model by XSD
Translation by Yang Tool
NMS developer
NW Device
NMS developer
NMS
NW Operator
Management Tool
Other Area Developer
Other Area Device
Each area has each preferable solution

16. NETCONF applicability
NMS development
Remote procedures on NW devices are incorporated by the advertised NETCONF configuration I/F information
I/F advertisement by WSDL/XSD is suitable since they are widely deployed on major commercial development environments
Network device development
Readability and independency are important.
Making NETCONF datamodel with Yang may suitable for developers not familiar with XSD.
Yang to XSD translation contributes to expand NETCONF application to wide area including APP area in IETF and other W3C-related area.