HP NNM Smart Plug-in for MPLS VPN

for the HP-UX, Linux, Solaris, and Windows operating system

Release Notes

Software version: 7.53 / December 2008

This document provides an overview of the changes made to the HP Network Node Manager Smart Plug-in for MPLS VPN (MPLS VPN SPI) for the 7.53 release. It contains important information not included in the manuals or in online help.

In This Version
Documentation Updates
Installation Notes
Enhancements and Fixes
Known Problems, Limitations, and Workarounds
Documentation Errata
Verified Environments
Accessibility Support
Local Language Support
Integration with Other HP Software Solutions
Support
Legal Notices

In This Version

MPLS VPN SPI provides almost real-time monitoring of MPLS VPN provider edge (PE) and customer edge (CE) routers by detecting several types of SNMP traps and enriching them to show higher-level VPN service-affecting events. Also, the MPLS VPN SPI provides the real-time monitoring of the Traffic Engineering (TE) tunnels by supporting the Root Cause Analysis (RCA) for any faults detected in MPLS TE tunnels.

NNM 7.53 is required for the installation of MPLS VPN SPI 7.53. The MPLS VPN SPI, version 7.53 is supported with NNM, version 7.53.

This release of the MPLS VPN SPI includes the following new features:

• Discovery and management of TE Tunnels. Displays the tunnel properties and also provides the details of the tunnel path.
• New TE Tunnel views provide the information of the fault point and events in the MPLS network.
• Provides the information of the routers used in the MPLS network using the MPLS LSR view.
• Provides a Route Map Tool that allows you to add extended Route Targets configured on a VRF of a Provide Edge (PE) Router. The Extended RTs provided by the tool are used into MPLS discovery module.
• Automatic discovery of Management VRFs in a Management VPN and displaying them explicitly in the Management VPN Details view.
• Defect fixes from version 3.2.

Documentation Updates

The first page of this release notes document contains the following identifying information:

• Version number, which indicates the software version.
• Publish date, which changes each time the document is updated.

To check for recent updates or to verify that you are using the most recent edition, go to the following web site:
http://h20230.www2.hp.com/selfsolve/manuals

1. In the Product list, click the product name.
2. In the Version list, click the version number.
3. In the OS list, click the OS type.
4. In the document list, click the document title.
5. To retrieve the document, click Open or Download.

Installation Notes

Installation requirements, as well as instructions for installing NNM SPI for MPLS VPN, are documented in the HP Network Node Manager Smart Plug-in for MPLS VPN, Installation Guide provided in Adobe Acrobat (.pdf) format. The document file is included on the product's CD media as:

\Docs\SPIs\mplsInstall.pdf

After installation the document can be found at:

After installation, this file (MPLS_RelNotes.html) can be found at: $OV_WWW/htdocs/C/ReleaseNotes/MPLS_RelNotes.html (UNIX) or %OV_WWW%\htdocs\C\ReleaseNotes\MPLS_RelNotes.html(Windows) or
Help: MPLS VPN SPI->MPLS VPN SPI Release Notes (from the menu command)

Software and Hardware Requirements

Before installing MPLS VPN SPI, 7.53, make sure that your system meets the following requirements:

• Hardware

1 GB RAM

• OS platform and compatibility

• HP-UX 11.0, 11.11, 11iv2 on PA-RISC, Itanium, and 11iv3 on PA-RISC, Itanium
• Solaris 2.8, 2.9, and 2.10
• Linux Red Hat Enterprise Release 4
• Microsoft Windows 2000 with Service Pack 4(Professional Edition, Server Edition, Advanced Server Edition)
• Microsoft Windows 2003 operating system with Service Pack 2 ( Standard Edition, Enterprise Edition, Web Edition (Service Pack 1 only)
• Microsoft Windows 2003 R2 (Standard Edition, Enterprise Edition)
• Microsoft Windows XP with Service Pack 2
• Software
  • HP Network Node Manager Advanced Edition, version 7.53.
  • A supported Web browser: Internet Explorer 6 or higher, Netscape 7 or higher, Mozilla 1.6 or higher
• Disk space
  • UNIX: 80 MB
  • Windows: 34 MB
• Required MIBs - The MPLS VPN SPI requires the following MIBs
  • Cisco SMI MIB (CISCO-SMI-MIB.my)
  • Cisco RTTMON MIB (CISCO-RTTMON-MIB.my)
  • MPLS VPN MIB and MPLS-LSR MIBs (MPLS-LSR.mib)
  • MPLS-TE MIB (MPLS-TE.mib)
  • Juniper MPLS MIB ( jnx-mpls.mib)
  • Juniper SMI MIB (jnx-smi.mib)
  • Juniper VPN MIN (jnx-vpn.mib)
  • Juniper Ping MIB (jnx-ping.mib)
  • Juniper E Series Router MIB (juniRouter.mib)
  • Juniper E Series MIBs (juniMibs.mib, juniMpls.mib, juniSmi.mib, juniTc.mib, and juniIpPolicy.mib)
  • Standard DISMAN Ping MIB (rfc2925-DISMAN-PING-MIB.my)
• Supported Routers : This release of the MPLS VPN SPI discovers and manages the following types of router devices:
  • Cisco routers with Internetwork Operating System (IOS) version 12.2(15)T and higher that supports MplsVpnMIB.
  • Juniper M, T, J series routers with Juniper Operating System (JunOS) version 6.1 or higher that support the Juniper SMI, VPN, and Ping MIBs.
  • Juniper E series routers with Juniper Operating System (JunOSe) version 5.3 or higher that support the Juniper SMI, VPN, and Ping MIBs.
  • Any CE router with SNMP access that supports MIB-2. Configuration of Cisco IP SLA tests on a CE router requires that the CE router runs IOS version 12.2(15)T and higher supports the Cisco RTTMON MIB. Configuration of Juniper Ping tests on a CE router requires that the CE runs JunOS version 6.1 or higher and supports the Juniper Ping MIB.
  • For optional core management through RAMS, each PE router must have a loopback address that participates in OSPF or IS-IS.

Upgrading from the Previous Version

Upgrading from any previous version (2.0,2.1, 3.0, 3.1,3.2) is supported in this release.

You must migrate to NNM Advanced Edition, version 7.53 before installing MPLS VPN SPI, version 7.53.

Installation Problems

See this section for issues and workarounds:

Windows Operating System: Installation Concerns

On the Windows operating system, the typical NNM installation option does not load the Cisco SMI MIB file (CISCO-SMI-MIB.my). You can choose the Custom NNM installation option and specify to load the SNMP MIBs. Alternatively, you can load this MIB using NNM’s xnmloadmib tool.

Windows Operating System: Upgrade Concern

Before upgrading to MPLS VPN SPI version 7.53 on the Windows operating system, stop all processes: %OV_BIN%\ovstop.

Ignore Warnings about MPLS VPN SPI Processes Not Started

During the MPLS VPN SPI installation, the NNM Extended Topology, setupExtTopo.ovpl script gives the warning about a failure to start the MPLS VPN SPI processes. However, after the installation completes, the MPLS VPN SPI processes (MPLS_sm and MPLS_pp) should be running.

xnmevents Exception Messages During Installation of the MPLS VPN SPI

The installation of the MPLS VPN SPI attempts to install messages for each locale (language) that the MPLS VPN SPI supports. In many cases, the target machine does not support all of these locales. The message installation attempt results in the following exception message being displayed once for each missing locale:

xnmevents: Cannot set locale LC_ALL to [system default].

You can safely ignore this message.

Installation Successfully Completed but Configuration Errors

Installation of MPLSVPN SPI is completed successfully but there are some configuration errors.

Workaround:

Check the errors in $OV_PRIV_LOG/mpls_config.log.

Run mpls_config.ovpl -default from command line instead of starting the installation again.

Installation of SPI fails in Windows; NNM Home Base has errors

SPI installation can fail if IIS is not properly set up by NNM. The symptoms can be either of the following:

• The Home Base is unable to load and an error message appears indicating the need to install or restart IIS.
• The Home Base does not load and a "server not found" (404) message appears.
  
Workaround:

1. Stop all NNM processes using ovstop, as well as any other product processes.
2. Locate and execute file \newconfig\OVWWW-FW\setupIIS.vbs from NNM 7.53 disk #1.
3. Restart all processes.

Known Problems, Limitations, and Workarounds

See this section for potential issues/workarounds as relevant to your requirement.

• Limitation with the Management VPN solution

Workaround:

The MPLS VPN SPI discovers only those Management VPNs whose topology is Hub & Spoke and the route-targets used in the Management VPN should occur in sufficiently large number of VRFs (at least 3 times more than that of the highest Route-target occurrence in VRFs count). The route-target occurrence count can be tuned. For more information, see MPLS VPN SPI Administrator Guide.

• Limitation with Juniper E series support

Workaround:

For Juniper E series, corresponding CE connections are not discovered. This is due to direct unavailability of the association of the interface to the VRF table from MIBs.

• Limitation with IP unnumbered interface support

Workaround:

VRFs associated with IP unnumbered interfaces are used in VPN calculation. The corresponding CE connections will not be discovered.

• Limitations with VRF-Lite and shadow router support
  • Only Cisco routers used as shadow routers (referred as SLA routers by Cisco) or VRF-Lite routers are discovered. Both of them are using the same VRF-Lite icon.
  • For VRF-Lite routers, the interface connected to PE is associated with a VRF table of that PE. If not, the MPLS VPN SPI does not discover the VRF-Lite routers. The VRF-Lite router supports MPLS-LSR MIB and MPLS VPN MIBs. If the routers do not support the MIBs, discovery fails. As a workaround, you can specify the routers in configuration file $OV_CONF/VrfLite.cfg.
  • For VRF-Lite routers, the MPLS VPNs views are context-sensitive. This means that only those VRF-Lite to PE router connections that belong to the VPN are shown in that MPLS VPN view.
  • For shadow routers, CDP should be enabled to discover the router.
• Limitation with duplicate IP support

Workaround:

Supports only Cisco devices with CDP enabled. Other connections with duplicate IPs will not be discovered. If CDP is not enabled, use the PE-to-CE Connection Editor utility to establish the connection between PE- to-CE. For more information, see MPLS VPN SPI Administrator Guide.

• Limitation with SLA testing

Workaround:

SLA test configurations on shadow routers (or SLA routers) will work only on those shadow routers that were discovered by the MPLS VPN SPI.

• SAA traps not received by MPLS VPN SPI

Workaround:

Configure each PE or CE router that acts as a source for one or more SAA tests to include the NNM management station as one of the SNMP trap recipients.

• MPLS views missing from dynamic views menu

Workaround:

UNIX:

1. Delete the alarm browser setup files:
1. cd /opt/OV/www/htdocs/C/dynamicViews
2. rm dvStyleV8.xml
3. rm menusettings.xml
2. Stop and restart the HP OpenView application server process:
1. ovstop -c ovas
2. ovstart -c ovas
3. Restart the Web browser.

Windows:

1. Delete the alarm browser setup files:
1. cd install_dir\www\htdocs\C\dynamicViews
2. del dvStyleV8.xml
3. del menusettings.xml
2. Stop and restart the HP OpenView application server process:
1. ovstop -c ovas
2. ovstart -c ovas
3. Restart the Web browser.

• Monitoring PE and CE routers through ICMP

Workaround:

If you configure NNM ( APA or netmon) for PE and CE router addresses to be monitored through ICMP, check the addresses on the PE-CE link interfaces. If they are not accessible from the NNM management station, disable the APA or netmon to NOT monitor these addresses. For more information, see MPLS VPN SPI Administrator Guide.

If APA is configured to poll such addresses, the MPLS VPN SPI ignores Address Unreachable events generated by the APA and does NOT perform VPN impact analysis. This default behavior can be altered in the mpls.conf configuration file.

• After the installation of the MPLS VPN SPI 7.53, if you migrate from the previous version, or enable APA polling, or if the VPN/ VRF status is not correct .

Workaround:

Restart MPLS_sm and Run /opt/OV/support/MPLS/eventgen.ovpl with the Refresh option.

• Hop list for a tunnel may not be accurate if MIB data in hop tables is incomplete or if there are nodes, interfaces that are not managed by NNM.

Workaround:

Include the node for the NNM discovery.

• If ovet_disco process exits with signal 11 during ET discovery and if the last 3 lines of ovet_disco.log file is as follows:

  No vrf-vrf cfg file /etc/opt/OV/share/conf/VrfToVrfMap.cfg
Time after Loading the user defined VRF Mapping <timestamp>
ovet_disco died on signal: 11(see /var/opt/OV/log/ovet_disco_err.log)

Workaround:

Restart ET discovery.

• When the tail node of a tunnel is not managed, the hop list shows two nodes instead of single node. Two IP addresses are present in the table in the MIB for the last node, one being a loopback address. As NNM does not manage the tail node, the MPLS VPN SPI shows the two addresses as two nodes.

Workaround:

Include the node for the NNM discovery.

• TE Tunnels-at-Node view takes significant time to retrieve data. This is a computationally intensive algorithm whose elapsed time depends on the number of interfaces of the selected node, the number of tunnels present and the size of the hop list of the tunnels.

Documentation Errata

There are no known errors in the MPLS VPN SPI documentation.

Verified Environments

The MPLS VPN SPI has been verified to work in high availability environments. To set the SPI in a high availability environment, you must install and configure the MPLS VPN SPI on both the active and standby management stations.

Please contact HP technical support for specific licensing and configuration needs.

Integration with Other HP Software Solutions

The MPLS VPN SPI integrates with the following optional software:

• HP Performance Insight (PI) version 5.3, installed on a separate server and meeting the following requirements:
  • Integrated with NNM using the NNM / PI Integration Module.
  • Includes one or more of the MPLS VPN and Service Assurance Report Packs.
• HP Route Analytics Management System (RAMS) version 5.50, meeting the following requirements:
  • Integrated with NNM using the NNM / RAMS Integration Module.
  • Supports one or more of the following protocols:
    • OSPF
    • IS-IS
    • mBGP and BGP (The mBGP option requires the BGP option).
  For information on the additional functionality provided by integration with PI and RAMS, see the MPLS VPN SPI Administrator Guide.

Support

You can visit the HP Software Support web site at:
http://www.hp.com/go/hpsoftwaresupport

This web site provides contact information and details about the products, services, and support that HP offers.

HP Software online software support provides customer self-solve capabilities. It provides a fast and efficient way to access interactive technical support tools needed to manage your business. As a valued support customer, you can benefit by being able to do the following:

• Search for knowledge documents of interest
• Submit and track progress on support cases
• Submit enhancement requests online
• Download software patches
• Manage a support contract
• Look up HP support contacts
• Review information about available services
• Enter discussions with other software customers
• Research and register for software training

Legal Notices

©Copyright 2008 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.

Confidential computer software. Valid license from HP required for possession, use or copying. Consistent with FAR 12.211 and 12.212, Commercial Computer Software, Computer Software Documentation, and Technical Data for Commercial Items are licensed to the U.S. Government under vendor's standard commercial license.

The only warranties for HP products and services are set forth in the express warranty statements accompanying such products and services. Nothing herein should be construed as constituting an additional warranty. HP shall not be liable for technical or editorial errors or omissions contained herein.

The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.