BIRD User's Guide: Protocols

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The Border Gateway Protocol is the routing protocol used for backbone level routing in the today's Internet. Contrary to the other protocols, its convergence doesn't rely on all routers following the same rules for route selection, making it possible to implement any routing policy at any router in the network, the only restriction being that if a router advertises a route, it must accept and forward packets according to it.

BGP works in terms of autonomous systems (often abbreviated as AS). Each AS is a part of the network with common management and common routing policy. It is identified by a unique 16-bit number (ASN). Routers within each AS usually exchange AS-internal routing information with each other using an interior gateway protocol (IGP, such as OSPF or RIP). Boundary routers at the border of the AS communicate global (inter-AS) network reachability information with their neighbors in the neighboring AS'es via exterior BGP (eBGP) and redistribute received information to other routers in the AS via interior BGP (iBGP).

Each BGP router sends to its neighbors updates of the parts of its routing table it wishes to export along with complete path information (a list of AS'es the packet will travel through if it uses the particular route) in order to avoid routing loops.

For IPv6, it uses the standard multiprotocol extensions defined in RFC 2283 ftp://ftp.rfc-editor.org/in-notes/rfc2283.txt including changes described in the latest draft ftp://ftp.rfc-editor.org/internet-drafts/draft-ietf-idr-bgp4-multiprotocol-v2-05.txt and applied to IPv6 according to RFC 2545 ftp://ftp.rfc-editor.org/in-notes/rfc2545.txt.

Route selection rules

BGP doesn't have any simple metric, so the rules for selection of an optimal route among multiple BGP routes with the same preference are a bit more complex and they are implemented according to the following algorithm. It starts the first rule, if there are more "best" routes, then it uses the second rule to choose among them and so on.

Prefer route with the highest Local Preference attribute.
Prefer route with the shortest AS path.
Prefer IGP origin over EGP and EGP origin over incomplete.
Prefer the lowest value of the Multiple Exit Discriminator.
Prefer routes received via eBGP over ones received via iBGP.
Prefer routes with lower internal distance to a boundary router.
Prefer the route with the lowest value of router ID of the advertising router.

IGP routing table

BGP is mainly concerned with global network reachability and with routes to other autonomous systems. When such routes are redistributed to routers in the AS via BGP, they contain IP addresses of a boundary routers (in route attribute NEXT_HOP). BGP depends on existing IGP routing table with AS-internal routes to determine immediate next hops for routes and to know their internal distances to boundary routers for the purpose of BGP route selection. In BIRD, there is usually one routing table used for both IGP routes and BGP routes.

Configuration

Each instance of the BGP corresponds to one neighboring router. This allows to set routing policy and all the other parameters differently for each neighbor using the following configuration parameters:

local [ip] as number

Define which AS we are part of. (Note that contrary to other IP routers, BIRD is able to act as a router located in multiple AS'es simultaneously, but in such cases you need to tweak the BGP paths manually in the filters to get consistent behavior.) Optional ip argument specifies a source address, equivalent to the source address option (see below). This parameter is mandatory.

neighbor ip as number

Define neighboring router this instance will be talking to and what AS it's located in. Unless you use the multihop clause, it must be directly connected to one of your router's interfaces. In case the neighbor is in the same AS as we are, we automatically switch to iBGP. This parameter is mandatory.

multihop [number]

Configure multihop BGP session to a neighbor that isn't directly connected. Accurately, this option should be used if the configured neighbor IP address does not match with any local network subnets. Such IP address have to be reachable through system routing table. For multihop BGP it is recommended to explicitly configure source address to have it stable. Optional number argument can be used to specify the number of hops (used for TTL). Note that the number of networks (edges) in a path is counted, i.e. if two BGP speakers are separated by one router, the number of hops is 2. Default: switched off.

source address ip

Define local address we should use for next hop calculation and as a source address for the BGP session. Default: the address of the local end of the interface our neighbor is connected to.

next hop self

Avoid calculation of the Next Hop attribute and always advertise our own source address as a next hop. This needs to be used only occasionally to circumvent misconfigurations of other routers. Default: disabled.

next hop keep

Forward the received Next Hop attribute even in situations where the local address should be used instead, like when the route is sent to an interface with a different subnet. Default: disabled.

missing lladdr self|drop|ignore

Next Hop attribute in BGP-IPv6 sometimes contains just the global IPv6 address, but sometimes it has to contain both global and link-local IPv6 addresses. This option specifies what to do if BIRD have to send both addresses but does not know link-local address. This situation might happen when routes from other protocols are exported to BGP, or when improper updates are received from BGP peers. self means that BIRD advertises its own local address instead. drop means that BIRD skips that prefixes and logs error. ignore means that BIRD ignores the problem and sends just the global address (and therefore forms improper BGP update). Default: self, unless BIRD is configured as a route server (option rs client), in that case default is ignore, because route servers usually do not forward packets themselves.

gateway direct|recursive

For received routes, their gw (immediate next hop) attribute is computed from received bgp_next_hop attribute. This option specifies how it is computed. Direct mode means that the IP address from bgp_next_hop is used if it is directly reachable, otherwise the neighbor IP address is used. Recursive mode means that the gateway is computed by an IGP routing table lookup for the IP address from bgp_next_hop. Recursive mode is the behavior specified by the BGP standard. Direct mode is simpler, does not require any routes in a routing table, and was used in older versions of BIRD, but does not handle well nontrivial iBGP setups and multihop. Recursive mode is incompatible with sorted tables. Default: direct for singlehop eBGP, recursive otherwise.

igp table name

Specifies a table that is used as an IGP routing table. Default: the same as the table BGP is connected to.

ttl security switch

Use GTSM (RFC 5082 - the generalized TTL security mechanism). GTSM protects against spoofed packets by ignoring received packets with a smaller than expected TTL. To work properly, GTSM have to be enabled on both sides of a BGP session. If both ttl security and multihop options are enabled, multihop option should specify proper hop value to compute expected TTL. Kernel support required: Linux: 2.6.34+ (IPv4), 2.6.35+ (IPv6), BSD: since long ago, IPv4 only. Note that full (ICMP protection, for example) RFC 5082 support is provided by Linux only. Default: disabled.

password string

Use this password for MD5 authentication of BGP sessions. Default: no authentication. Password has to be set by external utility (e.g. setkey(8)) on BSD systems.

passive switch

Standard BGP behavior is both initiating outgoing connections and accepting incoming connections. In passive mode, outgoing connections are not initiated. Default: off.

rr client

Be a route reflector and treat the neighbor as a route reflection client. Default: disabled.

rr cluster id IPv4 address

Route reflectors use cluster id to avoid route reflection loops. When there is one route reflector in a cluster it usually uses its router id as a cluster id, but when there are more route reflectors in a cluster, these need to be configured (using this option) to use a common cluster id. Clients in a cluster need not know their cluster id and this option is not allowed for them. Default: the same as router id.

rs client

Be a route server and treat the neighbor as a route server client. A route server is used as a replacement for full mesh EBGP routing in Internet exchange points in a similar way to route reflectors used in IBGP routing. BIRD does not implement obsoleted RFC 1863, but uses ad-hoc implementation, which behaves like plain EBGP but reduces modifications to advertised route attributes to be transparent (for example does not prepend its AS number to AS PATH attribute and keeps MED attribute). Default: disabled.

secondary switch

Usually, if an import filter rejects a selected route, no other route is propagated for that network. This option allows to try the next route in order until one that is accepted is found or all routes for that network are rejected. This can be used for route servers that need to propagate different tables to each client but do not want to have these tables explicitly (to conserve memory). This option requires that the connected routing table is sorted. Default: off.

enable route refresh switch

When BGP speaker changes its import filter, it has to re-examine all routes received from its neighbor against the new filter. As these routes might not be available, there is a BGP protocol extension Route Refresh (specified in RFC 2918) that allows BGP speaker to request re-advertisement of all routes from its neighbor. This option specifies whether BIRD advertises this capability and accepts such requests. Even when disabled, BIRD can send route refresh requests. Default: on.

interpret communities switch

RFC 1997 demands that BGP speaker should process well-known communities like no-export (65535, 65281) or no-advertise (65535, 65282). For example, received route carrying a no-adverise community should not be advertised to any of its neighbors. If this option is enabled (which is by default), BIRD has such behavior automatically (it is evaluated when a route is exported to the BGP protocol just before the export filter). Otherwise, this integrated processing of well-known communities is disabled. In that case, similar behavior can be implemented in the export filter. Default: on.

enable as4 switch

BGP protocol was designed to use 2B AS numbers and was extended later to allow 4B AS number. BIRD supports 4B AS extension, but by disabling this option it can be persuaded not to advertise it and to maintain old-style sessions with its neighbors. This might be useful for circumventing bugs in neighbor's implementation of 4B AS extension. Even when disabled (off), BIRD behaves internally as AS4-aware BGP router. Default: on.

capabilities switch

Use capability advertisement to advertise optional capabilities. This is standard behavior for newer BGP implementations, but there might be some older BGP implementations that reject such connection attempts. When disabled (off), features that request it (4B AS support) are also disabled. Default: on, with automatic fallback to off when received capability-related error.

advertise ipv4 switch

Advertise IPv4 multiprotocol capability. This is not a correct behavior according to the strict interpretation of RFC 4760, but it is widespread and required by some BGP implementations (Cisco and Quagga). This option is relevant to IPv4 mode with enabled capability advertisement only. Default: on.

route limit number

The maximal number of routes that may be imported from the protocol. If the route limit is exceeded, the connection is closed with an error. Limit is currently implemented as import limit number action restart. This option is obsolete and it is replaced by import limit option. Default: no limit.

disable after error switch

When an error is encountered (either locally or by the other side), disable the instance automatically and wait for an administrator to fix the problem manually. Default: off.

hold time number

Time in seconds to wait for a Keepalive message from the other side before considering the connection stale. Default: depends on agreement with the neighboring router, we prefer 240 seconds if the other side is willing to accept it.

startup hold time number

Value of the hold timer used before the routers have a chance to exchange open messages and agree on the real value. Default: 240 seconds.

keepalive time number

Delay in seconds between sending of two consecutive Keepalive messages. Default: One third of the hold time.

connect retry time number

Time in seconds to wait before retrying a failed attempt to connect. Default: 120 seconds.

start delay time number

Delay in seconds between protocol startup and the first attempt to connect. Default: 5 seconds.

error wait time number,number

Minimum and maximum delay in seconds between a protocol failure (either local or reported by the peer) and automatic restart. Doesn't apply when disable after error is configured. If consecutive errors happen, the delay is increased exponentially until it reaches the maximum. Default: 60, 300.

error forget time number

Maximum time in seconds between two protocol failures to treat them as a error sequence which makes the error wait time increase exponentially. Default: 300 seconds.

path metric switch

Enable comparison of path lengths when deciding which BGP route is the best one. Default: on.

med metric switch

Enable comparison of MED attributes (during best route selection) even between routes received from different ASes. This may be useful if all MED attributes contain some consistent metric, perhaps enforced in import filters of AS boundary routers. If this option is disabled, MED attributes are compared only if routes are received from the same AS (which is the standard behavior). Default: off.

deterministic med switch

BGP route selection algorithm is often viewed as a comparison between individual routes (e.g. if a new route appears and is better than the current best one, it is chosen as the new best one). But the proper route selection, as specified by RFC 4271, cannot be fully implemented in that way. The problem is mainly in handling the MED attribute. BIRD, by default, uses an simplification based on individual route comparison, which in some cases may lead to temporally dependent behavior (i.e. the selection is dependent on the order in which routes appeared). This option enables a different (and slower) algorithm implementing proper RFC 4271 route selection, which is deterministic. Alternative way how to get deterministic behavior is to use med metric option. This option is incompatible with sorted tables. Default: off.

igp metric switch

Enable comparison of internal distances to boundary routers during best route selection. Default: on.

prefer older switch

Standard route selection algorithm breaks ties by comparing router IDs. This changes the behavior to prefer older routes (when both are external and from different peer). For details, see RFC 5004. Default: off.

default bgp_med number

Value of the Multiple Exit Discriminator to be used during route selection when the MED attribute is missing. Default: 0.

default bgp_local_pref number

A default value for the Local Preference attribute. It is used when a new Local Preference attribute is attached to a route by the BGP protocol itself (for example, if a route is received through eBGP and therefore does not have such attribute). Default: 100 (0 in pre-1.2.0 versions of BIRD).

Attributes

BGP defines several route attributes. Some of them (those marked with `I' in the table below) are available on internal BGP connections only, some of them (marked with `O') are optional.

bgppath bgp_path

Sequence of AS numbers describing the AS path the packet will travel through when forwarded according to the particular route. In case of internal BGP it doesn't contain the number of the local AS.

int bgp_local_pref [I]

Local preference value used for selection among multiple BGP routes (see the selection rules above). It's used as an additional metric which is propagated through the whole local AS.

int bgp_med [O]

The Multiple Exit Discriminator of the route is an optional attribute which is used on external (inter-AS) links to convey to an adjacent AS the optimal entry point into the local AS. The received attribute is also propagated over internal BGP links. The attribute value is zeroed when a route is exported to an external BGP instance to ensure that the attribute received from a neighboring AS is not propagated to other neighboring ASes. A new value might be set in the export filter of an external BGP instance. See RFC 4451 ftp://ftp.rfc-editor.org/in-notes/rfc4451.txt for further discussion of BGP MED attribute.

enum bgp_origin

Origin of the route: either ORIGIN_IGP if the route has originated in an interior routing protocol or ORIGIN_EGP if it's been imported from the EGP protocol (nowadays it seems to be obsolete) or ORIGIN_INCOMPLETE if the origin is unknown.

ip bgp_next_hop

Next hop to be used for forwarding of packets to this destination. On internal BGP connections, it's an address of the originating router if it's inside the local AS or a boundary router the packet will leave the AS through if it's an exterior route, so each BGP speaker within the AS has a chance to use the shortest interior path possible to this point.

void bgp_atomic_aggr [O]

This is an optional attribute which carries no value, but the sole presence of which indicates that the route has been aggregated from multiple routes by some router on the path from the originator.

clist bgp_community [O]

List of community values associated with the route. Each such value is a pair (represented as a pair data type inside the filters) of 16-bit integers, the first of them containing the number of the AS which defines the community and the second one being a per-AS identifier. There are lots of uses of the community mechanism, but generally they are used to carry policy information like "don't export to USA peers". As each AS can define its own routing policy, it also has a complete freedom about which community attributes it defines and what will their semantics be.

eclist bgp_ext_community [O]

List of extended community values associated with the route. Extended communities have similar usage as plain communities, but they have an extended range (to allow 4B ASNs) and a nontrivial structure with a type field. Individual community values are represented using an ec data type inside the filters.

quad bgp_originator_id [I, O]

This attribute is created by the route reflector when reflecting the route and contains the router ID of the originator of the route in the local AS.

clist bgp_cluster_list [I, O]

This attribute contains a list of cluster IDs of route reflectors. Each route reflector prepends its cluster ID when reflecting the route.

Example

protocol bgp {
        local as 65000;                      # Use a private AS number
        neighbor 198.51.100.130 as 64496;    # Our neighbor ...
        multihop;                            # ... which is connected indirectly
        export filter {                      # We use non-trivial export rules
                if source = RTS_STATIC then { # Export only static routes
                        # Assign our community
                        bgp_community.add((65000,64501));
                        # Artificially increase path length
                        # by advertising local AS number twice
                        if bgp_path ~ [= 65000 =] then
                                bgp_path.prepend(65000);
                        accept;
                }
                reject;
        };
        import all;
        source address 198.51.100.14;   # Use a non-standard source address
}

6.2 Device

The Device protocol is not a real routing protocol. It doesn't generate any routes and it only serves as a module for getting information about network interfaces from the kernel.

Except for very unusual circumstances, you probably should include this protocol in the configuration since almost all other protocols require network interfaces to be defined for them to work with.

Configuration

scan time number

Time in seconds between two scans of the network interface list. On systems where we are notified about interface status changes asynchronously (such as newer versions of Linux), we need to scan the list only in order to avoid confusion by lost notification messages, so the default time is set to a large value.

primary [ "mask" ] prefix

If a network interface has more than one network address, BIRD has to choose one of them as a primary one. By default, BIRD chooses the lexicographically smallest address as the primary one.

This option allows to specify which network address should be chosen as a primary one. Network addresses that match prefix are preferred to non-matching addresses. If more primary options are used, the first one has the highest preference. If "mask" is specified, then such primary option is relevant only to matching network interfaces.

In all cases, an address marked by operating system as secondary cannot be chosen as the primary one.

As the Device protocol doesn't generate any routes, it cannot have any attributes. Example configuration looks like this:

protocol device {
        scan time 10;           # Scan the interfaces often
        primary "eth0" 192.168.1.1;
        primary 192.168.0.0/16;
}

6.3 Direct

The Direct protocol is a simple generator of device routes for all the directly connected networks according to the list of interfaces provided by the kernel via the Device protocol.

The question is whether it is a good idea to have such device routes in BIRD routing table. OS kernel usually handles device routes for directly connected networks by itself so we don't need (and don't want) to export these routes to the kernel protocol. OSPF protocol creates device routes for its interfaces itself and BGP protocol is usually used for exporting aggregate routes. Although there are some use cases that use the direct protocol (like abusing eBGP as an IGP routing protocol), in most cases it is not needed to have these device routes in BIRD routing table and to use the direct protocol.

There is one notable case when you definitely want to use the direct protocol -- running BIRD on BSD systems. Having high priority device routes for directly connected networks from the direct protocol protects kernel device routes from being overwritten or removed by IGP routes during some transient network conditions, because a lower priority IGP route for the same network is not exported to the kernel routing table. This is an issue on BSD systems only, as on Linux systems BIRD cannot change non-BIRD route in the kernel routing table.

The only configurable thing about direct is what interfaces it watches:

interface pattern [, ...]: By default, the Direct protocol will generate device routes for all the interfaces available. If you want to restrict it to some subset of interfaces (for example if you're using multiple routing tables for policy routing and some of the policy domains don't contain all interfaces), just use this clause.

Direct device routes don't contain any specific attributes.

Example config might look like this:

protocol direct {
        interface "-arc*", "*";         # Exclude the ARCnets
}

6.4 Kernel

The Kernel protocol is not a real routing protocol. Instead of communicating with other routers in the network, it performs synchronization of BIRD's routing tables with the OS kernel. Basically, it sends all routing table updates to the kernel and from time to time it scans the kernel tables to see whether some routes have disappeared (for example due to unnoticed up/down transition of an interface) or whether an `alien' route has been added by someone else (depending on the learn switch, such routes are either ignored or accepted to our table).

Unfortunately, there is one thing that makes the routing table synchronization a bit more complicated. In the kernel routing table there are also device routes for directly connected networks. These routes are usually managed by OS itself (as a part of IP address configuration) and we don't want to touch that. They are completely ignored during the scan of the kernel tables and also the export of device routes from BIRD tables to kernel routing tables is restricted to prevent accidental interference. This restriction can be disabled using device routes switch.

If your OS supports only a single routing table, you can configure only one instance of the Kernel protocol. If it supports multiple tables (in order to allow policy routing; such an OS is for example Linux), you can run as many instances as you want, but each of them must be connected to a different BIRD routing table and to a different kernel table.

Because the kernel protocol is partially integrated with the connected routing table, there are two limitations - it is not possible to connect more kernel protocols to the same routing table and changing route destination/gateway in an export filter of a kernel protocol does not work. Both limitations can be overcome using another routing table and the pipe protocol.

Configuration

persist switch

Tell BIRD to leave all its routes in the routing tables when it exits (instead of cleaning them up).

scan time number

Time in seconds between two consecutive scans of the kernel routing table.

learn switch

Enable learning of routes added to the kernel routing tables by other routing daemons or by the system administrator. This is possible only on systems which support identification of route authorship.

device routes switch

Enable export of device routes to the kernel routing table. By default, such routes are rejected (with the exception of explicitly configured device routes from the static protocol) regardless of the export filter to protect device routes in kernel routing table (managed by OS itself) from accidental overwriting or erasing.

kernel table number

Select which kernel table should this particular instance of the Kernel protocol work with. Available only on systems supporting multiple routing tables.

Attributes

The Kernel protocol defines several attributes. These attributes are translated to appropriate system (and OS-specific) route attributes. We support these attributes:

int krt_source

The original source of the imported kernel route. The value is system-dependent. On Linux, it is a value of the protocol field of the route. See /etc/iproute2/rt_protos for common values. On BSD, it is based on STATIC and PROTOx flags. The attribute is read-only.

int krt_metric

The kernel metric of the route. When multiple same routes are in a kernel routing table, the Linux kernel chooses one with lower metric.

ip krt_prefsrc

(Linux) The preferred source address. Used in source address selection for outgoing packets. Have to be one of IP addresses of the router.

int krt_realm

(Linux) The realm of the route. Can be used for traffic classification.

Example

A simple configuration can look this way:

protocol kernel {
        export all;
}

Or for a system with two routing tables:

protocol kernel {               # Primary routing table
        learn;                  # Learn alien routes from the kernel
        persist;                # Don't remove routes on bird shutdown
        scan time 10;           # Scan kernel routing table every 10 seconds
        import all;
        export all;
}

protocol kernel {               # Secondary routing table
        table auxtable;
        kernel table 100;
        export all;
}

6.5 OSPF

Introduction

Open Shortest Path First (OSPF) is a quite complex interior gateway protocol. The current IPv4 version (OSPFv2) is defined in RFC 2328 ftp://ftp.rfc-editor.org/in-notes/rfc2328.txt and the current IPv6 version (OSPFv3) is defined in RFC 5340 ftp://ftp.rfc-editor.org/in-notes/rfc5340.txt It's a link state (a.k.a. shortest path first) protocol -- each router maintains a database describing the autonomous system's topology. Each participating router has an identical copy of the database and all routers run the same algorithm calculating a shortest path tree with themselves as a root. OSPF chooses the least cost path as the best path.

In OSPF, the autonomous system can be split to several areas in order to reduce the amount of resources consumed for exchanging the routing information and to protect the other areas from incorrect routing data. Topology of the area is hidden to the rest of the autonomous system.

Another very important feature of OSPF is that it can keep routing information from other protocols (like Static or BGP) in its link state database as external routes. Each external route can be tagged by the advertising router, making it possible to pass additional information between routers on the boundary of the autonomous system.

OSPF quickly detects topological changes in the autonomous system (such as router interface failures) and calculates new loop-free routes after a short period of convergence. Only a minimal amount of routing traffic is involved.

Each router participating in OSPF routing periodically sends Hello messages to all its interfaces. This allows neighbors to be discovered dynamically. Then the neighbors exchange theirs parts of the link state database and keep it identical by flooding updates. The flooding process is reliable and ensures that each router detects all changes.

Configuration

In the main part of configuration, there can be multiple definitions of OSPF areas, each with a different id. These definitions includes many other switches and multiple definitions of interfaces. Definition of interface may contain many switches and constant definitions and list of neighbors on nonbroadcast networks.

protocol ospf <name> {
        rfc1583compat <switch>;
        stub router <switch>;
        tick <num>;
        ecmp <switch> [limit <num>];
        area <id> {
                stub;
                nssa;
                summary <switch>;
                default nssa <switch>;
                default cost <num>;
                default cost2 <num>;
                translator <switch>;
                translator stability <num>;

                networks {
                        <prefix>;
                        <prefix> hidden;
                }
                external {
                        <prefix>;
                        <prefix> hidden;
                        <prefix> tag <num>;
                }
                stubnet <prefix>;
                stubnet <prefix> {
                        hidden <switch>;
                        summary <switch>;
                        cost <num>;
                }
                interface <interface pattern> [instance <num>] {
                        cost <num>;
                        stub <switch>;
                        hello <num>;
                        poll <num>;
                        retransmit <num>;
                        priority <num>;
                        wait <num>;
                        dead count <num>;
                        dead <num>;
                        rx buffer [normal|large|<num>];
                        type [broadcast|bcast|pointopoint|ptp|
                                nonbroadcast|nbma|pointomultipoint|ptmp];
                        strict nonbroadcast <switch>;
                        real broadcast <switch>;
                        ptp netmask <switch>;
                        check link <switch>;
                        ecmp weight <num>;
                        ttl security [<switch>; | tx only]
                        tx class|dscp <num>;
                        tx priority <num>;
                        authentication [none|simple|cryptographic];
                        password "<text>";
                        password "<text>" {
                                id <num>;
                                generate from "<date>";
                                generate to "<date>";
                                accept from "<date>";
                                accept to "<date>";
                        };
                        neighbors {
                                <ip>;
                                <ip> eligible;
                        };
                };
                virtual link <id> [instance <num>] {
                        hello <num>;
                        retransmit <num>;
                        wait <num>;
                        dead count <num>;
                        dead <num>;
                        authentication [none|simple|cryptographic];
                        password "<text>";
                };
        };
}

rfc1583compat switch

This option controls compatibility of routing table calculation with RFC 1583 ftp://ftp.rfc-editor.org/in-notes/rfc1583.txt. Default value is no.

stub router switch

This option configures the router to be a stub router, i.e., a router that participates in the OSPF topology but does not allow transit traffic. In OSPFv2, this is implemented by advertising maximum metric for outgoing links, as suggested by RFC 3137 ftp://ftp.rfc-editor.org/in-notes/rfc3137.txt. In OSPFv3, the stub router behavior is announced by clearing the R-bit in the router LSA. Default value is no.

tick num

The routing table calculation and clean-up of areas' databases is not performed when a single link state change arrives. To lower the CPU utilization, it's processed later at periodical intervals of num seconds. The default value is 1.

ecmp switch [limit number]

This option specifies whether OSPF is allowed to generate ECMP (equal-cost multipath) routes. Such routes are used when there are several directions to the destination, each with the same (computed) cost. This option also allows to specify a limit on maximal number of nexthops in one route. By default, ECMP is disabled. If enabled, default value of the limit is 16.

area id

This defines an OSPF area with given area ID (an integer or an IPv4 address, similarly to a router ID). The most important area is the backbone (ID 0) to which every other area must be connected.

stub

This option configures the area to be a stub area. External routes are not flooded into stub areas. Also summary LSAs can be limited in stub areas (see option summary). By default, the area is not a stub area.

nssa

This option configures the area to be a NSSA (Not-So-Stubby Area). NSSA is a variant of a stub area which allows a limited way of external route propagation. Global external routes are not propagated into a NSSA, but an external route can be imported into NSSA as a (area-wide) NSSA-LSA (and possibly translated and/or aggregated on area boundary). By default, the area is not NSSA.

summary switch

This option controls propagation of summary LSAs into stub or NSSA areas. If enabled, summary LSAs are propagated as usual, otherwise just the default summary route (0.0.0.0/0) is propagated (this is sometimes called totally stubby area). If a stub area has more area boundary routers, propagating summary LSAs could lead to more efficient routing at the cost of larger link state database. Default value is no.

default nssa switch

When summary option is enabled, default summary route is no longer propagated to the NSSA. In that case, this option allows to originate default route as NSSA-LSA to the NSSA. Default value is no.

default cost num

This option controls the cost of a default route propagated to stub and NSSA areas. Default value is 1000.

default cost2 num

When a default route is originated as NSSA-LSA, its cost can use either type 1 or type 2 metric. This option allows to specify the cost of a default route in type 2 metric. By default, type 1 metric (option default cost) is used.

translator switch

This option controls translation of NSSA-LSAs into external LSAs. By default, one translator per NSSA is automatically elected from area boundary routers. If enabled, this area boundary router would unconditionally translate all NSSA-LSAs regardless of translator election. Default value is no.

translator stability num

This option controls the translator stability interval (in seconds). When the new translator is elected, the old one keeps translating until the interval is over. Default value is 40.

networks { set }

Definition of area IP ranges. This is used in summary LSA origination. Hidden networks are not propagated into other areas.

external { set }

Definition of external area IP ranges for NSSAs. This is used for NSSA-LSA translation. Hidden networks are not translated into external LSAs. Networks can have configured route tag.

stubnet prefix { options }

Stub networks are networks that are not transit networks between OSPF routers. They are also propagated through an OSPF area as a part of a link state database. By default, BIRD generates a stub network record for each primary network address on each OSPF interface that does not have any OSPF neighbors, and also for each non-primary network address on each OSPF interface. This option allows to alter a set of stub networks propagated by this router.

Each instance of this option adds a stub network with given network prefix to the set of propagated stub network, unless option hidden is used. It also suppresses default stub networks for given network prefix. When option summary is used, also default stub networks that are subnetworks of given stub network are suppressed. This might be used, for example, to aggregate generated stub networks.

interface pattern [instance num]

Defines that the specified interfaces belong to the area being defined. See interface common option for detailed description. In OSPFv3, you can specify instance ID for that interface description, so it is possible to have several instances of that interface with different options or even in different areas.

virtual link id [instance num]

Virtual link to router with the router id. Virtual link acts as a point-to-point interface belonging to backbone. The actual area is used as transport area. This item cannot be in the backbone. In OSPFv3, you could also use several virtual links to one destination with different instance IDs.

cost num

Specifies output cost (metric) of an interface. Default value is 10.

stub switch

If set to interface it does not listen to any packet and does not send any hello. Default value is no.

hello num

Specifies interval in seconds between sending of Hello messages. Beware, all routers on the same network need to have the same hello interval. Default value is 10.

poll num

Specifies interval in seconds between sending of Hello messages for some neighbors on NBMA network. Default value is 20.

retransmit num

Specifies interval in seconds between retransmissions of unacknowledged updates. Default value is 5.

priority num

On every multiple access network (e.g., the Ethernet) Designed Router and Backup Designed router are elected. These routers have some special functions in the flooding process. Higher priority increases preferences in this election. Routers with priority 0 are not eligible. Default value is 1.

wait num

After start, router waits for the specified number of seconds between starting election and building adjacency. Default value is 40.

dead count num

When the router does not receive any messages from a neighbor in dead count*hello seconds, it will consider the neighbor down.

dead num

When the router does not receive any messages from a neighbor in dead seconds, it will consider the neighbor down. If both directives dead count and dead are used, dead has precendence.

rx buffer num

This sets the size of buffer used for receiving packets. The buffer should be bigger than maximal size of any packets. Value NORMAL (default) means 2*MTU, value LARGE means maximal allowed packet - 65535.

type broadcast|bcast

BIRD detects a type of a connected network automatically, but sometimes it's convenient to force use of a different type manually. On broadcast networks (like ethernet), flooding and Hello messages are sent using multicasts (a single packet for all the neighbors). A designated router is elected and it is responsible for synchronizing the link-state databases and originating network LSAs. This network type cannot be used on physically NBMA networks and on unnumbered networks (networks without proper IP prefix).

type pointopoint|ptp

Point-to-point networks connect just 2 routers together. No election is performed and no network LSA is originated, which makes it simpler and faster to establish. This network type is useful not only for physically PtP ifaces (like PPP or tunnels), but also for broadcast networks used as PtP links. This network type cannot be used on physically NBMA networks.

type nonbroadcast|nbma

On NBMA networks, the packets are sent to each neighbor separately because of lack of multicast capabilities. Like on broadcast networks, a designated router is elected, which plays a central role in propagation of LSAs. This network type cannot be used on unnumbered networks.

type pointomultipoint|ptmp

This is another network type designed to handle NBMA networks. In this case the NBMA network is treated as a collection of PtP links. This is useful if not every pair of routers on the NBMA network has direct communication, or if the NBMA network is used as an (possibly unnumbered) PtP link.

strict nonbroadcast switch

If set, don't send hello to any undefined neighbor. This switch is ignored on other than NBMA or PtMP networks. Default value is no.

real broadcast switch

In type broadcast or type ptp network configuration, OSPF packets are sent as IP multicast packets. This option changes the behavior to using old-fashioned IP broadcast packets. This may be useful as a workaround if IP multicast for some reason does not work or does not work reliably. This is a non-standard option and probably is not interoperable with other OSPF implementations. Default value is no.

ptp netmask switch

In type ptp network configurations, OSPFv2 implementations should ignore received netmask field in hello packets and should send hello packets with zero netmask field on unnumbered PtP links. But some OSPFv2 implementations perform netmask checking even for PtP links. This option specifies whether real netmask will be used in hello packets on type ptp interfaces. You should ignore this option unless you meet some compatibility problems related to this issue. Default value is no for unnumbered PtP links, yes otherwise.

check link switch

If set, a hardware link state (reported by OS) is taken into consideration. When a link disappears (e.g. an ethernet cable is unplugged), neighbors are immediately considered unreachable and only the address of the iface (instead of whole network prefix) is propagated. It is possible that some hardware drivers or platforms do not implement this feature. Default value is no.

ttl security [switch | tx only]

TTL security is a feature that protects routing protocols from remote spoofed packets by using TTL 255 instead of TTL 1 for protocol packets destined to neighbors. Because TTL is decremented when packets are forwarded, it is non-trivial to spoof packets with TTL 255 from remote locations. Note that this option would interfere with OSPF virtual links.

If this option is enabled, the router will send OSPF packets with TTL 255 and drop received packets with TTL less than 255. If this option si set to tx only, TTL 255 is used for sent packets, but is not checked for received packets. Default value is no.

tx class|dscp|priority num

These options specify the ToS/DiffServ/Traffic class/Priority of the outgoing OSPF packets. See tx class common option for detailed description.

ecmp weight num

When ECMP (multipath) routes are allowed, this value specifies a relative weight used for nexthops going through the iface. Allowed values are 1-256. Default value is 1.

authentication none

No passwords are sent in OSPF packets. This is the default value.

authentication simple

Every packet carries 8 bytes of password. Received packets lacking this password are ignored. This authentication mechanism is very weak.

authentication cryptographic

16-byte long MD5 digest is appended to every packet. For the digest generation 16-byte long passwords are used. Those passwords are not sent via network, so this mechanism is quite secure. Packets can still be read by an attacker.

password "text"

An 8-byte or 16-byte password used for authentication. See password common option for detailed description.

neighbors { set }

A set of neighbors to which Hello messages on NBMA or PtMP networks are to be sent. For NBMA networks, some of them could be marked as eligible. In OSPFv3, link-local addresses should be used, using global ones is possible, but it is nonstandard and might be problematic. And definitely, link-local and global addresses should not be mixed.

Attributes

OSPF defines four route attributes. Each internal route has a metric. Metric is ranging from 1 to infinity (65535). External routes use metric type 1 or metric type 2. A metric of type 1 is comparable with internal metric, a metric of type 2 is always longer than any metric of type 1 or any internal metric. Internal metric or metric of type 1 is stored in attribute ospf_metric1, metric type 2 is stored in attribute ospf_metric2. If you specify both metrics only metric1 is used.

Each external route can also carry attribute ospf_tag which is a 32-bit integer which is used when exporting routes to other protocols; otherwise, it doesn't affect routing inside the OSPF domain at all. The fourth attribute ospf_router_id is a router ID of the router advertising that route/network. This attribute is read-only. Default is ospf_metric2 = 10000 and ospf_tag = 0.

Example

protocol ospf MyOSPF {
        rfc1583compat yes;
        tick 2;
        export filter {
                if source = RTS_BGP then {
                        ospf_metric1 = 100;
                        accept;
                }
                reject;
        };
        area 0.0.0.0 {
                interface "eth*" {
                        cost 11;
                        hello 15;
                        priority 100;
                        retransmit 7;
                        authentication simple;
                        password "aaa";
                };
                interface "ppp*" {
                        cost 100;
                        authentication cryptographic;
                        password "abc" {
                                id 1;
                                generate to "22-04-2003 11:00:06";
                                accept from "17-01-2001 12:01:05";
                        };
                        password "def" {
                                id 2;
                                generate to "22-07-2005 17:03:21";
                                accept from "22-02-2001 11:34:06";
                        };
                };
                interface "arc0" {
                        cost 10;
                        stub yes;
                };
                interface "arc1";
        };
        area 120 {
                stub yes;
                networks {
                        172.16.1.0/24;
                        172.16.2.0/24 hidden;
                }
                interface "-arc0" , "arc*" {
                        type nonbroadcast;
                        authentication none;
                        strict nonbroadcast yes;
                        wait 120;
                        poll 40;
                        dead count 8;
                        neighbors {
                                192.168.120.1 eligible;
                                192.168.120.2;
                                192.168.120.10;
                        };
                };
        };
}

6.6 Pipe

Introduction

The Pipe protocol serves as a link between two routing tables, allowing routes to be passed from a table declared as primary (i.e., the one the pipe is connected to using the table configuration keyword) to the secondary one (declared using peer table) and vice versa, depending on what's allowed by the filters. Export filters control export of routes from the primary table to the secondary one, import filters control the opposite direction.

The Pipe protocol may work in the transparent mode mode or in the opaque mode. In the transparent mode, the Pipe protocol retransmits all routes from one table to the other table, retaining their original source and attributes. If import and export filters are set to accept, then both tables would have the same content. The transparent mode is the default mode.

In the opaque mode, the Pipe protocol retransmits optimal route from one table to the other table in a similar way like other protocols send and receive routes. Retransmitted route will have the source set to the Pipe protocol, which may limit access to protocol specific route attributes. This mode is mainly for compatibility, it is not suggested for new configs. The mode can be changed by mode option.

The primary use of multiple routing tables and the Pipe protocol is for policy routing, where handling of a single packet doesn't depend only on its destination address, but also on its source address, source interface, protocol type and other similar parameters. In many systems (Linux being a good example), the kernel allows to enforce routing policies by defining routing rules which choose one of several routing tables to be used for a packet according to its parameters. Setting of these rules is outside the scope of BIRD's work (on Linux, you can use the ip command), but you can create several routing tables in BIRD, connect them to the kernel ones, use filters to control which routes appear in which tables and also you can employ the Pipe protocol for exporting a selected subset of one table to another one.

Configuration

peer table table

Defines secondary routing table to connect to. The primary one is selected by the table keyword.

mode opaque|transparent

Specifies the mode for the pipe to work in. Default is transparent.

Attributes

The Pipe protocol doesn't define any route attributes.

Example

Let's consider a router which serves as a boundary router of two different autonomous systems, each of them connected to a subset of interfaces of the router, having its own exterior connectivity and wishing to use the other AS as a backup connectivity in case of outage of its own exterior line.

Probably the simplest solution to this situation is to use two routing tables (we'll call them as1 and as2) and set up kernel routing rules, so that packets having arrived from interfaces belonging to the first AS will be routed according to as1 and similarly for the second AS. Thus we have split our router to two logical routers, each one acting on its own routing table, having its own routing protocols on its own interfaces. In order to use the other AS's routes for backup purposes, we can pass the routes between the tables through a Pipe protocol while decreasing their preferences and correcting their BGP paths to reflect the AS boundary crossing.

table as1;                              # Define the tables
table as2;

protocol kernel kern1 {                 # Synchronize them with the kernel
        table as1;
        kernel table 1;
}

protocol kernel kern2 {
        table as2;
        kernel table 2;
}

protocol bgp bgp1 {                     # The outside connections
        table as1;
        local as 1;
        neighbor 192.168.0.1 as 1001;
        export all;
        import all;
}

protocol bgp bgp2 {
        table as2;
        local as 2;
        neighbor 10.0.0.1 as 1002;
        export all;
        import all;
}

protocol pipe {                         # The Pipe
        table as1;
        peer table as2;
        export filter {
                if net ~ [ 1.0.0.0/8+] then {   # Only AS1 networks
                        if preference>10 then preference = preference-10;
                        if source=RTS_BGP then bgp_path.prepend(1);
                        accept;
                }
                reject;
        };
        import filter {
                if net ~ [ 2.0.0.0/8+] then {   # Only AS2 networks
                        if preference>10 then preference = preference-10;
                        if source=RTS_BGP then bgp_path.prepend(2);
                        accept;
                }
                reject;
        };
}

6.7 RAdv

Introduction

The RAdv protocol is an implementation of Router Advertisements, which are used in the IPv6 stateless autoconfiguration. IPv6 routers send (in irregular time intervals or as an answer to a request) advertisement packets to connected networks. These packets contain basic information about a local network (e.g. a list of network prefixes), which allows network hosts to autoconfigure network addresses and choose a default route. BIRD implements router behavior as defined in RFC 4861 ftp://ftp.rfc-editor.org/in-notes/rfc4861.txt and also the DNS extensions from RFC 6106 ftp://ftp.rfc-editor.org/in-notes/rfc6106.txt.

Configuration

There are several classes of definitions in RAdv configuration -- interface definitions, prefix definitions and DNS definitions:

interface pattern [, ...] { options }

Interface definitions specify a set of interfaces on which the protocol is activated and contain interface specific options. See interface common options for detailed description.

prefix prefix { options }

Prefix definitions allow to modify a list of advertised prefixes. By default, the advertised prefixes are the same as the network prefixes assigned to the interface. For each network prefix, the matching prefix definition is found and its options are used. If no matching prefix definition is found, the prefix is used with default options.

Prefix definitions can be either global or interface-specific. The second ones are part of interface options. The prefix definition matching is done in the first-match style, when interface-specific definitions are processed before global definitions. As expected, the prefix definition is matching if the network prefix is a subnet of the prefix in prefix definition.

rdnss { options }

RDNSS definitions allow to specify a list of advertised recursive DNS servers together with their options. As options are seldom necessary, there is also a short variant rdnss address that just specifies one DNS server. Multiple definitions are cumulative. RDNSS definitions may also be interface-specific when used inside interface options. By default, interface uses both global and interface-specific options, but that can be changed by rdnss local option.

dnssl { options }

DNSSL definitions allow to specify a list of advertised DNS search domains together with their options. Like rdnss above, multiple definitions are cumulative, they can be used also as interface-specific options and there is a short variant dnssl domain that just specifies one DNS search domain.

trigger prefix

RAdv protocol could be configured to change its behavior based on availability of routes. When this option is used, the protocol waits in suppressed state until a trigger route (for the specified network) is exported to the protocol, the protocol also returnsd to suppressed state if the trigger route disappears. Note that route export depends on specified export filter, as usual. This option could be used, e.g., for handling failover in multihoming scenarios.

During suppressed state, router advertisements are generated, but with some fields zeroed. Exact behavior depends on which fields are zeroed, this can be configured by sensitive option for appropriate fields. By default, just default lifetime (also called router lifetime) is zeroed, which means hosts cannot use the router as a default router. preferred lifetime and valid lifetime could also be configured as sensitive for a prefix, which would cause autoconfigured IPs to be deprecated or even removed.

Interface specific options:

max ra interval expr

Unsolicited router advertisements are sent in irregular time intervals. This option specifies the maximum length of these intervals, in seconds. Valid values are 4-1800. Default: 600

min ra interval expr

This option specifies the minimum length of that intervals, in seconds. Must be at least 3 and at most 3/4 * max ra interval. Default: about 1/3 * max ra interval.

min delay expr

The minimum delay between two consecutive router advertisements, in seconds. Default: 3

managed switch

This option specifies whether hosts should use DHCPv6 for IP address configuration. Default: no

other config switch

This option specifies whether hosts should use DHCPv6 to receive other configuration information. Default: no

link mtu expr

This option specifies which value of MTU should be used by hosts. 0 means unspecified. Default: 0

reachable time expr

This option specifies the time (in milliseconds) how long hosts should assume a neighbor is reachable (from the last confirmation). Maximum is 3600000, 0 means unspecified. Default 0.

retrans timer expr

This option specifies the time (in milliseconds) how long hosts should wait before retransmitting Neighbor Solicitation messages. 0 means unspecified. Default 0.

current hop limit expr

This option specifies which value of Hop Limit should be used by hosts. Valid values are 0-255, 0 means unspecified. Default: 64

default lifetime expr [sensitive switch]

This option specifies the time (in seconds) how long (after the receipt of RA) hosts may use the router as a default router. 0 means do not use as a default router. For sensitive option, see trigger. Default: 3 * max ra interval, sensitive yes.

rdnss local switch

Use only local (interface-specific) RDNSS definitions for this interface. Otherwise, both global and local definitions are used. Could also be used to disable RDNSS for given interface if no local definitons are specified. Default: no.

dnssl local switch

Use only local DNSSL definitions for this interface. See rdnss local option above. Default: no.

Prefix specific options:

skip switch

This option allows to specify that given prefix should not be advertised. This is useful for making exceptions from a default policy of advertising all prefixes. Note that for withdrawing an already advertised prefix it is more useful to advertise it with zero valid lifetime. Default: no

onlink switch

This option specifies whether hosts may use the advertised prefix for onlink determination. Default: yes

autonomous switch

This option specifies whether hosts may use the advertised prefix for stateless autoconfiguration. Default: yes

valid lifetime expr [sensitive switch]

This option specifies the time (in seconds) how long (after the receipt of RA) the prefix information is valid, i.e., autoconfigured IP addresses can be assigned and hosts with that IP addresses are considered directly reachable. 0 means the prefix is no longer valid. For sensitive option, see trigger. Default: 86400 (1 day), sensitive no.

preferred lifetime expr [sensitive switch]

This option specifies the time (in seconds) how long (after the receipt of RA) IP addresses generated from the prefix using stateless autoconfiguration remain preferred. For sensitive option, see trigger. Default: 14400 (4 hours), sensitive no.

RDNSS specific options:

ns address

This option specifies one recursive DNS server. Can be used multiple times for multiple servers. It is mandatory to have at least one ns option in rdnss definition.

lifetime [mult] expr

This option specifies the time how long the RDNSS information may be used by clients after the receipt of RA. It is expressed either in seconds or (when mult is used) in multiples of max ra interval. Note that RDNSS information is also invalidated when default lifetime expires. 0 means these addresses are no longer valid DNS servers. Default: 3 * max ra interval.

DNSSL specific options:

domain address

This option specifies one DNS search domain. Can be used multiple times for multiple domains. It is mandatory to have at least one domain option in dnssl definition.

lifetime [mult] expr

This option specifies the time how long the DNSSL information may be used by clients after the receipt of RA. Details are the same as for RDNSS lifetime option above. Default: 3 * max ra interval.

Example

protocol radv {
        interface "eth2" {
                max ra interval 5;      # Fast failover with more routers
                managed yes;            # Using DHCPv6 on eth2
                prefix ::/0 {
                        autonomous off; # So do not autoconfigure any IP
                };
        };

        interface "eth*";               # No need for any other options

        prefix 2001:0DB8:1234::/48 {
                preferred lifetime 0;   # Deprecated address range
        };

        prefix 2001:0DB8:2000::/48 {
                autonomous off;         # Do not autoconfigure
        };

        rdnss 2001:0DB8:1234::10;       # Short form of RDNSS

        rdnss {
                lifetime mult 10;
                ns 2001:0DB8:1234::11;
                ns 2001:0DB8:1234::12;
        };

        dnssl {
                lifetime 3600;
                domain "abc.com";
                domain "xyz.com";
        };
}

6.8 RIP

Introduction

The RIP protocol (also sometimes called Rest In Pieces) is a simple protocol, where each router broadcasts (to all its neighbors) distances to all networks it can reach. When a router hears distance to another network, it increments it and broadcasts it back. Broadcasts are done in regular intervals. Therefore, if some network goes unreachable, routers keep telling each other that its distance is the original distance plus 1 (actually, plus interface metric, which is usually one). After some time, the distance reaches infinity (that's 15 in RIP) and all routers know that network is unreachable. RIP tries to minimize situations where counting to infinity is necessary, because it is slow. Due to infinity being 16, you can't use RIP on networks where maximal distance is higher than 15 hosts. You can read more about RIP at http://www.ietf.org/html.charters/rip-charter.html. Both IPv4 (RFC 1723 ftp://ftp.rfc-editor.org/in-notes/rfc1723.txt) and IPv6 (RFC 2080 ftp://ftp.rfc-editor.org/in-notes/rfc2080.txt) versions of RIP are supported by BIRD, historical RIPv1 (RFC 1058 ftp://ftp.rfc-editor.org/in-notes/rfc1058.txt)is not currently supported. RIPv4 MD5 authentication (RFC 2082 ftp://ftp.rfc-editor.org/in-notes/rfc2082.txt) is supported.

RIP is a very simple protocol, and it has a lot of shortcomings. Slow convergence, big network load and inability to handle larger networks makes it pretty much obsolete. (It is still usable on very small networks.)

Configuration

In addition to options common for all to other protocols, RIP supports the following ones:

authentication none|plaintext|md5

selects authentication method to be used. none means that packets are not authenticated at all, plaintext means that a plaintext password is embedded into each packet, and md5 means that packets are authenticated using a MD5 cryptographic hash. If you set authentication to not-none, it is a good idea to add password section. Default: none.

honor always|neighbor|never

specifies when should requests for dumping routing table be honored. (Always, when sent from a host on a directly connected network or never.) Routing table updates are honored only from neighbors, that is not configurable. Default: never.

There are some options that can be specified per-interface:

metric num

This option specifies the metric of the interface. Valid

mode multicast|broadcast|quiet|nolisten|version1

This option selects the mode for RIP to work in. If nothing is specified, RIP runs in multicast mode. version1 is currently equivalent to broadcast, and it makes RIP talk to a broadcast address even through multicast mode is possible. quiet option means that RIP will not transmit any periodic messages to this interface and nolisten means that RIP will send to this interface butnot listen to it.

ttl security [switch | tx only]

If this option is enabled, the router will send RIP packets with TTL 255 and drop received packets with TTL less than 255. If this option si set to tx only, TTL 255 is used for sent packets, but is not checked for received packets. Such setting does not offer protection, but offers compatibility with neighbors regardless of whether they use ttl security.

Note that for RIPng, TTL security is a standard behavior (required by RFC 2080), but BIRD uses tx only by default, for compatibility with older versions. For IPv4 RIP, default value is no.

tx class|dscp|priority num

These options specify the ToS/DiffServ/Traffic class/Priority of the outgoing RIP packets. See tx class common option for detailed description.

The following options generally override behavior specified in RFC. If you use any of these options, BIRD will no longer be RFC-compliant, which means it will not be able to talk to anything other than equally configured BIRD. I have warned you.

port number

selects IP port to operate on, default 520. (This is useful when testing BIRD, if you set this to an address >1024, you will not need to run bird with UID==0).

infinity number

selects the value of infinity, default is 16. Bigger values will make protocol convergence even slower.

period number

specifies the number of seconds between periodic updates. Default is 30 seconds. A lower number will mean faster convergence but bigger network load. Do not use values lower than 12.

timeout time number

specifies how old route has to be to be considered unreachable. Default is 4*period.

garbage time number

specifies how old route has to be to be discarded. Default is 10*period.

Attributes

RIP defines two route attributes:

int rip_metric

RIP metric of the route (ranging from 0 to infinity). When routes from different RIP instances are available and all of them have the same preference, BIRD prefers the route with lowest rip_metric. When importing a non-RIP route, the metric defaults to 5.

int rip_tag

RIP route tag: a 16-bit number which can be used to carry additional information with the route (for example, an originating AS number in case of external routes). When importing a non-RIP route, the tag defaults to 0.

Example

protocol rip MyRIP_test {
        debug all;
        port 1520;
        period 12;
        garbage time 60;
        interface "eth0" { metric 3; mode multicast; };
        interface "eth*" { metric 2; mode broadcast; };
        honor neighbor;
        authentication none;
        import filter { print "importing"; accept; };
        export filter { print "exporting"; accept; };
}

6.9 Static

The Static protocol doesn't communicate with other routers in the network, but instead it allows you to define routes manually. This is often used for specifying how to forward packets to parts of the network which don't use dynamic routing at all and also for defining sink routes (i.e., those telling to return packets as undeliverable if they are in your IP block, you don't have any specific destination for them and you don't want to send them out through the default route to prevent routing loops).

There are five types of static routes: `classical' routes telling to forward packets to a neighboring router, multipath routes specifying several (possibly weighted) neighboring routers, device routes specifying forwarding to hosts on a directly connected network, recursive routes computing their nexthops by doing route table lookups for a given IP and special routes (sink, blackhole etc.) which specify a special action to be done instead of forwarding the packet.

When the particular destination is not available (the interface is down or the next hop of the route is not a neighbor at the moment), Static just uninstalls the route from the table it is connected to and adds it again as soon as the destination becomes adjacent again.

The Static protocol does not have many configuration options. The definition of the protocol contains mainly a list of static routes:

route prefix via ip

Static route through a neighboring router.

route prefix multipath via ip [weight num] [via ...]

Static multipath route. Contains several nexthops (gateways), possibly with their weights.

route prefix via "interface"

Static device route through an interface to hosts on a directly connected network.

route prefix recursive ip

Static recursive route, its nexthop depends on a route table lookup for given IP address.

route prefix blackhole|unreachable|prohibit

Special routes specifying to silently drop the packet, return it as unreachable or return it as administratively prohibited. First two targets are also known as drop and reject.

check link switch

If set, hardware link states of network interfaces are taken into consideration. When link disappears (e.g. ethernet cable is unplugged), static routes directing to that interface are removed. It is possible that some hardware drivers or platforms do not implement this feature. Default: off.

igp table name

Specifies a table that is used for route table lookups of recursive routes. Default: the same table as the protocol is connected to.

Static routes have no specific attributes.

Example static config might look like this:

protocol static {
        table testable;                  # Connect to a non-default routing table
        route 0.0.0.0/0 via 198.51.100.130; # Default route
        route 10.0.0.0/8 multipath       # Multipath route
                via 198.51.100.10 weight 2
                via 198.51.100.20
                via 192.0.2.1;
        route 203.0.113.0/24 unreachable; # Sink route
        route 10.2.0.0/24 via "arc0";    # Secondary network
}

Next Previous Contents

6. Protocols

6.1 BGP

Route selection rules

IGP routing table

Configuration

Attributes

Example

6.2 Device

Configuration

6.3 Direct

6.4 Kernel

Configuration

Attributes

Example

6.5 OSPF

Introduction

Configuration

Attributes

Example

6.6 Pipe

Introduction

Configuration

Attributes

Example

6.7 RAdv

Introduction

Configuration

Example

6.8 RIP

Introduction

Configuration

Attributes

Example

6.9 Static