OVN support for remote port mirroring using GRE

With an increasing number of network functions implemented as VNFs and acting as a transit point for the bulk of the network traffic, support for remote port mirroring to third-party analyzers for troubleshooting, billing, and other management activities are paramount. 

• Port Mirroring support from a source on an OVN compute node to a destination that may or may not be an OVN compute node
• Traffic from the source is replicated and mirrored traffic is GRE encapsulated for mirroring the destination

Port Mirroring Scenarios

• Remote Port Mirroring using GRE tunnel (i.e 1 local ip to 1 remote IP) and using a single mirror

• Remote Port Mirroring using 1 GRE tunnel (i.e 1 local ip and 1 remote IP) and using a single mirror but having multiple select_dst_port and select_src_port
• Remote Port Mirroring using GRE tunnel and 1 local ip to 2 remote IPs [2 mirrors and 2 GRE tunnels]
  • Mirror0 - incoming traffic of vf0
  • Mirror1 - incoming traffic of vf1

• Remote Port Mirroring using GRE tunnel and 1 local ip to 2 remote IPs [2 mirrors and 2 GRE tunnels]
  • Mirror0 - incoming and outgoing traffic of vf0

• • Mirror1 - incoming and outgoing traffic of vf1

• Local port mirroring

Test Plan

Verizon Gigamon Test Plan

Performance Testing

Port mirroring can consume excessive CPU cycles from the primary tasks for VNFs or applications deployed on the compute nodes. Guidelines for the impact of port mirroring and the resource footprint of traffic is important. 

• Trend analysis for CPU and memory usage with increase in traffic mirroring vs no traffic mirroring