13.9. Layer 2 and QoS

This section outlines some of the Layer 2 and QoS related features available in Trisul Network Analytics.

13.9.1 Layer 2 metrics

Netflow is considered to be a Layer 3 IP level technologies. However, it is possible to configure IPFIX to export MAC address information along with IP flow records.

MAC

In Cisco Flexible Netflow the following commands can be added to collect source and destination MAC addresses.


 match datalink mac source address input
 match datalink mac destination address input

The chief use case for collecting L2 MAC addresses in Netflow is to

  • collect the L2 MAC address can reliably identify a subscriber endpoint in an ISP edge network scenario.

The following counter groups show L2 data

MAC Traffic transmit and receive per MAC address
DirMAC Traffic flows over a L2 Link, a pair of MAC addresses

The following picture shows where these counters can be found.


Figure: Retro > Retro Counters to view MAC Counters

VLAN ID

L2 VLAN ID is supported. If exported by the device , these are directly shown under the counter group “VLAN Stats”

The following counter groups show L2 data

VLANStats 802.11 VLAN IDs traffic metrics

13.9.2 Tos DiffServ

Every IP Packet includes a 1-byte ToS field that has been used in various ways to provide specialized services.

These counters will only be activated if the target environment traffic deploys ToS and this information is exported in Netflow.

Trisul supports collecting the following Netflow template fields.

5 ipClassOfService For IPv4: the full 8 bit value of the IP ToS field. For IPv6: the 8-bit value of the Class of Service field
195 ipDiffServCodePoint The most significant 6 bits of the IPv4 TOS field or the IPv6 Traffic Class field
196 ipPrecedence The first 3 bits of the IPv4 TOS field or the IPv6 Traffic Class field. Value range 0-7

The following counter groups show ToS data

IP ToS The full 8-bit ToS field
IP Precedence Meters the traffic per ipProecedence
IP DSCP Meters the traffic per DiffServ code point

The following image shows where the ToS counters can be found (see the highlighted section)


Figure: Retro > Retro Counters to view IP ToS metrics

IP ToS

In this mode, Trisul simply meters the full 8 bit ToS field. The customer can then map ToS raw values with their own meanings.

IP Precedence

Trisul meters the 8 allowed values of IP Precedence. This was introduced by RFC 791 in 1981 and is now generally deprecated , but there may be some legacy networks still using this feature

000 Routine
001 Priority
010 Immediate
011 Flash
100 Flash Override
101 Critic/Critical
110 Internetwork Control
111 Network Control

DiffServ

The 6-bit DSCP (DiffServ Code Point) field. Specific meaning for these fields are flexible, Trisul users can assign textual labels to each value, possibly mapping onto router classifications.