Release 15.1SY Supervisor Engine 2T Software Configuration Guide

General Restrictions

• NSF requires SSO (see Chapter 7, “Stateful Switchover (SSO)”).
• The Hot Standby Routing Protocol (HSRP) is not supported with Cisco Nonstop Forwarding with Stateful Switchover. Do not use HSRP with Cisco Nonstop Forwarding with Stateful Switchover.

Restrictions for BGP NSF

• All neighboring devices participating in BGP NSF must be NSF-capable, having been configured for BGP graceful restart as described in the “Configuring and Verifying BGP for NSF” section.

Restrictions for EIGRP NSF

• All neighboring devices participating in EIGRP NSF operation must be NSF-capable or NSF-aware.
• An NSF-aware router cannot support two NSF-capable peers performing an NSF restart operation at the same time. However, both neighbors will reestablish peering sessions after the NSF restart operation is complete.

Restrictions for OSPF NSF

• OSPF NSF for virtual links is not supported.
• All OSPF networking devices on the same network segment must be NSF-aware (that is, running an NSF software image).
• OSPF NSF for sham links is not supported.

Restrictions for IS-IS NSF

• For IETF IS-IS, all neighboring devices must be running an NSF-aware software image.

Restrictions for IPv6 NSF

• IPv6 must be enabled on your router for IPv6 NSF to be supported.

NSF Overview

NSF works with SSO to minimize the amount of time a network is unavailable to its users following a switchover. The main objective of Cisco NSF is to continue forwarding IP packets following a route processor (RP) switchover.

Usually, when a networking device restarts, all routing peers of that device detect that the device went down and then came back up. This transition results in what is called a routing flap, which could spread across multiple routing domains. Routing flaps caused by routing restarts create routing instabilities, which are detrimental to the overall network performance. Cisco NSF helps to suppress routing flaps in SSO-enabled devices, thus reducing network instability.

Cisco NSF allows for the forwarding of data packets to continue along known routes while the routing protocol information is being restored following a switchover. With Cisco NSF, peer networking devices do not experience routing flaps. Data traffic is forwarded through intelligent line cards while the standby RP assumes control from the failed active RP during a switchover. The ability of line cards to remain up through a switchover and to be kept current with the Forwarding Information Base (FIB) on the active RP is key to Cisco NSF operation.

The Cisco NSF feature has several benefits, including the following:

• Improved network availability—NSF continues forwarding network traffic and application state information so that user session information is maintained after a switchover.
• Overall network stability—Network stability may be improved with the reduction in the number of route flaps that had been created when routers in the network failed and lost their routing tables.
• Neighboring routers do not detect link flapping—Because the interfaces remain up across a switchover, neighboring routers do not detect a link flap (that is, the link does not go down and come back up).
• Prevents routing flaps—Because SSO continues forwarding network traffic in the event of a switchover, routing flaps are avoided.
• No loss of user sessions—User sessions established prior to the switchover are maintained.

A networking device is NSF-aware if it is running NSF-compatible software. A device is NSF-capable if it has been configured to support NSF and would rebuild routing information from NSF-aware or NSF-capable neighbors.

CEF is always enabled on the switch and cannot be disabled. The routing protocols depend on CEF to continue forwarding packets during switchover while the routing protocols rebuild the Routing Information Base (RIB) tables. Once the routing protocols have converged, CEF updates the FIB table and removes stale route entries and CEF updates the line cards with the new FIB information.

Feature Interaction with NSF

• Cisco Express Forwarding
• Routing Protocol Operation
• BGP Operation
• EIGRP Operation
• IS-IS Operation
• OSPF Operation
• IPv6 Routing Protocol Operation

Cisco Express Forwarding

A key element of NSF is packet forwarding. In a Cisco networking device, packet forwarding is provided by CEF. CEF is always enabled on the switch and cannot be disabled. CEF maintains the FIB, and uses the FIB information that was current at the time of the switchover to continue forwarding packets during a switchover. This feature reduces traffic interruption during the switchover.

During normal NSF operation, CEF on the active RP synchronizes its current FIB and adjacency databases with the FIB and adjacency databases on the standby RP. Upon switchover of the active RP, the standby RP initially has FIB and adjacency databases that are mirror images of those that were current on the active RP. For platforms with intelligent line cards, the line cards will maintain the current forwarding information over a switchover; for platforms with forwarding engines, CEF will keep the forwarding engine on the standby RP current with changes that are sent to it by CEF on the active RP. In this way, the line cards or forwarding engines will be able to continue forwarding after a switchover as soon as the interfaces and a data path are available.

As the routing protocols start to repopulate the RIB on a prefix-by-prefix basis, the updates in turn cause prefix-by-prefix updates to CEF, which it uses to update the FIB and adjacency databases. Existing and new entries will receive the new version (“epoch”) number, indicating that they have been refreshed. The forwarding information is updated on the line cards or forwarding engine during convergence. The RP signals when the RIB has converged. The software removes all FIB and adjacency entries that have an epoch older than the current switchover epoch. The FIB now represents the newest routing protocol forwarding information.

Routing Protocol Operation

The routing protocols run only on the active RP, and they receive routing updates from their neighbor routers. Routing protocols do not run on the standby RP. Following a switchover, the routing protocols request that the NSF-aware neighbor devices send state information to help rebuild the routing tables. Alternately, the IS-IS protocol can be configured to synchronize state information from the active to the standby RP to help rebuild the routing table on the NSF-capable device in environments where neighbor devices are not NSF-aware.

For NSF operation, the routing protocols depend on CEF to continue forwarding packets while the routing protocols rebuild the routing information.

BGP Operation

When a NSF-capable router begins a BGP session with a BGP peer, it sends an OPEN message to the peer. Included in the message is a declaration that the NSF-capable device has “graceful restart capability.” Graceful restart is the mechanism by which BGP routing peers avoid a routing flap following a switchover. If the BGP peer has received this capability, it is aware that the device sending the message is NSF-capable. Both the NSF-capable router and its BGP peer(s) need to exchange the graceful restart capability in their OPEN messages, at the time of session establishment. If both the peers do not exchange the graceful restart capability, the session will not be graceful restart capable.

If the BGP session is lost during the RP switchover, the NSF-aware BGP peer marks all the routes associated with the NSF-capable router as stale; however, it continues to use these routes to make forwarding decisions for a set period of time. This functionality means that no packets are lost while the newly active RP is waiting for convergence of the routing information with the BGP peers.

After an RP switchover occurs, the NSF-capable router reestablishes the session with the BGP peer. In establishing the new session, it sends a new graceful restart message that identifies the NSF-capable router as having restarted.

At this point, the routing information is exchanged between the two BGP peers. Once this exchange is complete, the NSF-capable device uses the routing information to update the RIB and the FIB with the new forwarding information. The NSF-aware device uses the network information to remove stale routes from its BGP table. Following that, the BGP protocol is fully converged.

If a BGP peer does not support the graceful restart capability, it will ignore the graceful-restart capability in an OPEN message but will establish a BGP session with the NSF-capable device. This function will allow interoperability with non-NSF-aware BGP peers (and without NSF functionality), but the BGP session with non-NSF-aware BGP peers will not be graceful restart capable.

Note BGP support in NSF requires that neighbor networking devices be NSF-aware; that is, the devices must have the graceful restart capability and advertise that capability in their OPEN message during session establishment. If an NSF-capable router discovers that a particular BGP neighbor does not have graceful restart capability, it will not establish an NSF-capable session with that neighbor. All other neighbors that have graceful restart capability will continue to have NSF-capable sessions with this NSF-capable networking device.

EIGRP Operation

EIGRP NSF capabilities are exchanged by EIGRP peers in hello packets. The NSF-capable router notifies its neighbors that an NSF restart operation has started by setting the restart (RS) bit in a hello packet. When an NSF-aware router receives notification from an NSF-capable neighbor that an NSF-restart operation is in progress, the NSF-capable and NSF-aware routers immediately exchange their topology tables. The NSF-aware router sends an end-of-table (EOT) update packet when the transmission of its topology table is complete. The NSF-aware router then performs the following actions to assist the NSF-capable router:

• The EIGRP hello hold timer is expired to reduce the time interval set for hello packet generation and transmission. This allows the NSF-aware router to reply to the NSF-capable router more quickly reducing the amount of time required for the NSF-capable router to rediscover neighbors and rebuild the topology table.
• The route-hold timer is started. This timer is used to set the period of time that the NSF-aware router will hold known routes for the NSF-capable neighbor. This timer is configured with the timers nsf route-hold command. The default time period is 240 seconds.
• The NSF-aware router notes in the peer list that the NSF-capable neighbor is restarting, maintains adjacency, and holds known routes for the NSF-capable neighbor until the neighbor signals that it is ready for the NSF-aware router to send its topology table or the route-hold timer expires. If the route-hold timer expires on the NSF-aware router, the NSF-aware router will discard held routes and treat the NSF-capable router as a new router joining the network and reestablishing adjacency accordingly.
• The NSF-aware router will continue to send queries to the NSF-capable router which is still in the process of converging after switchover, effectively extending the time before a stuck-in-active (SIA) condition can occur.

When the switchover operation is complete, the NSF-capable router notifies its neighbors that it has reconverged and has received all of their topology tables by sending an EOT update packet to the assisting routers. The NSF-capable then returns to normal operation. The NSF-aware router will look for alternate paths (go active) for any routes that are not refreshed by the NSF-capable (restarting router). The NSF-aware router will then return to normal operation. If all paths are refreshed by the NSF-capable router, the NSF-aware router will immediately return to normal operation.

Note NSF-aware routers are completely compatible with non-NSF aware or capable neighbors in an EIGRP network. A non-NSF aware neighbor will ignore NSF capabilities and reset adjacencies and otherwise maintain the peering sessions normally.

IS-IS Operation

The IS-IS protocol can be configured to use state information that has been synchronized between the active and the standby RP to recover route information following a switchover instead of information received from peer devices.

When an IS-IS NSF-capable router performs an RP switchover, it must perform two tasks in order to resynchronize its Link State Database with its IS-IS neighbors. First, it must relearn the available IS-IS neighbors on the network without causing a reset of the neighbor relationship. Second, it must reacquire the contents of the Link State Database for the network.

The IS-IS NSF feature offers two options when configuring NSF:

• Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) IS-IS
• Cisco IS-IS

If neighbor routers on a network segment are NSF-aware, meaning that neighbor routers are running a software version that supports the IETF Internet draft for router restartability, they will assist an IETF NSF router which is restarting. With IETF, neighbor routers provide adjacency and link-state information to help rebuild the routing information following a switchover. A benefit of IETF IS-IS configuration is operation between peer devices based on a proposed standard.

Note If you configure IETF on the networking device, but neighbor routers are not IETF-compatible, NSF will abort following a switchover.

If the neighbor routers on a network segment are not NSF-aware, you must use the Cisco configuration option. The Cisco IS-IS configuration transfers both protocol adjacency and link-state information from the active to the standby RP. A benefit of Cisco configuration is that it does not rely on NSF-aware neighbors.

IETF IS-IS Configuration

Using the IETF IS-IS configuration, as quickly as possible after an RP switchover, the NSF-capable router sends IS-IS NSF restart requests to neighboring NSF-aware devices. Neighbor networking devices recognize this restart request as a cue that the neighbor relationship with this router should not be reset, but that they should initiate database resynchronization with the restarting router. As the restarting router receives restart request responses from routers on the network, it can begin to rebuild its neighbor list.

Once this exchange is complete, the NSF-capable device uses the link-state information to remove stale routes, update the RIB, and update the FIB with the new forwarding information. IS-IS is then fully converged.

The switchover from one RP to the other happens within seconds. IS-IS reestablishes its routing table and resynchronizes with the network within a few additional seconds. At this point, IS-IS waits for a specified interval before it will attempt a second NSF restart. During this time, the new standby RP will boot up and synchronize its configuration with the active RP. The IS-IS NSF operation waits for a specified interval to ensure that connections are stable before attempting another restart of IS-IS NSF. This functionality prevents IS-IS from attempting back-to-back NSF restarts with stale information.

Cisco IS-IS Configuration

Using the Cisco configuration option, full adjacency and LSP information is saved, or “checkpointed,” to the standby RP. Following a switchover, the newly active RP maintains its adjacencies using the checkpointed data, and can quickly rebuild its routing tables.

Note Following a switchover, Cisco IS-IS NSF has complete neighbor adjacency and LSP information; however, it must wait for all interfaces that had adjacencies prior to the switchover to come up. If an interface does not come up within the allocated interface wait time, the routes learned from these neighbor devices are not considered in routing table recalculation. IS-IS NSF provides a command to extend the wait time for interfaces that, for whatever reason, do not come up in a timely fashion.

The switchover from one RP to the other happens within seconds. IS-IS reestablishes its routing table and resynchronizes with the network within a few additional seconds. At this point, IS-IS waits for a specified interval before it will attempt a second NSF restart. During this time, the new standby RP will boot up and synchronize its configuration with the active RP. Once this synchronization is completed, IS-IS adjacency and LSP data is checkpointed to the standby RP; however, a new NSF restart will not be attempted by IS-IS until the interval time expires. This functionality prevents IS-IS from attempting back-to-back NSF restarts.

OSPF Operation

When an OSPF NSF-capable router performs an RP switchover, it must perform two tasks in order to resynchronize its Link State Database with its OSPF neighbors. First, it must relearn the available OSPF neighbors on the network without causing a reset of the neighbor relationship. Second, it must re-acquire the contents of the Link State Database for the network.

As quickly as possible after an RP switchover, the NSF-capable router sends an OSPF NSF signal to neighboring NSF-aware devices. Neighbor networking devices recognize this signal as a cue that the neighbor relationship with this router should not be reset. As the NSF-capable router receives signals from other routers on the network, it can begin to rebuild its neighbor list.

Once neighbor relationships are reestablished, the NSF-capable router begins to resynchronize its database with all of its NSF-aware neighbors. At this point, the routing information is exchanged between the OSPF neighbors. Once this exchange is complete, the NSF-capable device uses the routing information to remove stale routes, update the RIB, and update the FIB with the new forwarding information. The OSPF protocols are then fully converged.

Note OSPF NSF requires that all neighbor networking devices be NSF-aware. If an NSF-capable router discovers that it has non-NSF -aware neighbors on a particular network segment, it will disable NSF capabilities for that segment. Other network segments composed entirely of NSF-capable or NSF-aware routers will continue to provide NSF capabilities.

The OSPF RFC 3623 Graceful Restart feature allows you to configure IETF NSF in multivendor networks. For more information, see the OSPF RFC 3623 Graceful Restart document.

IPv6 Routing Protocol Operation

IPv6 support for NSF includes the following features:

• Nonstop Forwarding and Graceful Restart for MP-BGP IPv6 Address Family
• Nonstop Forwarding for IPv6 RIP
• Nonstop Forwarding for IPv6 Static Routes

Nonstop Forwarding and Graceful Restart for MP-BGP IPv6 Address Family

The switch supports the graceful restart capability for IPv6 BGP unicast and VPNv6 address families, enabling Cisco NSF functionality for BGP IPv6. The BGP graceful restart capability allows the BGP routing table to be recovered from peers without keeping the TCP state.

NSF continues forwarding packets while routing protocols converge, therefore avoiding a route flap on switchover. Forwarding is maintained by synchronizing the FIB between the active and standby RP. On switchover, forwarding is maintained using the FIB. The RIB is not kept synchronized; therefore, the RIB is empty on switchover. The RIB is repopulated by the routing protocols and subsequently informs FIB about RIB convergence by using the NSF_RIB_CONVERGED registry call. The FIB tables are updated from the RIB, removing any stale entries. The RIB starts a failsafe timer during RP switchover, in case the routing protocols fail to notify the RIB of convergence.

The Cisco BGP address family identifier (AFI) model is modular and scalable, and supports multiple AFIs and subsequent address family identifier (SAFI) configurations.

For information about how to configure the IPv6 BGP graceful restart capability, see the “ Implementing Multiprotocol BGP for IPv6 ” document.

Nonstop Forwarding for IPv6 RIP

RIP registers as an IPv6 NSF client. Doing so has the benefit of using RIP routes installed in the Cisco Express Forwarding table until RIP has converged on the standby.

Nonstop Forwarding for IPv6 Static Routes

Cisco NSF supports IPv6 static routes.

Configuring and Verifying BGP for NSF

• Configuring BGP for NSF
• Verifying NSF for BGP

Configuring BGP for NSF

Perform this task to configure BGP for NSF. Repeat this task on each BGP NSF peer device:

This example shows how to configure BGP for NSF:

Verifying NSF for BGP

Perform this task to verify that the graceful restart function is configured on the SSO-enabled networking device and on the neighbor devices:

This example shows how to NSF for BGP:

Configuring and Verifying EIGRP NSF

• Configuring EIGRP for NSF
• Verifying EIGRP for NSF

Configuring EIGRP for NSF

Note ● An NSF-aware router must be completely converged with the network before it can assist an NSF-capable router in an NSF restart operation.

• Distributed platforms that run a supporting version of Cisco IOS software can support full NSF capabilities. These routers can perform a restart operation and can support other NSF capable peers.
• Single processor platforms that run a supporting version of Cisco IOS software support only NSF awareness. These routers maintain adjacency and hold known routes for the NSF-capable neighbor until it signals that it is ready for the NSF-aware router to send its topology table or the route-hold timer expires.

Perform this task to configure EIGRP for NSF. Repeat this procedure on each EIGRP NSF peer device:

This example shows how to configure EIGRP for NSF:

Verifying EIGRP for NSF

Perform this task to verify that NSF awareness or capability or both are enabled on the SSO-enabled networking device and on the neighbor devices.

This example shows how to verify EIGRP for NSF:

Configuring and Verifying OSPF NSF

• Configuring OSPF for NSF
• Verifying OSPF for NSF

Configuring OSPF for NSF

Note All peer devices participating in OSPF NSF must be made OSPF NSF aware; NSF awareness is enabled by default when a supporting version of Cisco IOS software is installed on a router that supports NSF capability or NSF awareness.

Perform this task to configure OSPF for NSF:

This example shows how to configure OSPF for NSF:

Verifying OSPF for NSF

Perform this task to verify OSPF for NSF:

This example shows how to verify OSPF for NSF:

Configuring and Verifying IS-IS NSF

• Configuring NSF for IS-IS
• Verifying NSF for IS-IS

Configuring NSF for IS-IS

Perform this task to configure NSF for IS-IS:

This example shows how to configure NSF for IS-IS:

Verifying NSF for IS-IS

Perform this task to verify NSF for IS-IS:

This example shows how to verify NSF for IS-IS:

Troubleshooting Cisco Nonstop Forwarding

To troubleshoot Cisco Nonstop Forwarding, use the following commands as needed:

Example: Configuring BGP NSF

The following example shows how to configure BGP NSF on a networking device.

Example: Configuring BGP NSF Neighbor Device

The following example shows how to configure BGP NSF on a neighbor router. All devices supporting BGP NSF must be NSF-aware, meaning that these devices recognize and advertise graceful restart capability.

Example: Verifying BGP NSF

Verify that “bgp graceful-restart” appears in the BGP configuration of the SSO-enabled router by entering the show running-config command.

On the SSO device and the neighbor device, verify that the graceful restart function is shown as both advertised and received, and confirm the address families that have the graceful restart capability. If no address families are listed, then BGP NSF also will not occur.

Example: Configuring EIGRP NSF Converge Timer

The timers nsf converge command is used to adjust the maximum time that a restarting router will wait for the EOT notification from an NSF-capable or NSF-aware peer. The following example shows how to set the converge timer to one minute.

Example: EIGRP Graceful-Restart Purge-Time Timer Configuration

The timers graceful-restart purge-time command is used to set the route-hold timer that determines how long an NSF-aware router that is running EIGRP will hold routes for an inactive peer. The following example shows how to set the route-hold timer to two minutes:

Example: Configuring EIGRP NSF Route-Hold Timer

The timers nsf route-hold command is used to set the maximum period of time that an NSF-aware router will hold known routes for an NSF-capable neighbor during a switchover operation. The following example shows how to set the route-hold timer to two minutes.

Example: Configuring EIGRP NSF Signal Timer

The timers nsf signal command is used to adjust the maximum time for the initial restart period. The following example shows how to set the signal timer to 10 seconds.

Router# configure terminal

Router(config)# router eigrp 101

Router(config-router)# timers nsf signal 10

Example: Verifying EIGRP NSF

Verify that EIGRP NSF support is present in the installed Cisco IOS software image by entering the show ip protocols command. “EIGRP NSF-aware route hold timer is...” is displayed in the output when either NSF awareness or capability is supported. This line displays the default or user-defined value for the route-hold timer. “EIGRP NSF...” is displayed in the output only when the NSF capability is supported. This line will also print “disabled” or “enabled” depending on the status of the EIGRP NSF feature.

Example: Disabling EIGRP NSF Support

EIGRP NSF capability is enabled by default on distributed platforms that run a supporting version of Cisco IOS software. The nsf command used to enable or disable the EIGRP NSF capability. The following example shows how to disable NSF capability:

Example: Configuring OSPF NSF

The following example shows how to configure OSPF NSF on a networking device:

Example: Verifying OSPF NSF

To verify NSF for OSPF, you must check that the NSF function is configured on the SSO-enabled networking device. Verify that “nsf” appears in the OSPF configuration of the SSO-enabled device by entering the show running-config command:

Next, use the show ip ospf command to verify that NSF is enabled on the device.

Example: Configuring IS-IS NSF

The following example shows how to configure Cisco proprietary IS-IS NSF operation on a networking device:

The following example shows how to configure IS-IS NSF for IETF operation on a networking device:

Example: Verifying IS-IS NSF

Verify that NSF appears in the IS-IS configuration of the SSO-enabled device by entering the show running-config command. The display will show either Cisco IS-IS or IETF IS-IS configuration. The following example indicates that the device uses the Cisco implementation of IS-IS NSF:

If the NSF configuration is set to cisco, use the show isis nsf command to verify that NSF is enabled on the device. Using the Cisco configuration, the display output will be different on the active and standby RPs. The following example shows output for the Cisco configuration on the active RP. In this example, note the presence of the phrase “NSF restart enabled”:

The following example shows sample output for the Cisco configuration on the standby RP. In this example, note the presence of the phrase “NSF restart enabled”:

The following example shows sample output for the IETF IS-IS configuration on the networking device:

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