Cisco router lab
July 24, 2007 – 7:50 pmIt can be very hard to get hands on practise working with networking technologies. It usually requires a stack of routers and switches to be able to configure up a meaningful topology. There are simulator software packages but they don’t run the code that runs on real routers.
Recently I discovered dynamips written by Christophe Fillot who is either a phd student or faculty member at UTC (University of Technology of Compiegne, France), I’m not sure which. Its an application that emulates the MIPS hardware of a range of Cisco routers. Cisco IOS software can be booted by this emulator. IOS software is not distributed with dynamips as that would be a violation of Cisco’s copyright. If you have a Cisco support contract you will have access to IOS software downloads. In addition to the core dynamips application there is dynagen (written by a number of people) which is a python user interface which makes interacting with dynamips a whole lot easier.
To get started, head over to the tutorial on the dynagen website
One Response to “Cisco router lab”
I gotta say, I do love the software. Great way to simulate a MPLS core withour having to shell out for some high end boxen.
By Ian on Jul 25, 2007