The content in this post is intended for educational and informational purposes only. All software rights belong to their respective owners. The Cisco IOSv and IOSv L2 devices could be considered the standard for learning Cisco routing and switching in the confines of a virtual network environment. They’re light in resource usage and contain a vast feature set. Prerequisites Cisco Modeling Labs subscription GNS3 with macOS on Apple Silicon macOS Point your web browser to the CML Software Download page. ...

Before we work our way through the steps, I will start by pointing out GNS3 server has the following constraints when running on Apple Silicon: Lack of Linux KVM for x86_64 virtualized guests Slight performance penalty with emulated x86_64 Linux binaries (Rosetta ) The following are my results after testing a number of different Cisco device types: Device Working? Information IOL ✅ - IOL L2 ✅ - IOSv ✅ - IOSv L2 ✅ - ASAv ❌ Requires SSSE3 CPU instructions for cryptographic operations Catalyst 8000V ❌ Requires vmx or svm CPU flag for Linux KVM Nexus 9000v ❌ Requires vmx or svm CPU flag for Linux KVM As you can see, we’re primarily limited to Cisco (IOL , IOSv , Dynamips ) images, VPCS, and Docker containers. The upside is that we’re rarely CPU-bound running labs on Apple Silicon. The amount of system memory in the Mac is usually the limiting factor. And let’s face it: connecting to a dedicated x86_64 GNS3 compute server with ample CPU cores and RAM is the ideal solution for running large labs. ...

Though remote development is not available out of the box for Sublime Text, we can enable a form of it with the sublime-rsync-ssh package. This versatile plugin has many features and options, but this post will focus solely on syncing a single local folder to a remote folder. I recommend you peruse the README for more information. Prerequisites Sublime Text with macOS is used in the examples, but it’s still applicable for Windows and Linux. Cygwin is required for Windows. ...

Vagrant supports three types of networks: public, private, and port-forwarding. The private network type has the option to use a UDP tunnel for a point-to-point link when using the vagrant-libvirt plugin. This connection type is ideal for links between virtual network devices. Refer to the following resources if you need more information: Pseudo-wires With Vagrant and Libvirt vagrant-libvirt Networks Vagrant Private Networks The only drawback with this type of connection is concerning packet sniffing. Since the connection uses a tunnel for encapsulation, we need a method to view the relevant data within the tunnel somehow. ...

After opening the GNS3 client and starting nodes, we primarily access the remote virtual devices with a console connection. This console connection is either Telnet, VNC, or SPICE. A console connection covers our requirement for physical access to virtual devices, but today, most administrative tasks are carried out with a link to the network management interface . I define the GNS3 server as remote if the gns3server process is not running on the host operating system. I consider the GNS3 VM remote because the gns3server process runs on a guest operating system (Ubuntu). ...

Why not add the CSR 1000v to round out our collection of Cisco virtual appliances? Similar to the Cisco Nexus 9000v, each instance of the Cisco CSR 1000v requires a considerable amount of hardware resources to run. Again, I recommend a Mac with at least 16GB of memory and a dual-core CPU if you plan to run more than a single instance. Ingredients used in this guide: macOS Mojave (10.14) VMware Fusion 11 Pro Vagrant 2.2.3 VMware provider for Vagrant Cisco Cloud Services Router 1000V Series A valid service contract is required for the download. ...

The Cisco Nexus 9000v shares the same software image as its hardware counterpart, so it provides a terrific solution for feature testing and/or network automation. The only caveat is the hardware resources required to run it. I recommend a Mac with at least 16GB of memory and a dual-core CPU. Ingredients used in this guide: macOS Mojave (10.14) VMware Fusion 11 Pro Vagrant 2.2.3 VMware provider for Vagrant Cisco Nexus 9000v Switch Steps 1. Sign in to your Cisco account to download the Nexus 9000v Switch software. The software is available here Select the Download Options link Select the version from the menu on the left. For my example, I will be using the Release 7.0(3)I7(5a) Click the Download button for Cisco Nexus 9000/3000 Virtual Switch for ESXi or Fusion Save the nxosv-final.7.0.3.I7.5a.ova file to the Downloads folder 2. Create the Cisco Nexus 9000v template. Open the VMware Fusion application Menu: File → Import… Click the Choose File… button Navigate to and select the nxosv-final.7.0.3.I7.5a.ova file in the Downloads folder Click the Open button Click the Continue button Click the Continue button to use the Default profile Save As: Nexus Click the Save button Click the Customize Settings button to modify the virtual appliance settings Set Processors to 2 processor cores Set Memory to 6144 MB Set Network Adapter to Share with my Mac Remove CD/DVD (IDE) Upgrade the VM hardware version to 16 (Compatibility → Upgrade) Close the Settings window Quit the VMware Fusion application 3. Remove additional network interfaces from the virtual appliance configuration file. From a macOS terminal, remove Network Adapter 2 to Network Adapter 10. ...

And yet another virtual network appliance to Vagrantize… Ingredients used in this guide: macOS Mojave (10.14) VMware Fusion 11 Pro Vagrant 2.2.3 VMware provider for Vagrant Cisco IOS XRv Router v6.1.3 The Cisco IOS XRV Router image is available as part of your Cisco VIRL subscription. Steps 1. Convert the disk image format type. The Cisco IOS XRv Router is provided in the qcow2 (QEMU) disk image format. The QEMU disk image utility (qemu-img) is required to convert the disk image to the vmdk (VMware) format. The utility is included with the qemu package. Use either MacPorts or Homebrew to install. ...

Continuing my journey to Vagrantize more virtual network appliances… Ingredients used in this guide: macOS Mojave (10.14) VMware Fusion 11 Pro Vagrant 2.2.2 VMware provider for Vagrant FortiGate-VM The FortiGate VM includes a limited embedded 15-day trial license that supports: 1 CPU maximum 1 GB RAM maximum Low encryption only (no HTTPS administrative access) All features except FortiGuard updates Steps 1. Download and unzip the FortiGate VM deployment package for VMware. FortiGate VM deployment packages are included with FortiGate firmware images on the Customer Service & Support site. I will be using FortiGate VM v6.0.2 for my example. ...

This post is a companion to the previous GNS3 with Microsoft Azure post. For many of us, an asymmetrical Internet connection usually equates to a much slower upload than download speed. Specifically, in our case, this results in a time-consuming process of uploading GNS3 image files to our remote gns3server VM instance. What if we need to recreate the disk attached to our gns3server VM instance? Modify the type (i.e., HDD to SSD) or decrease the size of the disk, which again would require us to recreate the disk? What if we need to spin up multiple gns3server VM instances for training purposes? Each situation may require a good amount of unnecessary (re)uploading. ...