MPLS Lab Setup

Introduction

This page is an attempt to put together a lab setup for the testing of MPLS / VPLS as well as Traffic Engineering. This is not an attempt to explain how MPLS works, rather it is to promote discussion around the operation of MPLS. Before working through this lab you should first familiarize yourself with the concepts in this WIKI article http://wiki.mikrotik.com/wiki/MPLSVPLS as most of the setup has been based around those concepts. As my understanding of MPLS is also rather limited please feel free to edit and correct where required. If you want the original network diagram (in Visio format) please email me on david [at] mikrotiksa dot com. I can also export to some other formats. There is also a discussion on the forum about this wiki. Please check for updates.

--savagedavid 11:59, 21 April 2008 (EEST)

Lab Setup

Network Diagram

First lets look at a network diagram of the basic setup

The setup was created using 6 RB532's, but anything with 3 network interfaces and 32MB memory should be able to do the job. P1 - P3 are the Provider (MPLS Backbone) routers. PE1 - PE3 are the Provider Edge routers which do the Label Popping

MPLS Setup

The next step is to add and configure the MPLS system. In order to distribute labels for routes, LDP needs to be enabled. Then all interfaces that participate in MPLS need to be added.

P1

/mpls ldp 
set enabled=yes lsr-id=10.255.255.1 transport-address=10.255.255.1
/mpls ldp interface 
add interface=ether1
add interface=ether2
add interface=ether3

P2

/mpls ldp 
set enabled=yes lsr-id=10.255.255.2 transport-address=10.255.255.2
/mpls ldp interface 
add interface=ether1
add interface=ether2
add interface=ether3

P3

/mpls ldp 
set enabled=yes lsr-id=10.255.255.3 transport-address=10.255.255.3
/mpls ldp interface 
add interface=ether1

PE1

/mpls ldp 
set enabled=yes lsr-id=10.255.255.4 transport-address=10.255.255.4
/mpls ldp interface 
add interface=ether1

PE2

/mpls ldp 
set enabled=yes lsr-id=10.255.255.5 transport-address=10.255.255.5
/mpls ldp interface 
add interface=ether1

PE3

/mpls ldp 
set enabled=yes lsr-id=10.255.255.6 transport-address=10.255.255.6
/mpls ldp interface 
add interface=ether1

This should now give you an operational MPLS setup.