That is Half III of a three-blog collection on options to beat challenges related to bridging the digital divide.
In half I of this collection, we mentioned conventional broadband community architectures and their limitations. In half II, we mentioned particulars on the evolution of broadband networks, utilizing a distributed structure with a centralized management aircraft, designed to deal with the challenges related to conventional broadband networks. On this closing weblog, we’ll concentrate on the Cisco answer with Subscriber Edge.
Cisco Subscriber Edge answer
The Management and Consumer Aircraft Separation Broadband Community Gateway (CUPS BNG) answer from Cisco terminates residential broadband subscribers, is aligned with TR-459, and referred to as Cisco Subscriber Edge or cloud-native BNG (cnBNG), as a result of cloud-native expertise is used to host management aircraft features.
Given the crucial want for resiliency within the management aircraft, which is tasked with terminating thousands and thousands of subscriber classes over a whole lot of distributed person planes, Cisco’s subscriber edge management aircraft has been developed as a cloud-native software from the bottom up utilizing Go programming language to make sure superior reliability.
As a part of the evolution to cloud-native community features, the Cisco Subscriber Edge management aircraft structure is decomposed into a number of microservices and deployed as containers that may be independently scaled, upgraded, and deployed in accordance with necessities (see Determine 1 on cloud-native tenets used for the management aircraft structure).
The decomposition of management features into a number of impartial stateless microservices permits higher resiliency. It additionally allows hitless improve of the management aircraft, impartial patching of downside or failed containers, and restricted rollout of options or software program modifications with no widespread practical affect. These microservices are deployed utilizing the identical infrastructure as Extremely 5G Packet Core, which hosts the 5G Packet Core Features as containers, and could be simply prolonged to run on third-party container-as-a-service (CaaS) platforms.
Cisco Subscriber Edge structure
Cisco Subscriber Edge structure (see Determine 2) is aligned with Broadband Discussion board TR-459 . On this structure, the management aircraft is cloud-native with selections of {hardware} and software program person planes based mostly on the IOS XR community working system (NOS).
The Cisco Subscriber Edge structure offers quite a few technical benefits and advantages, positioning CSPs to successfully broaden their networks in alignment with the altering calls for of the market. These benefits are distinctive to the Cisco structure and complement the advantages already inherent within the CUPS framework. The extra advantages embody:
- Operational ease: Cisco’s management aircraft structure contains an Ops Middle perform, which makes BNG operations extra user-friendly for BNG community engineers and decreasing the necessity to handle Kubernetes straight. For added effectivity, Cisco Crosswork Community Automation presents automation for deployment, lifecycle administration, and repair orchestration, whereas additionally sustaining service assurance.
- Trade-leading scale: On the coronary heart of Cisco Subscriber Edge is a cloud-native management aircraft, designed for large industry-leading scale, supporting a community of 1 million classes with a whole lot of person planes. Increasing capability is simplified by including further computing sources or new nodes, making certain a easy scale-up course of that retains current subscriber classes on-line with none affect.
- Resiliency: Cisco’s structure makes use of a layered method for resilience that ensures the management aircraft is protected against server to knowledge middle failures in a cloud-native surroundings. The person aircraft safety is ensured by subscriber redundancy group (SRG) function assist, which mitigates dangers from hyperlink and platform failures to complete web site outages.
- Simplified BNG Monitoring: With Cisco Subscriber Edge, the duty of monitoring BNG key efficiency indicators (KPIs) is simplified by an included Grafana Dashboard, taking out complicated monitoring setups and additional licensing prices. This intuitive dashboard showcases an intensive choice of metrics that operation groups can customise, simplifying the monitoring expertise considerably. Furthermore, Cisco Subscriber Edge ensures easy integration with third-party dashboards, by telemetry and bulk statistics.
- Simpler integration: Cisco Subscriber Edge structure is aligned to TR-459 commonplace, which makes use of the CUPS mannequin to cut back OSS/BSS touchpoints with the management aircraft, thereby facilitating smoother integration. Constructed on a basis of cloud-native expertise and a microservices framework, the management aircraft ensures fast deployment of recent options, streamlining the mixing course of for enhanced effectivity.
Bridge to common broadband
The Cisco Subscriber Edge answer, aligned to Broadband Discussion board TR-459 commonplace, marks a major development in broadband community gateway expertise. With the cloud-native management aircraft, CSPs can effectively handle the calls for of thousands and thousands of subscriber classes throughout an enormous array of distributed person planes deployed at totally different layers within the community.
The Cisco answer may help CSPs adapt to evolving broadband and site visitors necessities, broaden their networks successfully, and leverage distinctive answer benefits which enhance advantages inherent within the CUPS framework.
For BNG engineers, the Cisco structure simplifies operations and will increase effectivity by the Ops Middle perform and Cisco Crosswork automation capabilities.
Community operators can profit from a fortified answer utilizing a layered structure that protects each the management aircraft and person aircraft from varied malfunctions and outages, together with web site failures and knowledge middle outages. Different operational advantages embody simpler integration with standards-based alignment, and simplified monitoring of key BNG efficiency indicators utilizing the embedded Grafana dashboard for a customizable and complete view of efficiency metrics with out further prices.
Cisco’s dedication to innovation and the cloud-native method empowers community operators to construct a brighter future for broadband networks. Decreasing prices, simplifying networks, and enabling high-quality companies may help make the web extra reasonably priced and ubiquitous with higher end-user experiences for all.
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