welcome my dear friends have you ever
wondered what is the difference between NFV and SDN and how they work
telecom industry is going through a revolution where cloud native networks
are going to become necessity if you want to be technically competent grow
and rise in telecom you should learn and upgrade yourself to these cloud
technologies such as NFV , such as SDN such as Containers and Hypervisors , Yes I
am here to clarify all of this in a super simplified way using
easy-to-understand graphics and to make it memorable and fun ... well if we see the
SDN and NFV .. both architect use the network abstraction but they are doing
it differently while NFV covers the Softwarization , The Virtualization and
makes the building block ready .. The SDN does a totally different thing , The SDN
forwards the data packet from the one network device to the another one .. At the
same time , SDN's networking control function for routing and policy
definitions are building the highways and the pipelines where our traffic can
reach to its destination . The NFV movement started with the push coming
from the mobile service providers in 2012 , These TIER-1 operators felt that
they can greatly simplify their operations and they can reduce the cost
if all the network functions are Virtualized as software appliances ..
NFV is all about three main components which we are going to cover
and discuss in detail .. The 1st concept is a Softwarization .. The 2nd concept
is a virtualization and the last one is the Orchestration or Automation Well this is a classic network of 4G
which is deployed across all the mobile operators across the globe .. We will see
how this typical 4G network which is a typical traditional network , The way it have been deployed how are we are going to virtualize this You can see that all
these nodes they are deployed on traditional hardware , We also call this
as purpose built hardware , This is specialized appliance or Hardware which
is meant to perform a very very specific function .. for example we can see these
individual Hardware racks serving the individual functions such as the routers
the PGWs , the HLRs , the MMEs The OSC , The PCRF , The DNS and so on
so far This is one node one function , One typical set of and the type of
hardware .. The problem with this type of deployment is the lack of scalability .
There is also a problem with lack of speed and the lack of flexibility and
there are so many issues which we are going to discuss moving ahead and we
have also seen them in the last video usually this hampers the business as
there is always a delay in the new product launch and there is always
issues with the meeting the customer requirements Now let us understand what is NFV and how NFV solve these issues NFV stands for network
function virtualization and as we have discussed they are going to do three
things , The 1st one is the softwarization the 2nd one is the
virtualization and the last one is a orchestration and automation
NFV replaces the costly dedicated and purpose-built hardware with the generic
servers that use software to provide a bunch of different virtualized network
functions we call it as VNFs as well virtualization is all about software
package that perform a specific function we call this as a VNF that is virtual
network function , this VNF is equivalent to the physical network
and is capable to perform any Network tasks .. such as it can work as a router or
virtual router , it can work as a switch or virtual switch , it can work as a
virtual HLR , it can work as a virtual MSC , it can work as a virtual
SMSC and so on so forth , it can potentially take any network function
and decouple the network services from the hardware that delivered them
Decoupling means the services and the hardware they are separated from each
other it also separate out the network
function from the capacity , This effectively means you can deploy a very
small .. Relatively small .. A large .. a very large , or Huge capacity of any instance . You only need to increase the license compute and storage in order to increase
or decrease the capacity and then you can take the capacity and increase you
can do the scale up or you can do the scale down it's all flexible . NFV
uses the virtual machines as the key building blocks where applications can
be hosted . These virtual machines are having flexible capacity and can host
any application . NFV turns the traditional network hardware into the
virtualized network function and these virtual network functions , they are
running on a generic hardware such as the HP and the Dell .. We also call this
generic Hardware as COTS .. COTS stands for commercial off-the-shelf hardware.
NFV also enable the service chaining which helps multiple function to be used
in chronology , We'll understand all these concepts moving ahead in the NFV
architecture In October 2012 , Seven TIER-1 operators grouped together and they
started working on their problems you can see the name of these operators on
the right hand side these operators they have came up with the concept of network
function virtualization to solve most of their day-to-day issues and challenges
these seven operators they published a white paper in a conference in Germany and they post this white paper to the standards Body . Now
standards body like the ITU-T and the ETSI which is European telecommunications
standards Institute .. they started working on this white paper . Now there is a
community formed by the name of ISG NFV which have evolved the technology
through the several phases .... Now these are the guys who have released the
publications and who have done the standardization who came up with a Release 2 and then Release 3 and they have done numerous POCs in this
subject and ultimately they evolve the standards this large community today
consists of 300 plus companies including 38 of world major service providers . In
end of video I am also going to share you the link where you can see all these
white papers and the specs which have been developed by the ETSI . Now on the left hand side you can see the framework which have been delivered deployed and
standardized by the ETSI team now what is the need of this framework this
particular group which have been formed by ETSI , this group have came up with the
architecture framework and specification for NFV . There are 3 main components
to the entire architecture , The 1st one is the NFVI , the 2nd one is the VNF and the 3rd one is the MANO . This architecture ensures a tight coupling
between the hardware and the software which are again highly .. which are again
going to be highly highly customized moving ahead . I meant to say you can put
software from one partner you can put hardware from another partner , you need
to have Inter-Op and Inter-working between them . This particular NFV
architecture framework is developed to ensure that while maintaining the high
level of customization and flexibility there is a standardization and there is
always a compatibility prevails between various deployments between various
vendors between various solutions .It should not happen the solution which is
deployed out there in Asia is different from the solution which is going to be
deployed in the US , The solution which have been prepared by the Huawei should
not differ from the solution which have been prepared by the Nokia . I mean to say
they all have to follow some standards within the Interop is
always there and we maintain the standards out there .. that is the need of
the framework which have been deployed which have been developed by the ETSI
team .. Now let us understand what are the building blocks of NFV . Network
function virtualization infrastructure we call it as an NFVI as well .. This is the
layer who is responsible to handle hardware , This hosts all Storage , Compute , Network hardware and this is going to abstract the same as virtual resources
for consumption of the virtual machines We deployed Generic COTS hardware
or servers or blades in the NFVI layer In order to leverage massive scale
required by the telecom network providers, We can deployed these Hardware plates
in server or like we can deploy them in a bulk .. We can deploy them in multiple
locations Virtualized Network function VNF is the second layer where we are
going to host the actual application These application are the virtual
network functions which are running as software ... A single VNF can be deployed
over multiple virtual machines ultimately you are going to host
multiple applications over there I mean to say you can put MSC in 1st VNF , SMSC in 2nd VNF and so on so forth , On right hand side in orange color you can
see the MANO layer ... We also call it as NFV mono layer which is network function
virtualization management and orchestration architectural framework
for managing and controlling the entire piece . The manager is sitting on the
right . This MANO is controlling the entire cloud . Now let's move ahead where
we are going to get into the depth and we are going to understand how this
cloud infrastructure works out there so we are going to cover the concept of
VNF in more detail on this slide , This shows the actual telecom applications
such as the vSMSC , I mean to say the virtual SMSC , the virtual MSC , the
virtual HLR , the virtual SGSN , the virtual GGSN , they're all deployed in
the software module in the VNF . You can see it out there .. VNF is hosting these
telecom nodes as virtual applications we can allocate resources to these virtual
nodes on the basis of requirements such as vHLR or virtual HLR needs much
more storage while virtual MSC requires much more compute . All of these
individual virtual network nodes can have Reserved compute , Reserved storage
and Reserved networks . Network means the NIC .. the portion of the NIC card which
is going to give you the the i/o operations to the to the NET to the LAN / WAN connectivity I mean to say you can allocate a limited set of the
CPUs , a limited set of storage to a particular application , For example you
you can allocate 5 virtual CPUs to .. say a 8 TB of the storage and say 2 NIC
to a virtual SMSC You can give a different type of resources to the MSC . It depends upon the application which type of resources are required . Now
the beauty of this particular cloud infrastructure is the SMSC or virtual SMSC is not going to eat up the resources which have been allocated to the virtual
MSC your virtual HLR . They are not going to eat each other resources .. they
are separated they are logically separated . This allocation of resources
is done by the virtualization layer which is sitting in NFVI Now let's understand the NFV architecture in detail , We'll start with a bottom layer
which consists of NFVI and VIM . You can see it on the bottom . NFVI stands
for the network function virtualization infrastructure . The role of this layer is
to host the hardware and manage the physical part . We can deploy blades of generic HP and Dell hardware which are visible in the
bottom . The NFV infrastructure - NFVI is a combination of a physical networking
which is the NIC card for I/O , The Computing , The Storage resources exposed as a common networking or NFV infrastructure , These resources can be at
one place or they can be geographically distributed across multiple locations
This layer also contains a critical component by the name of hypervisor
which is responsible for abstracting the physical resources into the virtual
resources . The virtualization layer sits right above the hardware and abstract
the resources so that they can be logically partitioned and provided to
the VNF Performing their specific network functions . Net-Net
NFVI abstracts the actual hardware or generic Dell HP blades into the virtual
resource by the name of the virtual compute , The virtual memory and the
virtual network . On right hand side you can see there is another component which
is VIM . We also call it as virtualized infrastructure manager . The role of VIM is to manage and control the NFVI VIM also manages the FCAPS reporting and the events of these NFVI . The NFVI means the virtual part of the resources as
well as the physical part of the resources .. i mean to say you have to
insert a blade you have to make one particular HP or Dell blade active in
the network all of that management of this entire Hardware is done by the VIM Alright let's jump to the 2nd layer Now this is the layer where we are going
to discuss the VNF and VNF manager , This is going to be the critical key
component for the virtualization . Before we start with a VNF , Let's understand
what is this network function . Now network function actually refers to the
telecom nodes such as the MSC such as the HLR which provides the functionality
such as like handling the voice handling the data storing the customer so on so far .
Traditionally these network functions or nodes they are always
deployed as a physical appliances they are running on propriety hardware and
they are tightly coupled with the underlying software . A VNF on another
hand is a network function using the software that is decoupled from the
underlying hardware . This virtualized network function run inside the virtual
machines we call it as VMs. You can see it on the screen We can have virtual SMSC running on 2 VMs virtual MSC running on 1 VM and virtual
HLR running on 3 VMs Based on the requirement .. we can increase or decrease the number of VMs or we can increase or decrease the number of
resources which are required by the VNF or the application . A VNF manager on the
right hand side it is responsible for the things related to the FCAPS - The
operations and the management of the VNF such as the setting ,the monitoring ,the
configuration ,the performance ,the logging and all kind of fault ,all kind
of alerting ,all kind of performance anything everything related to the
operation and maintenance of these particular VNFs , The VNF manager also
manages the lifecycle of VNF which also includes the creation the deletion
maintaining migration all of that The FCAPs and O&M of applications such as the virtual MSC and virtual SMSC virtual HLR is done by EM . Now this
is specifically the operations of the application ... I mean to say the ..
O&M of application means for an example if MSC link is going down , if MSC KPIs are degrading , if HLR linked with STP is going down or if HLR is
having some problem as a application now the KPI , the links , the interface is
the node alerts these particular things the operation is done by the element
management . Now you can see there are three layers of the FCAPS or Operation
and maintenance which are out there which have been discussed the first
layer is the FCAPs or operations of NFVI and VM or Hardware .. This is done by
the VIM .. we also call it as Virtualized Infrastructure Manager , the
2nd one is the FCAPs or operation of the VNF , I mean to say the creation of VNF , deletion of VNF , the performance of VNF and all that . That is
run by the VNF Manager . The topmost one the FCAPs or operation of the Telecom
virtualize application like the virtual MSC , the virtual HLR wherein like we can
see the layings interfaces the KPIs and rest of that the FCAPs and operation
of these nodes this is being done by the EM Now let's cover the last building
block or architectural block for the NFV which is the orchestrator . this
orchestration is the topmost node which you can see in the yellow color . This is
the key to any type of automation expected out of the SDN and the NFV . This
is a part of NFV framework and it is also known by the name of NFV Mano . It's
basically a component of the NFV Mano this is also called as the NFVO or NFV Orchestrator This helps to standardize the function
of virtual networking to increase the interoperability of software-defined
network .. the SDN , The NFVO performs the resource orchestration and network
service orchestration . It is a central component of NFV based solution it
binds together the different functions to create end-to-end the resource
coordinated service in a dispersed NFV environment . I mean to say you have
to create a new GGSN and then you need to create the entire flow . The
orchestrator is going to do it the orchestrator is going to manage the ..
global view of the resources it is going to manage the global flows , it is going
to keep tap on the hardware resources , it is also going to coordinate for
allocating and scaling of the resources or scaling down the resources , it is also
going to help the specific VNF or keep track of the individual VNF instances , It
also helps in end-to-end network service creation in a very very automated way ..
NFV also does the resource orchestration which is ensuring that there are always adequate resources available for compute the
storage and there are always network resources available to provide network
services which is required by the users The NFVO for all this type of the
automation and all these resource management and the flow management .. How does it work ? It is going to coordinate with the VIM
or directly with the NFVI resources or with the VNF Managers for the
required automation for required creation of the resources ..
Required allocation of the resources It has the ability to coordinate
authorized release and engage the resources which are required by the
particular flow . NET NET , it is doing the global governance of the flows and the
resources and it is going to do it in a very very automated way . Typically there
is always a single Orchestrator that oversee the entire NFV - SDN Service Now this is the link you can use it for
going through the ETSI specification so whatever architecture which we have
discussed the NFV framework , You can go through that ETSI specification varying
like you can get the more nitty-gritty of the aspects so you can follow this
particular link which is shown on the screen Well we have understood the high
level NFV and like how NFV works , but the problem is still not resolved we have
seen NFV helps in virtualizing the network which helped us in the rapid
deployment and ultimately reduce a new service new node creation times too few
seconds .. For an example , we can create the virtual MSC or virtual MME or virtual
SMSC .. We can do it in all few seconds and we can make it much more automated with
the help of the orchestrator but there is a problem , The problem is the network
connectivity .. We can create the virtual resources but if we are not going to
provide the connectivity it is not going to work . The connectivity
or network reachability requires multiple things that requires the IP
allocation the bandwidth allocation the policy opening the routing changes
it requires end-to-end reachability , It requires lot of service testing and then entire thing is manual .. You can see all these things on the right-hand side now
if you are taking few days to accomplish and complete these things then there is
no fun of doing the NFV piece which is ready with you in few seconds I meant to
say you cannot deliver the end-to-end new service or new node in few minutes
or few seconds because the while NFV is ready immediately in few seconds but the
network reachability is going to take few days now . SDN is going to help us out
there . Now in next video I am going to take you through the SDN piece and we
are going to understand how SDN works on the ground and how SDN is helping us
on this particular Network reachability piece well that's me we have already
covered the NFV or virtualized Network for Teleco operators .. In next video we
are going to cover the SDN .. stay tuned to that if you want to download this to PPT
or video please visit my website http://telecomtutorial.info/ Hope this video
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