CN107749807B

CN107749807B - Network function verification method and verification system for NFV

Info

Publication number: CN107749807B
Application number: CN201711048725.8A
Authority: CN
Inventors: 黄韬; 魏亮; 周洪利; 檀朝红; 陈俊霞
Original assignee: Jiangsu Future Networks Innovation Institute
Current assignee: Jiangsu Future Networks Innovation Institute
Priority date: 2017-10-31
Filing date: 2017-10-31
Publication date: 2020-07-28
Anticipated expiration: 2037-10-31
Also published as: CN107749807A

Abstract

The invention discloses a network function verification method and a verification system facing NFV, wherein the verification method is based on a verification system consisting of a user input device and a network function verifier, and specifically comprises the following steps of 1, acquiring network service requirements of users, and determining resource requirement types of network service instantiation; step 2, generating a logic topology model adaptive to network service implementation according to Network Function Virtualization (NFV) service requirements; step 3, analyzing resource requirements according to the logic topology model, executing the instantiation process of the logic topology, and establishing the mapping relation between the logic topology and the resources; step 4, calculating parameters of the service flow according to the service requirement of the NFV of the user, configuring a generation mode of the service flow, and issuing a corresponding service test script to instantiated resources; and 5, executing the service test script on the instantiated resources. The method can instantiate the network verification environment according to the network service requirements of different users, and automatically test and analyze the support service flow.

Description

Network function verification method and verification system for NFV

Technical Field

The invention relates to the technical field of network cache systems, in particular to a network function verification method and a network function verification system for NFV.

Background

With the development of general-purpose hardware and Virtualization technologies, more and more software processing functions are carried by Network Function Virtualization (NFV). In the network evolution process, the NFV realizes software and hardware decoupling and function abstraction. The NFV supports flexible updating of resources and rapid development and deployment of new services, and supports automatic deployment, elastic expansion, fault isolation, self-healing and the like based on service requirements. NFV needs to adapt to various Network Service (NS) functions, but due to the influence of various factors, a lot of problems occur in the current NFV deployment process. The current NFV standard still advances in multiparty gaming, and there is a huge compatibility risk between verification testing and formal deployment. When cross-layer integration is adopted, the existing operation and maintenance model cannot quickly confirm the responsibility main body. Different service users are interested in different aspects. For example, the carrier network carries the actual traffic and data, which is more concerned with the route forwarding capability, while the BAT is concerned with the performance of the server.

Disclosure of Invention

In order to solve the technical problem, the invention provides a network function verification method and system for NFV, which can instantiate a network verification environment according to network service requirements of different users and automatically perform testing and analysis of support service flows.

In a first aspect, the present invention provides a network function verification method for NFV, including the following steps:

step 1, acquiring network service requirements of a user, and determining resource requirement types instantiated by the network service;

the resources mainly comprise three categories: network transmission resources, data processing resources and service test resources;

the network transmission type resource refers to a physical resource or a virtual resource for realizing network connection and routing forwarding service, such as a virtual switch, a virtual router and the like;

the data processing resources refer to physical resources or virtual resources capable of running IO intensive services or compute intensive services, such as a virtual host executing NAT services, a virtual host executing firewall applications, and the like;

the service test type resource refers to a physical resource or a virtual resource for assisting NFV service test, such as a virtual host generating test network traffic;

step 2, generating an adaptive logic topology model according to the NFV service requirement;

step 3, analyzing resource requirements according to the adaptive logic topology model, executing the instantiation process of the logic topology, and establishing a mapping relation between the logic topology and the resources;

step 4, calculating parameters of the service flow according to the service requirement of the NFV of the user, configuring a generation mode of the service flow, and issuing a corresponding service test script to instantiated resources;

the service test script includes but is not limited to setting a network traffic forwarding path, setting a network traffic type, setting a network traffic generation rate, setting a test start time, setting a test duration, and the like.

And 5, executing the service test script by the instantiated resource.

In a second aspect, the present invention provides an NFV-oriented network function verification system, including a user input device and a network function verifier;

(1) the user input device is a device for receiving NFV service requests of users and analyzing resources and logical topological structures required by instantiated user network function verification environments, and comprises a user input receiving unit, a service requirement analysis unit and a resource configuration management unit;

the user input receiving unit is responsible for receiving the parameters of the NFV service to be instantiated by the user;

the service demand analysis unit is responsible for calculating resource demand of the NFV service and an adaptive logic topology model according to the parameters of the NFV service input by a user;

the resource allocation management unit is responsible for generating a configuration file for each resource according to the calculation result of the service demand analysis unit, continuously managing all the configuration files and providing parameter support for instantiation of each element in the logic topology and generation of service flow;

(2) the network function verifier is a device for executing and verifying network function environment instantiation and outputting an instantiation state, and comprises a logic topology adapting unit, a service flow generating unit and an instantiation result output unit;

the logical topology adapting unit is responsible for instantiating each element in the logical topology model according to the configuration file of the resource configuration management unit;

the service flow generation unit is responsible for generating network flow meeting the conditions of specified type, specified rate and the like according to the configuration file of the resource configuration management unit;

the instantiation result output unit is responsible for acquiring configuration execution parameters of the logic topology adaptation unit and the service flow generation unit and outputting the instantiated NFV service environment and the instantiated system parameters to a user.

Compared with the prior art, the invention adopting the technical scheme has the following technical effects: the NFV supports flexible updating of resources and rapid development and deployment of new services, and needs to adapt to various network services, but the prior art lacks a method and a system which can rapidly generate and verify NFV network functions; the invention realizes the network function verification process facing to NFV, uniformly and quickly realizes the design, realization and verification process of NFV functions in a dynamic expansion mode (both resource mapping and test script can be adjusted), and provides a feasible method and a system for adapting different services to different service user requirements.

Drawings

Fig. 1 is a schematic basic structural diagram of an NFV-oriented network function verification system according to an embodiment of the present invention;

fig. 2 is a flowchart of a network function verification method for NFV according to an embodiment of the present invention;

fig. 3 is a schematic detailed structural diagram of an NFV-oriented network function verification system according to an embodiment of the present invention;

fig. 4 is a flowchart of a detailed interaction process of the NFV-oriented network function verification system according to an embodiment of the present invention.

Detailed Description

The technical solutions in the embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings in the embodiments of the present invention. It is to be understood that the described embodiments are merely exemplary of the invention, and not restrictive of the full scope of the invention. All other embodiments, which can be derived by a person skilled in the art from the embodiments given herein without making any creative effort, shall fall within the protection scope of the present invention.

The network function verification method and system for NFV provided by the embodiment of the invention can instantiate a network verification environment according to the service requirements of different users and automatically test and analyze the service flow supporting NFV.

As shown in fig. 1, a basic structure of an NFV-oriented network function verification system provided in an embodiment of the present invention includes: a user input unit and a network function verifier; the user input device is responsible for receiving NFV service requests of users and analyzing resources and logic topological structures required by instantiated user network function verification environments; the network function verifier is responsible for executing and verifying network function environment instantiation and outputting the instantiated state; relationship 101 represents the user importer sending the resource profile to the network function verifier.

As shown in fig. 2, a schematic diagram of a network function verification method for NFV according to an embodiment of the present invention includes:

step 201, acquiring network service requirements of a user, and determining resource requirement types instantiated by the network service; step 202, generating an adaptive logic topology model according to NFV service requirements;

steps

201 and 202 occur with the user input device of fig. 1;

step 203, analyzing resource requirements according to the adapted logic topology model, executing an instantiation process of the logic topology, and establishing a mapping relation between the logic topology and the resources; the "analyze resource requirements according to the adapted logical topology model" in step 203 occurs at the user input device in fig. 1; the step 203 of executing the instantiation process of the logical topology and establishing the mapping relationship between the logical topology and the resource occurs in the network function verifier in fig. 1;

step 204, calculating parameters of the service flow according to the service requirement of the NFV of the user, configuring a generation mode of the service flow, and issuing a corresponding service test script to instantiated resources; step 205, the instantiated resource executes a service test script;

steps

204 and 205 occur with the network function verifier of fig. 1.

To further understand the structure of the NFV-oriented network function verification system provided in the embodiment of the present invention, the user input device and the network function verifier in fig. 1 are divided into different functional units, and fig. 3 is a detailed schematic structural diagram of the NFV-oriented network function verification system provided in the embodiment of the present invention.

The user input device in fig. 3 includes three parts, namely a user input receiving unit, a service requirement analyzing unit and a resource allocation managing unit;

1) the user input receiving unit is responsible for receiving the parameters of the NFV service to be instantiated by the user; in a specific implementation, the NFV service request of the user includes a network service unit topology requirement, a service test unit topology requirement, a service traffic type, a forwarding path requirement, and the like;

2) the service demand analysis unit is responsible for calculating resource demand of the NFV service and an adaptive logic topology model according to the parameters of the NFV service input by a user; the resource requirements mainly include three categories of resources: network transmission resources, data processing resources and service test resources;

the data processing resources refer to physical resources or virtual resources capable of running IO intensive services or compute intensive services, and generally, a virtual host with a network function, such as a virtual host executing NAT services, a virtual host executing firewall applications, and the like, is deployed;

the service test type resource refers to a physical resource or a virtual resource for assisting in NFV service test, such as a virtual host generating test network traffic and a virtual host deploying verification software;

3) the resource allocation management unit is responsible for generating a configuration file for each resource according to the calculation result of the service demand analysis unit, continuously managing all the configuration files and providing parameter support for instantiation of each element in the logic topology and generation of service flow;

in a specific implementation, the configuration object includes, but is not limited to, a host mirror image, a navigator configuration, a network card configuration, a network configuration (a network segment, a gateway, a host route, a DNS, etc.), a template configuration file vnfd of a virtual network function, a template configuration file nsd of a network service, and the like;

the network function verifier in fig. 3 includes three parts, namely a logic topology adapting unit, a service traffic generating unit and an instantiation result output unit;

1) the logical topology adapting unit is responsible for instantiating each element in the logical topology model according to the configuration file of the resource configuration management unit;

specific instantiation comprises but is not limited to the instantiation of virtual resources in a logic topology based on OpenStack computing virtualization, network virtualization and network function virtualization;

for example, an instantiation process is illustrated, wherein a network transmission type resource is created in the instantiation process, and the network transmission type resource comprises an OpenStack network, a subnet, a port, a router and the like; then, creating service test resources, namely creating a virtual host based on different test software images; finally, data processing resources are created, vnfd and nsd template information is generated, vnfd, nsd, vnf and ns objects are created, and virtual host information in vnf and ns is synchronized to a local database so as to support later management operation on the virtual hosts;

2) the service flow generation unit is responsible for generating network flow meeting the conditions of specified type, specified rate and the like according to the configuration file of the resource configuration management unit;

the service test script output by the service flow generation unit according to the resource allocation management unit includes but is not limited to setting a network flow forwarding path, setting a network flow type, setting a network flow generation rate, setting test start time, setting test duration and the like;

for example, the network traffic forwarding path and the traffic type configuration may be implemented in two parts, the network traffic forwarding path and the traffic type configuration inside the network service unit are implemented by a vnffg object virtualized by an OpenStack network function, and the traffic forwarding path and the traffic type configuration between the service test unit and the network service unit are implemented by a port chain object of a network-sfc of an OpenStack;

3) the instantiation result output unit is responsible for acquiring configuration execution parameters of the logic topology adaptation unit and the service flow generation unit and outputting the instantiated NFV service environment and the instantiated system parameters to a user.

For further understanding, the following describes in detail the interaction process between each unit in the user input device and each unit in the network function verifier in this embodiment, and fig. 4 is a schematic diagram of a detailed interaction process of the NFV-oriented network function verification system according to this embodiment of the present invention:

1) the user input receiving unit obtains the requirement of the NFV network function verification service of the user through a man-machine interface, a machine-machine interface and the like;

2) the user input receiving unit sends the requirement in the previous step 1) to the service requirement analyzing unit, and the operation corresponds to the relation 301 in fig. 3;

3) the service requirement analysis unit is responsible for analyzing the user requirement transmitted in the last step 2), calculating various resources required for realizing the user requirement, and constructing a service logic topology model required by the network function verification process;

4) the service requirement analysis unit sends the service resource requirement and the service logic topology model generated in the last step 3) to the resource configuration management unit, and the operation corresponds to the relation 302 in fig. 3;

5) the resource allocation management unit generates various resource allocation files according to the service logic topology model, the resource requirements and the current resource situation;

6) the resource configuration management unit sends the configuration file or the script file generated in the previous step 5) to the logical topology adapting unit and the service traffic generating unit respectively, and the two processes respectively correspond to the relationship 303 in fig. 3 and the relationship 304 in fig. 3; the relationship 303 in fig. 3 conveys the configuration file of the network transmission type resource, the configuration file of the data processing type resource, and the configuration file of the service test type resource; relationship 304 in FIG. 3 conveys a business test script file;

7) the logical topology adapting unit instantiates each element in the logical topology model according to the configuration file of the resource configuration management unit transmitted by the relationship 303, including instantiating a network transmission resource, a data processing resource and a service test resource; specific instantiation comprises but is not limited to the instantiation of virtual resources in a logic topology based on OpenStack computing virtualization, network virtualization and network function virtualization;

8) the service traffic generation unit configures attributes such as the type, forwarding path, bandwidth, etc. of service traffic according to the instantiated service test class resources in the previous step 7) and the service test script file transmitted by the relationship 304 in fig. 3; after the configuration is completed, performing NFV service test; the process of performing NFV services corresponds to relationship 305 in fig. 3;

9) the logic topology adapting unit sends the initial state information, the intermediate process information, the completion state information and the like of each instantiated resource to the instantiation result output unit; this process corresponds to relationship 306 in FIG. 3;

10) the service flow generating unit continuously outputs and sends the service flow state to the instantiation result output unit; this process corresponds to relationship 307 in FIG. 3;

11) the instantiation result output unit collects various state information in the instantiation and network function verification processes and outputs the state information through a man-machine interface, a machine-machine interface and the like.

It should be noted that the method and system embodiments described above are only schematic, and the devices and units described as separate components in the system structure may or may not be physically separate, and the components used as input and output may or may not be physical units, and may be located in one place, or may be distributed on multiple network units. Some or all of the modules may be selected according to actual needs to achieve the purpose of the solution of the present embodiment. In addition, in the drawings of the embodiment of the system provided by the invention, the connection relationship between the devices and the units indicates that the devices and the units have communication connection therebetween, and the connection relationship may be specifically implemented as one or more communication buses or signal lines. One of ordinary skill in the art can understand and implement it without inventive effort.

Through the above description of the embodiments, those skilled in the art can clearly understand that the resources related to the present invention may be in a virtualized form or in a physical form. However, more often than not, a virtualized software program implementation is a preferred implementation for the present invention. Based on such understanding, the technical solutions of the present invention may be embodied in the form of a software product, which is stored in a readable storage medium, such as a floppy disk, a usb disk, a removable hard disk, a Read-Only Memory (ROM), a Random Access Memory (RAM), a magnetic disk or an optical disk of a computer, and includes instructions for enabling a computer device (which may be a personal computer, a server, or a network device) to execute the methods according to the embodiments of the present invention.

As described above, the NFV-oriented network function verification method and system provided by the embodiment of the present invention are described in detail, and a person skilled in the art may change the specific implementation and application scope according to the idea of the embodiment of the present invention, so that the content of the present specification should not be construed as limiting the present invention.

Claims

1. An NFV-oriented network function verification method, characterized in that the verification method comprises the following steps:

step 2, generating a logic topology model adapted to the network service instantiation according to the Network Function Virtualization (NFV) service requirement;

step 3, analyzing resource requirements according to the logic topology model, executing the instantiation process of the logic topology, and establishing the mapping relation between the logic topology and the resources;

and 5, executing the service test script on the instantiated resource.

2. The NFV-oriented network function authentication method according to claim 1, wherein the resources include three categories: network transmission type resources, data processing type resources and service test type resources.

3. The NFV-oriented network function authentication method according to claim 2, wherein the network transmission-class resource refers to a physical resource or a virtual resource for implementing network connection and a route forwarding service;

the data processing resources refer to physical resources or virtual resources capable of running IO intensive services or compute intensive services;

the service test type resource refers to a physical resource or a virtual resource for assisting in NFV service test.

4. The NFV-oriented network function authentication method of claim 2,

the service test script comprises setting a network flow forwarding path, setting a network flow type, setting a network flow generation rate, setting test starting time and setting test duration.

5. An NFV-oriented network function authentication system, the authentication system comprising a user input unit and a network function authenticator;

the user input device is a device for receiving NFV service requests of users and analyzing resources and logic topological structures required by instantiated user network function verification environments, and comprises a user input receiving unit, a service requirement analysis unit and a resource configuration management unit;

the network function verifier is a device for executing and verifying network function environment instantiation and outputting an instantiation state, and comprises a logic topology adapting unit, a service flow generating unit and an instantiation result output unit.

6. An NFV-oriented network function authentication system according to claim 5,

the resource allocation management unit is responsible for generating a configuration file for each resource according to the calculation result of the service demand analysis unit, continuously managing all the configuration files, and providing parameter support for instantiation of each element in the logic topology and generation of service flow.

7. An NFV-oriented network function authentication system according to claim 5,

the service flow generating unit is responsible for generating network flow meeting the conditions of specified type and specified rate according to the configuration file of the resource configuration management unit;