Basic Architecture

In Huawei CloudCampus Solution, the basic architecture of the virtualization solution for large- and medium-sized campus networks is illustrated in Figure 1-1. This architecture consists of three layers: network layer, management layer, and application layer.

• Network layer

  Network virtualization technologies are introduced to divide the network layer into a physical network (underlay) and a virtual network (overlay).

  • Underlay: a physical network that provides basic connection services for a campus. To meet access requirements of diverse types of terminals, the underlay network provides a unified, converged terminal access capability that allows access of wired, wireless, and IoT terminals simultaneously.
  • Overlay: a virtual network built on top of a physical network (underlay) by using virtualization technologies. Service policies deployed on an overlay network are separated from the underlay network, which decouples service complexity from network complexity. Multiple overlay networks can serve different services or customer segments.
• Management layer

  The management layer provides network-level management capabilities, such as configuration management, service management, maintenance and fault detection, and security threat analysis. Management-layer components include iMaster NCE-Campus and iMaster NCE-CampusInsight.

  • iMaster NCE-Campus: network automation engine. It provisions services to network devices through the Network Configuration Protocol (NETCONF) and provides open application programming interfaces (APIs) to integrate with third-party platforms. NETCONF is an XML-based network management protocol. It works with the YANG data modeling language to implement model-driven network management and achieve network configuration automation in a programmable manner, simplifying network O&M and accelerating service deployment.
  • iMaster NCE-CampusInsight: intelligent network analysis engine. It employs technologies such as Telemetry to collect information about network devices, including their packet loss rate, traffic, status, and configuration, and delivers intelligent O&M services for user networks based on intelligent algorithms. Telemetry is a network monitoring technology developed to fast collect performance data from physical or virtual devices remotely. The Telemetry-based data collection technology provides iMaster NCE-CampusInsight with accurate, real-time, and abundant data sources, which serve as the basis for intelligent O&M.
• Application layer

  iMaster NCE-Campus offers standard RESTful APIs to open up identified network resources, service quality, network topology, and other information to upper-layer services. With these standard open APIs, third-party vendors can customize innovative service applications suited to their own service needs.