SOFTWARE DEFINED NETWORKING

Lab 1: Introduction to Mininet

Document Version: 05-27-2020

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Lab 1: Introduction to Mininet

Contents

Overview ............................................................................................................................. 3
Objectives............................................................................................................................ 3
Lab settings ......................................................................................................................... 3
Lab roadmap ....................................................................................................................... 3
1 Introduction to Mininet .............................................................................................. 3
2 Invoke Mininet using the CLI ...................................................................................... 5
2.1 Invoke Mininet using the default topology .......................................................... 5
2.2 Test connectivity .................................................................................................. 9
3 Build and emulate a network in Mininet using the GUI ........................................... 10
3.1 Build the network topology ............................................................................... 10
3.2 Test connectivity ................................................................................................ 12
3.3 Automatic assignment of IP addresses .............................................................. 15
3.4 Save and load a Mininet topology ..................................................................... 18
4 Configure router r1 ................................................................................................... 19
4.1 Verify end-hosts configuration........................................................................... 20
4.2 Configure router’s interface ............................................................................... 21
4.3 Verify router r1 configuration ............................................................................ 25
4.4 Test connectivity between end-hosts ................................................................ 26
References ........................................................................................................................ 26

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Lab 1: Introduction to Mininet

Overview

This lab provides an introduction to Mininet, a virtual testbed used for testing network
tools and protocols. It demonstrates how to invoke Mininet from the command-line
interface (CLI) utility and how to build and emulate topologies using a graphical user
interface (GUI) application. In this lab we will use Containernet, a Mininet network
emulator fork that allows to use Docker containers as hosts in emulated network
topologies. However, all the concepts covered are bounded to Mininet.

Objectives

By the end of this lab, students should be able to:

1. Understand what Mininet is and why it is useful for testing network topologies.
2. Invoke Mininet from the CLI.
3. Construct network topologies using the GUI.
4. Save/load Mininet topologies using the GUI.
5. Configure the interfaces of a router using the CLI.

Lab settings

The information in Table 1 provides the credentials of the machine containing Mininet.

Table 1. Credentials to access Client1 machine.

Device Account Password

Client1 admin password

Lab roadmap

This lab is organized as follows:

1. Section 1: Introduction to Mininet.

2. Section 2: Invoke Mininet using the CLI.
3. Section 3: Build and emulate a network in Mininet using the GUI.
4. Section 4: Configure router r1.

1 Introduction to Mininet

Mininet is a virtual testbed enabling the development and testing of network tools and
protocols. With a single command, Mininet can create a realistic virtual network on any
type of machine (Virtual Machine (VM), cloud-hosted, or native). Therefore, it provides
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an inexpensive solution and streamlined development running in line with production

networks1. Mininet offers the following features:

• Fast prototyping for new networking protocols.

• Simplified testing for complex topologies without the need of buying expensive
hardware.
• Realistic execution as it runs real code on the Unix and Linux kernels.
• Open source environment backed by a large community contributing extensive
documentation.

h1 s1 s2 h2

s3

Mininet Emulated Network Hardware Network

Figure 1. Hardware network vs. Mininet emulated network.

Mininet is useful for development, teaching, and research as it is easy to customize and
interact with it through the CLI or the GUI. Mininet was originally designed to experiment
with OpenFlow2 and Software-Defined Networking (SDN)3. This lab, however, only focuses
on emulating a simple network environment without SDN-based devices.

Mininet’s logical nodes can be connected into networks. These nodes are sometimes
called containers, or more accurately, network namespaces. Containers consume
sufficiently fewer resources that networks of over a thousand nodes have created,
running on a single laptop. A Mininet container is a process (or group of processes) that
no longer has access to all the host system’s native network interfaces. Containers are
then assigned virtual Ethernet interfaces, which are connected to other containers
through a virtual switch4. Mininet connects a host and a switch using a virtual Ethernet
(veth) link. The veth link is analogous to a wire connecting two virtual interfaces, as
illustrated below.

Figure 2. Network namespaces and virtual Ethernet links.

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Each container is an independent network namespace, a lightweight virtualization feature

that provides individual processes with separate network interfaces, routing tables, and
Address Resolution Protocol (ARP) tables.
Mininet provides network emulation opposed to simulation, allowing all network
software at any layer to be simply run as is; i.e. nodes run the native network software of
the physical machine. On the other hand, in a simulated environment applications and
protocol implementations need to be ported to run within the simulator before they can
be used.

2 Invoke Mininet using the CLI

The first step to start Mininet using the CLI is to start a Linux terminal.

2.1 Invoke Mininet using the default topology

Step 1. Launch a Linux terminal by holding the Ctrl+Alt+T keys or by clicking on the
Linux terminal icon.

Figure 3. Shortcut to open a Linux terminal.

The Linux terminal is a program that opens a window and permits you to interact with a
command-line interface (CLI). A CLI is a program that takes commands from the keyboard
and sends them to the operating system for execution.

Step 2. To start a minimal topology, enter the command shown below. When prompted
for a password, type password and hit enter. Note that the password will not be visible
as you type it.

sudo mn

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Figure 4. Starting Mininet using the CLI.

The above command starts Mininet with a minimal topology, which consists of a switch
connected to two hosts as shown below.

c0

10.0.0.1 10.0.0.2

s1-eth1 s1-eth2
h1-eth0 h2-eth0
h1 s1 h2
10.0.0.0/8
Figure 5. Mininet’s default minimal topology.

When issuing the sudo mn command, Mininet initializes the topology and launches its
command line interface which looks like this:

mininet>

Step 3. To display the list of Mininet CLI commands and examples on their usage, type the
following command:

help

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Figure 6. Mininet’s help command.

Step 4. To display the available nodes, type the following command:

nodes

Figure 7. Mininet’s nodes command.

The output of this command shows that there is a controller, two hosts (host h1 and host
h2), and a switch (s1).

Step 5. It is useful sometimes to display the links between the devices in Mininet to
understand the topology. Issue the command shown below to see the available links.

net

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Figure 8. Mininet’s net command.

The output of this command shows that:

1. Host h1 is connected using its network interface h1-eth0 to the switch on

interface s1-eth1.
2. Host h2 is connected using its network interface h2-eth0 to the switch on
interface s1-eth2.
3. Switch s1:
a. has a loopback interface lo.
b. connects to h1-eth0 through interface s1-eth1.
c. connects to h2-eth0 through interface s1-eth2.
4. Controller c0 is the brain of the network, where it has a global knowledge about
the network. A controller instructs the switches on how to forward/drop packets
in the network.

Mininet allows you to execute commands on a specific device. To issue a command for a
specific node, you must specify the device first, followed by the command.

Step 6. To proceed, issue the command:

h1 ifconfig

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Figure 9. Output of h1 ifconfig command.

This command executes the ifconfig Linux command on host h1. The command shows
host h1’s interfaces. The display indicates that host h1 has an interface h1-eth0 configured
with IP address 10.0.0.1, and another interface lo configured with IP address 127.0.0.1
(loopback interface).

2.2 Test connectivity

Mininet’s default topology assigns the IP addresses 10.0.0.1/8 and 10.0.0.2/8 to host h1
and host h2 respectively. To test connectivity between them, you can use the command
ping . The ping command operates by sending Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP)
Echo Request messages to the remote computer and waiting for a response. Information
available includes how many responses are returned and how long it takes for them to
return.

Step 1. On the CLI, type the command shown below. This command tests the connectivity
between host h1 and host h2. To stop the test, press Ctrl+c . The figure below shows a
successful connectivity test. Host h1 (10.0.0.1) sent four packets to host h2 (10.0.0.2) and
successfully received the expected responses.

h1 ping 10.0.0.2

Figure 10. Connectivity test between host h1 and host h2.

Step 2. Stop the emulation by typing the following command:

exit

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Figure 11. Stopping the emulation using exit .

The command sudo mn -c is often used on the Linux terminal (not on the Mininet CLI)
to clean a previous instance of Mininet (e.g., after a crash).

3 Build and emulate a network in Mininet using the GUI

In this section, you will use the application MiniEdit5 to deploy the topology illustrated
below. MiniEdit is a simple GUI network editor for Mininet.

Figure 12. Lab topology.

3.1 Build the network topology

Step 1. A shortcut to MiniEdit is located on the machine’s Desktop. Start MiniEdit by

clicking on MiniEdit’s shortcut. When prompted for a password, type password .

Figure 13. MiniEdit Desktop shortcut.

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MiniEdit will start, as illustrated below.

Figure 14. MiniEdit Graphical User Interface (GUI).

The main buttons in this lab are:

1. Select: allows selection/movement of the devices. Pressing Del on the keyboard

after selecting the device removes it from the topology.
2. Host: allows addition of a new host to the topology. After clicking this button, click
anywhere in the blank canvas to insert a new host.
3. Legacy switch: allows addition of a new legacy switch to the topology. After
clicking this button, click anywhere in the blank canvas to insert the switch.
4. Link: connects devices in the topology (mainly switches and hosts). After clicking
this button, click on a device and drag to the second device to which the link is to
be established.
5. Run: starts the emulation. After designing and configuring the topology, click the
run button.
6. Stop: stops the emulation.

Step 2. To build the topology illustrated in Figure 12, two hosts and one switch must be
deployed. Deploy these devices in MiniEdit, as shown below.

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Figure 15. MiniEdit’s topology.

Use the buttons described in the previous step to add and connect devices. The
configuration of IP addresses is described in Step 3.

Step 3. Configure the IP addresses of host h1 and host h2. Host h1’s IP address is
10.0.0.1/8 and host h2’s IP address is 10.0.0.2/8. A host can be configured by holding the
right click and selecting properties on the device. For example, host h2 is assigned the IP
address 10.0.0.2/8 in the figure below.

Figure 16. Configuration of a host’s properties.

3.2 Test connectivity

Before testing the connection between host h1 and host h2, the emulation must be
started.

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Step 1. Click on the Run button to start the emulation. The emulation will start and the
buttons of the MiniEdit panel will gray out, indicating that they are currently disabled.

Figure 17. Starting the emulation.

Step 2. Open a terminal on host h1 by holding the right click on host h1 and selecting
Terminal. This opens a terminal on host h1 and allows the execution of commands on the
host h1. Repeat the procedure on host h2.

Figure 18. Opening a terminal on host h1.

The network and terminals at host h1 and host h2 will be available for testing.

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Figure 19. Terminals at host h1 and host h2.

Step 3. On host h1’s terminal, type the command shown below to display its assigned IP
addresses. The interface h1-eth0 at host h1 should be configured with the IP address
10.0.0.1 and subnet mask 255.0.0.0.

ifconfig

Figure 20. Output of ifconfig command on host h1.

Repeat Step 3 on host h2. Its interface h2-eth0 should be configured with IP address
10.0.0.2 and subnet mask 255.0.0.0.

Step 4. On host h1’s terminal, type the command shown below. This command tests the
connectivity between host h1 and host h2. To stop the test, press Ctrl+c . The figure
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below shows a successful connectivity test. Host h1 (10.0.0.1) sent six packets to host h2
(10.0.0.2) and successfully received the expected responses.

ping 10.0.0.2

Figure 21. Connectivity test using ping command.

Step 5. Stop the emulation by clicking on the Stop button.

Figure 22. Stopping the emulation.

3.3 Automatic assignment of IP addresses

In the previous section, you manually assigned IP addresses to host h1 and host h2. An
alternative is to rely on Mininet for an automatic assignment of IP addresses (by default,
Mininet uses automatic assignment), which is described in this section.

Step 1. Remove the manually assigned IP address from host h1. Hold right-click on host
h1, Properties. Delete the IP address, leaving it unassigned, and press the OK button as
shown below. Repeat the procedure on host h2.

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Figure 23. Host h1 properties.

Step 2. Click on Edit, Preferences button. The default IP base is 10.0.0.0/8. Modify this
value to 15.0.0.0/8, and then press the OK button.

Figure 24. Modification of the IP Base (network address and prefix length).

Step 3. Run the emulation again by clicking on the Run button. The emulation will start
and the buttons of the MiniEdit panel will be disabled.

Step 4. Open a terminal on host h1 by holding the right click on host h1 and selecting
Terminal.

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Figure 25. Opening a terminal on host h1.

Step 5. Type the command shown below to display the IP addresses assigned to host h1.
The interface h1-eth0 at host h1 now has the IP address 15.0.0.1 and subnet mask
255.0.0.0.

ifconfig

Figure 26. Output of ifconfig command on host h1.

You can also verify the IP address assigned to host h2 by repeating Steps 4 and 5 on host
h2’s terminal. The corresponding interface h2-eth0 at host h2 has now the IP address
15.0.0.2 and subnet mask 255.0.0.0.

Step 6. Stop the emulation by clicking on Stop button.

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Figure 27. Stopping the emulation.

3.4 Save and load a Mininet topology

In this section you will save and load a Mininet topology. It is often useful to save the
network topology, particularly when its complexity increases. MiniEdit enables you to
save the topology to a file.

Step 1. Save the current topology by clicking on File then Save. Provide a name for the
topology and save it in the local folder. In this case, we used myTopology as the topology
name.

Figure 28. Saving the topology.

Step 2. Load the topology by clicking on File then Open. Search for the topology file called
lab1.mn and click on Open. A new topology will be loaded to MiniEdit.

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Figure 29. Opening a topology.

4 Configure router r1

In the previous section, you loaded a topology that consists in two networks directly
connected to router r1. Consider Figure 30. In this topology two LANs, defined by switch
s1 and switch s2 are connected to router r1. Initially, host h1 and host h2 do not have
connectivity thus, you will configure router r1’s interfaces in order to establish
connectivity between the two networks.

Figure 30. Topology.

Table 2 summarized the IP addresses used to configure router r1 and the end-hosts.

Table 2. Topology information.

Device Interface IIP Address Subnet Default
gateway
r1-eth0 192.168.1.1 /24 N/A
r1
r1-eth1 192.168.2.1 /24 N/A

h1 h1-eth0 192.168.1.10 /24 192.168.1.1

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h2 h2-eth0 192.168.2.10 /24 192.168.2.1

Step 1. Click on the Run button to start the emulation. The emulation will start and the
buttons of the MiniEdit panel will gray out, indicating that they are currently disabled.

Figure 31. Starting the emulation.

4.1 Verify end-hosts configuration

In this section, you will verify that the IP addresses are assigned according to Table 2.
Additionally, you will check routing information.

Step 1. Hold right-click on host h1 and select Terminal. This opens the terminal of host
h1 and allows the execution of commands on that host.

Figure 32. Opening a terminal on host h1.

Step 2. In host h1 terminal, type the command shown below to verify that the IP address
was assigned successfully. You will verify that host h1 has two interfaces, h1-eth0
configured with the IP address 192.168.1.10 and the subnet mask 255.255.255.0 and, the
loopback interface lo configured with the IP address 127.0.0.1.

ifconfig

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Figure 33. Output of ifconfig command.

Step 3. In host h1 terminal, type the command shown below to verify that the default
gateway IP address is 192.168.1.1.

route

Figure 34. Output of route command.

Step 4. In order to verify host 2 default route, proceed similarly by repeating from step 1
to step 3 in host h2 terminal. Similar results should be observed.

4.2 Configure router’s interface

Step 1. In order to configure router r1, hold right-click on router r1 and select Terminal.

Figure 35. Opening a terminal on router r1.

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Step 2. In this step, you will start zebra daemon, which is a multi-server routing software
that provides TCP/IP based routing protocols. The configuration will not be working if you
do not enable zebra daemon initially. In order to start the zebra, type the following
command:

zebra

Figure 36. Starting zebra daemon.

Step 3. After initializing zebra, vtysh should be started in order to provide all the CLI
commands defined by the daemons. To proceed, issue the following command:

vtysh

Figure 37. Starting vtysh on router r1.

Step 4. Type the following command in the router r1 terminal to enter in configuration
mode.

configure terminal

Figure 38. Entering in configuration mode.

Step 5. Type the following command in the router r1 terminal to configure interface r1-
eth0.

interface r1-eth0

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Figure 39. Configuring interface r1-eth0.

Step 6. Type the following command on router r1 terminal to configure the IP address of
the interface r1-eth0.

ip address 192.168.1.1/24

Figure 40. Configuring an IP address to interface r1-eth0.

Step 7. Type the following command exit from interface r1-eth0 configuration.

exit

Figure 41. Exiting from configuring interface r1-eth0.

Step 8. Type the following command on router r1 terminal to configure the interface r1-
eth1.

interface r1-eth1

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Figure 42. Configuring interface r1-eth1.

Step 9. Type the following command on router r1 terminal to configure the IP address of
the interface r1-eth1.

ip address 192.168.2.1/24

Figure 43. Configuring an IP address to interface r1-eth1.

Step 10. Type the following command to exit from r1-eth1 interface configuration.

exit

Figure 44. Exiting from configuring interface r1-eth1.

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4.3 Verify router r1 configuration

Step 1. Exit from router r1 configuration mode issuing the following command:

exit

Figure 45. Exiting from configuration mode.

Step 2. Type the following command on router r1 terminal to verify the routing
information of router r1. It will be showing all the directly connected networks.

show ip route

Figure 46. Displaying routing information of router r1.

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4.4 Test connectivity between end-hosts

In this section you will run a connectivity test between host h1 and host h2.

Step 1. In host h1 terminal type the command shown below. Notice that according to
Table 2, the IP address 192.168.2.10 is assigned to host h2. To stop the test press ctrl+c

ping 192.168.2.10

Figure 47. Connectivity test between host h1 and host h2.

This concludes Lab 1. Stop the emulation and then exit out of MiniEdit and Linux terminal.

References

1. Mininet walkthrough. [Online]. Available: http://Mininet.org.

2. N. Mckeown, T. Anderson, H. Balakrishnan, G. Parulkar, L. Peterson, J. Rexford, S.
Shenker, and J. Turner, “OpenFlow,” ACM SIGCOMM Computer Communication
Review, vol. 38, no. 2, p. 69, 2008.
3. J. Esch, “Prolog to, software-defined networking: a comprehensive survey,”
Proceedings of the IEEE, vol. 103, no. 1, pp. 10–13, 2015.
4. P. Dordal, “An Introduction to computer networks,”. [Online]. Available:
https://intronetworks.cs.luc.edu/.
5. B. Lantz, G. Gee, “MiniEdit: a simple network editor for Mininet,” 2013. [Online].
Available: https://github.com/Mininet/Mininet/blob/master/examples.

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