How flexiWAN works

High Level Architecture Diagram

flexiWAN comprises a software based edge device, flexiEdge, and a central management system, flexiManage. The diagram below shows a flexiEdge device connected to flexiManage using a secure API. flexiManage provides management and configuration of flexiEdge devices and statistics colleciton. With flexiManage, network administrators can view and manage all flexiEdge devices.

High Level Block Diagram

flexiWAN High Level Block Diagram

flexiEdge

A flexiEdge device comprises three key components:

  • Router infrastructure - a modified version of FD.io Vector Packet Processor (VPP) - https://fd.io/gettingstarted/technology/

  • Routing control plane - Free Range Routing (FRR) - https://frrouting.org/

  • flexiWAN Agent - The software element that connects flexiEdge with the flexiManage system broker through on-the-wire secure APIs

flexiAgent

flexiWAN Agent connects with the flexiWAN management using a bi-directional secured web socket connection for configuration and statistics. flexiWAN Agent supports the follwoing capabilities:

  • Get simplified JSON API commands

  • Separate and translate APIs into internal commands provisioned in Linux and the Router

  • Key-value configuration storage

  • Orchestrate the execution sequence between various elements

  • Maintain configuration order

  • Restore the last system state and configuration after reboot

  • Transaction configuration processing and roll-back on failures

  • Monitor components and restart them on failure

  • Provide JSON structure of the entire configuration

  • Provide various CLI commands for troubleshooting

flexiManage

flexiManage runs on a scalable web server, providing network management. Through flexiManage, network administrators can manage devices and networks flexiManage system broker is responsible for communicating with flexiEdge devices and serves as the communication channel between the web server and the devices. flexiWAN analytics system collects statistics from the flexiEdge devices and provides monitoring status and updates to network administrators.