Netpalm
ReST based network device broker
Install / Use
/learn @tbotnz/NetpalmREADME
Table of Contents
- What is netpalm?
- Features
- Concepts
- Additional Features
- Examples
- API Docs
- Caching
- Configuration
- Installation
- Further Reading
- Contributing
What is netpalm?
Leveraging best of breed open source network components like napalm, netmiko, ncclient and requests, netpalm makes it easy to abstract from any network devices native telnet, SSH, NETCONF or RESTCONF interface into a modern model driven open api 3 interface.
<p align="center"> <img src="/static/images/np-basic-new1.png"> </p>Taking a platform based approach means netpalm allows you to bring your own jinja2 config, service and webhook templates, python scripts and webhooks for quick adoption into your existing devops workflows.
Built on a scalable microservice based architecture netpalm provides unparalleled scalable API access into your network.
Features
- Speaks REST and JSON RPC northbound, then CLI over SSH or Telnet or NETCONF/RESTCONF southbound to your network devices
- Turns any Python script into a easy to consume, asynchronous and documented API with webhook support
- Large amount of supported network device vendors thanks to napalm, netmiko, ncclient and requests
- Built in multi-level abstraction interface for network service lifecycle functions for create, retrieve and delete and validate
- In band service inventory
- Ability to write your own service models and templates using your own existing jinja2 templates
- Well documented API with postman collection full of examples and every instance gets it own self documenting openAPI 3 UI.
- Supports pre- and post-checks across CLI devices raising exceptions and not deploying config as required
- Multiple ways to queue jobs to devices, either pinned strict (prevent connection pooling at device)or pooled first in first out
- Modern, container based scale out architecture supported by every component
- Highly configurable for all aspects of the platform
- Leverages an encrypted Redis layer providing caching and queueing of jobs to and from devices
Concepts
Basic Concepts
netpalm acts as a ReST broker and abstraction layer for NAPALM, Netmiko, NCCLIENT or a Python Script. netpalm uses TextFSM or Jinja2 to model and transform both ingress and egress data if required.
<p align="center"> <img src="/static/images/np-basic-overview.png"> </p>Component Concepts
netpalm is underpinned by a container based scale out architecture for all components.
<p align="center"> <img src="/static/images/np-component.png"> </p>Queueing Concepts
netpalm provides domain focused queueing strategy for task execution on network equipment.
<p align="center"> <img src="/static/images/np-basic-q.png"> </p>Scaling Concepts
Every netpalm container can be scaled in and out as required. Kubernetes or Swarm is recommended for any large scale deployments.
<p align="center"> <img src="/static/images/np-scale-out.png"> </p>To scale out the basic included compose deployment use the docker-compose command
docker-compose scale netpalm-controller=1 netpalm-worker-pinned=2 netpalm-worker-fifo=3
Additional Features
-
Jinja2
- BYO jinja2 config templates
- BYO jinja2 service templates
- BYO jinja2 webhook templates
- Can be used to just render Jinja2 templates via the REST API
- Automatically generates a JSON schema for any Jinja2 Template
-
Parsers
- TextFSM support via netmiko
- NTC-templates for parsing/structuring device data (includes)
- TTP Template Text Parser - Jinja2-like parsing of semi-structured CLI data
- Napalm getters
- Genie support via netmiko
- Automated download and installation of TextFSM templates from http://textfsm.nornir.tech online TextFSM development tool
- Optional dynamic rendering of Netconf XML data into JSON
-
Webhooks
- Comes with standard REST webhook which supports data transformation via your own jinja2 template
- Supports you to bring your own (BYO) webhook scripts
-
Scripts
-
Queueing
- Supports a "pinned" queueing strategy where a dedicated process and queue is established for your device, tasks are sync queued and processed for that device
- Supports a "fifo" pooled queueing strategy where a pool of workers
- Supports on the fly changes to the async queue strategy for a device
-
Caching
- Can cache responses from devices so that the same request doesn't have to go back to the device
- Automated cache poisioning on config changes on devices
-
Scaling
- Horizontal container based scale out architecture supported by each component
Examples
We could show you examples for days, but we recommend playing with the online postman collection to get a feel for what can be done. We also host a public instance where you can test netpalm via the Swagger UI.
<details> <summary style="display:inline-block;" markdown="span"><strong><code>getconfig</code> method</strong></summary>netpalm also supports all arguments for the transport libs, simply pass them in as below
netpalm supports model driven service templates,
