BGP Soft Reset Enhancement

This feature module describes the Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) Soft Reset Enhancement feature. It includes information on the benets of the new feature, supported platforms, related documents, and so forth. This document includes the following sections:

Feature Overview, page 1 Supported Platforms, page 3 Prerequisites, page 4 Conguration Tasks, page 4 Conguration Examples, page 7 Command Reference, page 8

Feature Overview
Routing policies for a peer include all the congurations such as route-map, distribute-list, prex-list, and lter-list that may impact inbound or outbound routing table updates. Whenever there is a change in the routing policy, the BGP session must be cleared, or reset, for the new policy to take effect. There are two types of reset, hard reset and soft reset. Clearing a BGP session using a hard reset invalidates the cache and results in a negative impact on the operation of networks as the information in the cache becomes unavailable. Soft reset is recommended because it allows routing tables to be recongured and activated without clearing the BGP session. Soft reset is done on a per-neighbor basis. There are two types of soft reset:

When soft reset is used to generate inbound updates from a neighbor, it is called dynamic inbound soft reset. When soft reset is used to send a new set of updates to a neighbor, it is called outbound soft reset.

Previously, in order to perform a soft reset for inbound routing table updates, the neighbor soft-reconguration command directed the Cisco IOS software in the local BGP router to store all received (inbound) routing policy updates without modication. This method is memory-intensive and not recommended unless absolutely necessary. (Outbound updates have never required the extra memory and are not affected by this feature.)

BGP Soft Reset Enhancement 1

Managing Routing Policy Changes

With this software release, the BGP Soft Reset Enhancement feature provides automatic support for dynamic soft reset of inbound BGP routing table updates that is not dependent upon stored routing table update information. The new method requires no preconguration (as with the neighbor soft-reconguration command) and requires much less memory than the previous soft reset method for inbound routing table updates.

Managing Routing Policy Changes

When the routing policy of a BGP neighbor changes, the session must be reset (cleared) for the changes to take effect. Because resetting a BGP session can be disruptive to networks, a soft reset method is recommended for reconguring the routing table. Previously, in order to recongure the inbound routing table, both the local BGP router and the BGP peer rst needed to be congured to store incoming routing policy updates using the neighbor soft-reconguration command. Additional resources, particularly memory, were required to store the inbound routing table updates. The clear ip bgp command could then initiate the soft reset, which generated a new set of inbound routing table updates using the stored information. This feature provides an additional method for soft reset that allows the dynamic exchange of route refresh requests and routing information between BGP routers, and the subsequent re-advertisement of the respective outbound routing table. Soft reset using the route refresh capability does not require preconguration and consumes no additional memory resources. To use this new method, both BGP peers must support the soft route refresh capability, which is advertised in the OPEN message sent when a peer sends its routing table update. Any router running BGP with this software release automatically supports the route refresh capability. Routers running previous Cisco IOS software releases do not support the route refresh capability and must use the older soft reset method. If the soft reset fails, you can still clear the BGP session, but it will have a negative impact upon network operations and should only be used as a last resort.
Note Outbound resets have never required preconguration or storing of routing table updates, and

remain unchanged by the BGP Soft Reset Enhancement. The procedure for an outbound reset is described in the section Reset BGP Connections in the Cisco IOS Release 12.0 Network Protocols Conguration Guide, Part 1.

Benets
Allows Dynamic Route Refresh Requests
This feature provides a way to initiate nondisruptive routing policy changes by allowing the dynamic exchange of route refresh requests between BGP routers, and the subsequent re-advertisement of the respective outbound routing tables.

Requires No Preconguration
Because support for the soft reset using the route refresh capability is included in this release of the Cisco IOS software, no further router conguration is required. You can initiate a soft inbound reset using only the clear ip bgp in command.

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Restrictions

Requires No Additional Memory Resources

Unlike a soft reset using the stored inbound routing table updates provided by the neighbor soft-reconguration command, when both BGP peers support the route refresh capability inbound routing table updates are not stored in the local BGP router. The soft reset requests are exchanged dynamically, and no additional memory is required.

Flexibility
There are now two available methods for inbound soft reset; the older method using stored inbound routing table updates, and the method provided by this feature using dynamic exchange of update information.

Restrictions
Both BGP peers must support the route refresh capability. If one side does not, then the only soft reconguration option is to use the neighbor soft-reconguration command, which initiates storage of inbound routing table updates and requires additional memory.

Related Documents

Network Protocols Conguration Guide, Part 1, Cisco IOS Release 12.0 Network Protocols Command Reference, Part 1, Cisco IOS Release 12.0

Supported Platforms

Cisco 1003 Cisco 1004 Cisco 1005 Cisco 1600 series Cisco 2500 series Cisco 3600 series Cisco 3800 series Cisco 4000 series (Cisco 4000, 4000-M, 4500, 4500-M, 4700, 4700-M) Cisco 5200 series Cisco 7000 series Cisco 7200 series Cisco 7500 series

BGP Soft Reset Enhancement 3

Supported Standards, MIBs, and RFCs

Supported Standards, MIBs, and RFCs

Standards

draft-chen-bgp-route-refresh-01.txt, IETF Internet Standards, August, 1995

MIB
No new or modied MIBs are supported by this feature.

RFCs
No new or modied RFCs are supported by this feature.

Prerequisites
Both BGP peers must support the soft reset route refresh capability, rst included in this software release. If one router does not, then the only soft reconguration option is to use the neighbor soft-reconguration command, which initiates storage of inbound routing table updates and requires additional memory, followed by the clear ip bgp in command.

Conguration Tasks
See the following Conguring BGP Soft Reset section for conguration tasks for the BGP Soft Reset Enhancement feature. This task is required.

Conguring BGP Soft Reset

Whenever there is a change in the routing policy, the BGP session must be reset (cleared) for the new policy to take effect and the routing table to be recongured. Using a hard reset to clear a BGP session causes cache invalidation and results in a negative impact on network operation. Soft reset is recommended because it allows routing table policies to be recongured and activated without clearing the BGP session. Soft reset is done on a per-neighbor basis. Soft resets can be inbound or outbound:

When soft reset is used to generate inbound updates from a neighbor, it is called dynamic inbound soft reset. There are two ways to perform an inbound soft reset: dynamically, and using stored routing update information.

When soft reset is used to send a new set of updates to a neighbor, it is called outbound soft reset. There is only one way to perform an outbound soft reset.

Conguring BGP Dynamic Inbound Soft Reset

If both the local BGP router and the neighbor router support the route refresh capability, you can perform a dynamic soft inbound reset. This type of reset has the following advantages over a soft inbound reset using stored routing update information:

Does not require preconguration Does not require additional memory for storing routing update information

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Configuring BGP Soft Reset

To determine whether a router supports the route refresh capability, use the show ip bgp command.
Command
Router# show ip bgp [network] [network-mask] [longer-prefixes]

Purpose Shows whether a neighbor supports the route refresh capability. If the specied router supports the route refresh capability, the following message is displayed: Received route refresh capability from peer.

If all the BGP routers support the route refresh capability, you can use the dynamic soft reset method for resetting the inbound routing table.
Command
Router# clear ip bgp {* | address | peer-group-name} soft in

Purpose Performs a dynamic soft reset on the connection specied in the command.

Conguring BGP Outbound Soft Reset

Outbound soft resets do not require any preconguration. Using the keyword soft species that a soft reset be performed.
Command
clear ip bgp {* | address | peer-group-name} soft out

Purpose Performs a soft reset on the connection specied in the command.

Conguring BGP Soft Reset Using Stored Routing Policy Information

If all of the BGP routers in the connection do not support the route refresh capability, use the soft reset method that generates a new set of inbound routing table updates from information previously stored. To initiate storage of inbound routing table updates, you must rst precongure the router using the neighbor soft-reconguration command. Keep in mind that the memory requirements for storing the inbound update information can become quite large.
Command
Router config# neighbor {ip-address | peer-group-name} soft-reconfiguration inbound

Purpose Initiates storage of inbound routing table updates from the specied neighbor or peer group.

Once you have initiated storage of inbound routing table updates for a specic neighbor or peer group, you can perform a soft inbound reset for that neighbor or peer group.
Command
Router config# clear ip bgp {* | address | peer-groupname} soft in

Purpose Performs a soft reset on the connection specied in the command.

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Verifying BGP Soft Reset

Verifying BGP Soft Reset

Verify whether a soft reset is successful by checking information about the routing table and about BGP neighbors.
Step 1

Enter the show ip bgp command to display entries in the BGP routing table. The following output shows that the peer supports the route refresh capability.
Router# show ip bgp BGP table version is 716977, local router ID is 193.0.32.1 Status codes: s suppressed, * valid, > best, i - internal Origin codes: i - IGP, e - EGP, ? - incomplete Received route refresh capability from peer. Network * i3.0.0.0 *>i * i6.0.0.0 *>i * i7.0.0.0 *>i * * i8.0.0.0 *>i * * i13.0.0.0 *>i * * i15.0.0.0 *>i * i16.0.0.0 *>i * Next Hop 193.0.22.1 193.0.16.1 193.0.22.1 193.0.16.1 193.0.22.1 193.0.16.1 198.92.72.24 193.0.22.1 193.0.16.1 198.92.72.24 193.0.22.1 193.0.16.1 198.92.72.24 193.0.22.1 193.0.16.1 193.0.22.1 193.0.16.1 198.92.72.24 Metric LocPrf Weight Path 0 100 0 1800 1239 ? 0 100 0 1800 1239 ? 0 100 0 1800 690 568 ? 0 100 0 1800 690 568 ? 0 100 0 1800 701 35 ? 0 100 0 1800 701 35 ? 0 1878 704 701 35 ? 0 100 0 1800 690 560 ? 0 100 0 1800 690 560 ? 0 1878 704 701 560 ? 0 100 0 1800 690 200 ? 0 100 0 1800 690 200 ? 0 1878 704 701 200 ? 0 100 0 1800 174 ? 0 100 0 1800 174 ? 0 100 0 1800 701 i 0 100 0 1800 701 i 0 1878 704 701 i

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Dynamic Inbound Soft Reset

Step 2

Enter the show ip bgp neighbors command to display information about the BGP and TCP connections to neighbors.
Router# show ip bgp neighbors 171.69.232.178 BGP neighbor is 171.69.232.178, remote AS 10, external link Index 1, Offset 0, Mask 0x2 Inbound soft reconfiguration allowed BGP version 4, remote router ID 171.69.232.178 BGP state = Established, table version = 27, up for 00:06:12 Last read 00:00:12, hold time is 180, keepalive interval is 60 seconds Minimum time between advertisement runs is 30 seconds Received 19 messages, 0 notifications, 0 in queue Sent 17 messages, 0 notifications, 0 in queue Inbound path policy configured Route map for incoming advertisements is testing Connections established 2; dropped 1 Connection state is ESTAB, I/O status: 1, unread input bytes: 0 Local host: 171.69.232.181, Local port: 11002 Foreign host: 171.69.232.178, Foreign port: 179 Enqueued packets for retransmit: 0, input: 0, saved: 0 Event Timers (current time is 0x530C294): Timer Starts Wakeups Retrans 12 0 TimeWait 0 0 AckHold 12 10 SendWnd 0 0 KeepAlive 0 0 GiveUp 0 0 PmtuAger 0 0 iss: 133981889 irs: 3317025518 snduna: 133982166 rcvnxt: 3317025810 sndnxt: rcvwnd:

Next 0x0 0x0 0x0 0x0 0x0 0x0 0x0 133982166 16093 sndwnd: delrcvwnd: 16108 291

SRTT: 441 ms, RTTO: 2784 ms, RTV: 951 ms, KRTT: 0 ms minRTT: 0 ms, maxRTT: 300 ms, ACK hold: 300 ms Flags: higher precedence, nagle Datagrams (max data segment is 1460 bytes): Rcvd: 15 (out of order: 0), with data: 12, total data bytes: 291 Sent: 23 (retransmit: 0), with data: 11, total data bytes: 276

Conguration Examples
This section provides the following conguration examples:

Dynamic Inbound Soft Reset Inbound Soft Reset Using Stored Information

Dynamic Inbound Soft Reset

The following examples shows the clear ip bgp 131.108.1.1 soft in command used to initiate a dynamic soft reconguration in the BGP peer 131.108.1.1. This command requires that the peer supports the route refresh capability.
Router# clear ip bgp 131.108.1.1 soft in

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Inbound Soft Reset Using Stored Information

Inbound Soft Reset Using Stored Information

The following example enables inbound soft reconguration for the neighbor 131.108.1.1. All the updates received from this neighbor will be stored unmodied, regardless of the inbound policy. When inbound soft reconguration is performed later, the stored information will be used to generate a new set of inbound updates.
router bgp 100 neighbor 131.108.1.1 remote-as 200 neighbor 131.108.1.1 soft-reconfiguration inbound

The following example clears the session with the neighbor 131.108.1.1.
clear ip bgp 131.108.1.1 soft in

Command Reference
This section documents new or modied commands. All other commands used with this feature are documented in the Cisco IOS Release 12.0 command reference publications.

clear ip bgp show ip bgp

In Cisco IOS Release 12.0(1)T or later, you can search and lter the output for show and more commands. This functionality is useful when you need to sort through large amounts of output, or if you want to exclude output that you do not need to see. To use this functionality, enter a show or more command followed by the pipe character (|), one of the keywords begin, include, or exclude, and an expression that you want to search or lter on: command | {begin | include | exclude} regular-expression Following is an example of the show atm vc command in which you want the command output to begin with the rst line where the expression PeakRate appears: show atm vc | begin PeakRate For more information on the search and lter functionality, refer to the Cisco IOS Release 12.0(1)T feature module titled CLI String Search.

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clear ip bgp

clear ip bgp
To reset a Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) connection or session, use the clear ip bgp EXEC command. clear ip bgp {* | address | peer-group-name} [soft [in | out]]

Syntax Description
* address peer-group-name soft in | out Resets all current BGP sessions. Resets only the identied BGP neighbor. Resets the specied BGP peer group. (Optional) Soft reset. Does not reset the session. (Optional) Triggers inbound or outbound soft reset. If the in or out option is not specied, both inbound and outbound soft reset are triggered.

Defaults
No default behavior or values.

Command Modes
EXEC

Command History
Release 10.0 12.0(6)T Modication This command was introduced. The dynamic inbound soft reset capability was added.

Usage Guidelines
You can reset inbound routing table updates dynamically or by generating new updates using stored update information. Using stored update information requires additional memory for storing the updates. To reset inbound routing table updates dynamically, all BGP routers must support the route refresh capability. To determine whether a BGP router supports this capability, use the show ip bgp command. If a router supports the route refresh capability, the following message is displayed: Received route refresh capability from peer. If all BGP routers support the route refresh capability, use the clear ip bgp {* | address | peer-group name} in command. You need not use the soft keyword, because soft reset is automatically assumed when the route refresh capability is supported. To generate new inbound updates from stored update information (rather than dynamically), without resetting the BGP session, you must rst precongure the local BGP router using the neighbor soft-reconguration command. This preconguration causes the software to store all received updates without modication regardless of whether an update is accepted by the inbound policy. Storing updates is memory intensive and should be avoided if possible.
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clear ip bgp

Outbound BGP soft conguration has no memory overhead and does not require any preconguration. You can trigger an outbound reconguration on the other side of the BGP session to make the new inbound policy take effect. Use this command whenever any of the following changes occur:

Examples

Additions or changes to the BGP-related access lists Changes to BGP-related weights Changes to BGP-related distribution lists Changes in the specications of the BGP timer Changes to the BGP administrative distance Changes to BGP-related route maps

The following example clears all entries from the host name-and-address cache (hard reset):
clear host *

The following example clears the inbound session with the neighbor 131.108.1.1 without resetting the session:
clear ip bgp 131.108.1.1 soft in

The following example clears the outbound session with the peer-group corp without resetting the session:
clear ip bgp corp soft out

Related Commands
Command neighbor soft-reconguration show ip bgp Description Congures the Cisco IOS software to start storing inbound routing table updates. Displays entries in the BGP routing table.

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show ip bgp

show ip bgp
To display entries in the Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) routing table, use the show ip bgp EXEC command. show ip bgp [network] [network-mask] [longer-prexes]

Syntax Description
network network-mask longer-prexes (Optional) Network number, entered to display a particular network in the BGP routing table. (Optional) Displays all BGP routes matching the address/mask pair. (Optional) Displays route and more specic routes.

Defaults
No default behavior or values.

Command Modes
EXEC

Command History
Release 10.0 12.0 12.0(6)T Modication This command was introduced. The display of prex advertisement statistics was added. The display of a message indicating support for route refresh capability was added.

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show ip bgp

Examples
The following is sample output from the show ip bgp command:
Router# show ip bgp BGP table version is 716977, local router ID is 193.0.32.1 Status codes: s suppressed, * valid, > best, i - internal Origin codes: i - IGP, e - EGP, ? - incomplete Received route refresh capability from peer. Network * i3.0.0.0 *>i * i6.0.0.0 *>i * i7.0.0.0 *>i * * i8.0.0.0 *>i * * i13.0.0.0 *>i * * i15.0.0.0 *>i * i16.0.0.0 *>i * Next Hop 193.0.22.1 193.0.16.1 193.0.22.1 193.0.16.1 193.0.22.1 193.0.16.1 198.92.72.24 193.0.22.1 193.0.16.1 198.92.72.24 193.0.22.1 193.0.16.1 198.92.72.24 193.0.22.1 193.0.16.1 193.0.22.1 193.0.16.1 198.92.72.24 Metric LocPrf Weight Path 0 100 0 1800 1239 ? 0 100 0 1800 1239 ? 0 100 0 1800 690 568 ? 0 100 0 1800 690 568 ? 0 100 0 1800 701 35 ? 0 100 0 1800 701 35 ? 0 1878 704 701 35 ? 0 100 0 1800 690 560 ? 0 100 0 1800 690 560 ? 0 1878 704 701 560 ? 0 100 0 1800 690 200 ? 0 100 0 1800 690 200 ? 0 1878 704 701 200 ? 0 100 0 1800 174 ? 0 100 0 1800 174 ? 0 100 0 1800 701 i 0 100 0 1800 701 i 0 1878 704 701 i

Table 1 describes signicant elds shown in the display.

Table 1 Field BGP table version local router ID Status codes Field Descriptions Description Internal version number of the table. This number is incremented whenever the table changes. IP address of the router. Status of the table entry. The status is displayed at the beginning of each line in the table. It can be one of the following values: sThe table entry is suppressed. *The table entry is valid. >The table entry is the best entry to use for that network. iThe table entry was learned via an internal BGP session. Origin codes Indicates the origin of the entry. The origin code is placed at the end of each line in the table. It can be one of the following values: iEntry originated from IGP and was advertised with a network router conguration command. eEntry originated from EGP. ?Origin of the path is not clear. Usually this is a router that is redistributed into BGP from an IGP. route refresh capability Network Indicates that the peer supports dynamic soft reconguration using the route refresh capability. IP address of a network entity.

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show ip bgp

Table 1 Field Next Hop

Field Descriptions (continued) Description IP address of the next system that is used when forwarding a packet to the destination network. An entry of 0.0.0.0 indicates that the router has some non-BGP routes to this network. If shown, this is the value of the interautonomous system metric. This eld frequently is not used. Local preference value as set with the set local-preference route-map conguration command. The default value is 100. Weight of the route as set via autonomous system lters. Autonomous system paths to the destination network. There can be one entry in this eld for each autonomous system in the path.

Metric LocPrf Weight Path

The following is sample output from the show ip bgp command when you specify longer-prexes:
Router# show ip bgp 198.92.0.0 255.255.0.0 longer-prefixes BGP table version is 1738, local router ID is 198.92.72.24 Status codes: s suppressed, * valid, > best, i - internal Origin codes: i - IGP, e - EGP, ? - incomplete Network 198.92.0.0 198.92.1.0 198.92.11.0 198.92.14.0 198.92.15.0 198.92.16.0 198.92.17.0 198.92.18.0 198.92.19.0 Next Hop 198.92.72.30 198.92.72.30 198.92.72.30 198.92.72.30 198.92.72.30 198.92.72.30 198.92.72.30 198.92.72.30 198.92.72.30 198.92.72.30 198.92.72.30 198.92.72.30 198.92.72.30 198.92.72.30 198.92.72.30 198.92.72.30 198.92.72.30 198.92.72.30 Metric LocPrf Weight Path 8896 32768 ? 0 109 108 8796 32768 ? 0 109 108 42482 32768 ? 0 109 108 8796 32768 ? 0 109 108 8696 32768 ? 0 109 108 1400 32768 ? 0 109 108 1400 32768 ? 0 109 108 8876 32768 ? 0 109 108 8876 32768 ? 0 109 108

*> * *> * *> * *> * *> * *> * *> * *> * *> *

? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?

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show ip bgp

The following is sample output from the show ip bgp command, showing information for prex 3.0.0.0:
show ip bgp 3.0.0.0 BGP routing table entry for 3.0.0.0/8, version 628 Paths: (1 available, best #1) Advertised to peer-groups: ebgp Advertised to non peer-group peers: 171.69.232.162 109 65000 297 701 80 171.69.233.56 from 171.69.233.56 (172.19.185.32) Origin incomplete, localpref 100, valid, external, best, ref 2

Note If a prex has not been advertised to any peer, the display shows Not advertised to any peer.

Related Commands
Command clear ip bgp neighbor soft-reconguration Description Resets a BGP connection or session. Congure the Cisco IOS software to start storing inbound routing table updates.

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