Setting Up Aether-in-a-Box

Aether-in-a-Box (AiaB) provides an easy way to deploy Aether’s SD-CORE and ROC components, and then run basic tests to validate the installation. This guide describes the steps to set up AiaB.

AiaB can be set up with a 4G or 5G SD-CORE. In either case, SD-CORE configuration can be done with or without the ROC. The ROC provides an interactive GUI for examining and changing the configuration, and is used to manage the production Aether; it can be deployed to test the integration between ROC and SD-CORE. If the ROC is not deployed, a simple tool called SimApp is used to configure the required state in SD-CORE for testing core functionality.

Helm charts are the primary method of installing the SD-CORE and ROC resources. AiaB offers a great deal of flexibility regarding which Helm chart versions to install:

  • Local definitions of charts (for testing Helm chart changes)

  • Latest published charts (for deploying a development version of Aether)

  • Specified versions of charts (for deploying a specific Aether release)

AiaB can be run on a bare metal machine or VM. System prerequisites:

  • Ubuntu 18.04

  • Kernel 4.15 or later

  • Haswell CPU or newer

Clone Repositories

To initialize the AiaB environment, first clone the following repository using your Gerrit ID:

cd ~
git clone "ssh://<username>@gerrit.opencord.org:29418/aether-in-a-box"

If you are going to install AiaB using published Helm charts, you can proceed to the next section.

If you wish to install SD-CORE from local Helm charts, clone these additional repositories:

mkdir -p ~/cord
cd ~/cord
git clone "ssh://<username>@gerrit.opencord.org:29418/helm-charts"
git clone "ssh://<username>@gerrit.opencord.org:29418/aether-helm-charts"

If you wish to install the ROC from local Helm charts, clone these:

mkdir -p ~/cord
cd ~/cord
git clone https://github.com/atomix/atomix-helm-charts.git
git clone https://github.com/onosproject/onos-helm-charts.git
git clone "ssh://<username>@gerrit.opencord.org:29418/roc-helm-charts"

Now change to ~/aether-in-a-box directory.

Set up Authentication Tokens

Edit the file configs/authentication.

Fill out REGISTRY_USERNAME and REGISTRY_CLI_SECRET as follows:

  • Log into the Aether Harbor Registry using your Crowd credentials

  • Select User Profile from the drop-down menu in the upper right corner

  • For REGISTRY_USERNAME, use the Username in your profile

  • Copy the CLI secret to the clipboard and paste to REGISTRY_CLI_SECRET

If you wish to install SD-CORE using Aether’s published Helm charts, or if you are installing the ROC, also fill out REPO_USERNAME and REPO_PASSWORD with the information needed to authenticate with Aether’s Helm chart repository.

If you have already set up AiaB but you used incorrect credentials, first clean up AiaB as described in the Cleanup section, then edit configs/authentication and re-build AiaB.

Installing the ROC

Note that you must install the ROC before installing SD-CORE. If you are not using the ROC to configure SD-CORE, you can skip this step.

First choose whether you will install the 4G or 5G SD-CORE. To install the ROC to configure the 4G SD-CORE:

make roc-4g-models

To install the ROC to configure the 5G SD-CORE:

make roc-5g-models

By default the above commands install the ROC from the local charts in the Git repos cloned earlier. In order to install the ROC using the latest published charts, add CHARTS=latest to the command, e.g.,:

CHARTS=latest make roc-4g-models

To install the Aether 1.5 release, add CHARTS=release-1.5:

CHARTS=release-1.5 make roc-4g-models

Start the 4G SD-CORE

If you are installing the 5G SD-CORE, you can skip this step.

To deploy the 4G SD-CORE and run a simple ping test:

make test

By default the above commands install the 4G SD-CORE from the local charts in the Git repos cloned earlier. In order to install the SD-CORE using the latest published charts, add CHARTS=latest to the command, e.g.,:

CHARTS=latest make test

To install the Aether 1.5 release, add CHARTS=release-1.5:

CHARTS=release-1.5 make test

Start the 5G SD-CORE

If you have already installed the 4G SD-CORE, you must skip this step. Only one version of the SD-CORE can be installed at a time.

To deploy the 5G SD-CORE:

make 5gc

By default the above commands install the 5G SD-CORE from the local charts in the Git repos cloned earlier. In order to install the SD-CORE using the latest published charts, add CHARTS=latest to the command, e.g.,:

CHARTS=latest make 5gc

To install the Aether 1.5 release, add CHARTS=release-1.5:

CHARTS=release-1.5 make 5gc

You can use gnbsim to test 5G functionality. For example, to run the 5G user registration:

kubectl -n omec exec gnbsim-0 -- /go/src/gnbsim/gnbsim register

Currently there is no ping test for the 5G SD-CORE.

Cleanup

The first time you build AiaB, it takes a while because it sets up the Kubernetes cluster. Subsequent builds will be much faster if you follow these steps to clean up the Helm charts without destroying the Kubernetes cluster.

  • Clean up the 4G SD-CORE: make reset-test

  • Clean up the 5G SD-CORE: make reset-5g-test

  • Clean up the ROC: make roc-clean

It’s normal for the above commands to take a minute or two to complete.

As an example, suppose that you want to test the 4G SD-CORE with the ROC, and then the 5G SD-CORE with the ROC. You could run these commands:

CHARTS=latest make roc-4g-models   # Install ROC with 4G configuration
CHARTS=latest make test            # Install 4G SD-CORE and run ping test
make reset-test
make roc-clean
CHARTS=latest make roc-5g-models   # Install ROC with 5G configuration
CHARTS=latest make 5gc             # Install 5G SD-CORE
make reset-5g-test
make roc-clean

Developer Loop

Suppose you wish to test a new build of a 5G SD-CORE services. You can deploy custom images by editing ~/aether-in-a-box/5g-core-values.yaml, for example:

images:
    tags:
        webui: registry.aetherproject.org/omecproject/5gc-webui:onf-release3.0.5-roc-935305f
    pullPolicy: IfNotPresent

To upgrade a running 5G SD-CORE with the new image, or to deploy the 5G SD-CORE with the image:

make 5gc

Troubleshooting / Known Issues

If you suspect a problem, first verify that all pods are in Running state:

kubectl -n omec get pods
kubectl -n aether-roc get pods

If the pods are stuck in ImagePullBackOff state, then it’s likely an issue with credentials. See the Set up Authentication Tokens section.

4G Test Fails

Occasionally make test (for 4G) fails for unknown reasons; this is true regardless of which Helm charts are used. If this happens, first try cleaning up AiaB and re-running the test. If make test fails consistently, check whether the configuration has been pushed to the SD-CORE:

kubectl -n omec logs config4g-0 | grep "Successfully"

You should see that a device group and slice has been pushed:

[INFO][WebUI][CONFIG] Successfully posted message for device group 4g-oaisim-user to main config thread
[INFO][WebUI][CONFIG] Successfully posted message for slice default to main config thread

Then tail the config4g-0 log and make sure that the configuration has been successfully pushed to all SD-CORE components.

5G Test Fails

Currently the 5G gnbsim does not support data packets, though the UE can successfully register. For example the gnbsim register command gets stuck here:

ip address in string  172.250.0.1
err <nil>
UE address -  172.250.0.1
Assigned address to UE address  172.250.0.1
sent message NGAP-PDU Session Resource Setup Response
Failed to write gtpu packet
Sent uplink gtpu packet
Failed to write gtpu packet
Sent uplink gtpu packet
Failed to write gtpu packet
Sent uplink gtpu packet

Fixing this is work-in-progress.