Advanced functionalities issue

[Fabrizio]

Hello, I have the following functionalities and I'm wondering about if they can be implemented using FlexiManage. These are:

1. Packet duplication: let's say I have two WAN interfaces and I would like to duplicate outgoing packets through these two interfaces
2. Max throughput per link: I would like to set the maximum reachable throughput for every single link
3. Configurable params: I would like to customize some params as the connectivity check polling interval or the number of connectivity check attempts

Do you provide any FlexiManage functionalities to accomplish these requests? Thank you.

[Ivor]

Hi Fabrizio,

I'll reply in same order.

1. We will be working on this in 2022 but keep in mind that since most of the delay-sensitive applications, mainly VoIP,  have codec level and media engine level capabilities for more efficient duplication and media quality as they have access to the packet payload and can duplicate only the important frames and measure user quality of experience in the client side. Doing duplication in the SD-WAN edge level, where most of the VoIP is encrypted, can be far less effective and can sometimes even have drawbacks and therefore should be considered based on more parameters.

2. This feature is planned for Q1 2022.

3. Can you elaborate what exact parameters are you referring to and its use case?

Thanks!

Ivor

[Fabrizio]

Hi Ivor,

thanks for your reply.

In same order:

1. That's clear and a great advice. But please, could you clarify which quarter of the year you are going to release it?
2. Good news!
3. In my scenario, I would like to configure some parameters that are currently not configurable in flexiManage. These are:
   • Connectivity checks: I would like to configure the number of attempts that flexiManage has to do before declaring a device (or an interface) "DOWN" or "UP"
   • Connectivity check polling time: I would like to configure the connectivity polling frequency. To be clearer, flexiManage checks the device connectivity every X milliseconds and I would like to configure this parameter X
   • Connectivtiy timeout: I would like to configure how much time to wait before declaring a device (or an interface) "DOWN". 

Thank you 

[Ivor]

Hi Fabrizio,

Thanks for the response. In regards to first point, we're working through our roadmap here. We may shift feature priorities depending of the demand so I'd ask if our business development team can reach out to you to understand your requirements and deployment plans?

Regarding the third point, there's no immediate plan to implement such customization but I'll share your input to our engineering.

Thanks,

Ivor

[Dennis McGough]

"Packet duplication: let's say I have two WAN interfaces and I would like to duplicate outgoing packets through these two interfaces"

I have a series of specific use cases where I'd like to see this as a feature in the Path Selection Policy. For realtime traffic where drops are to be avoided and where a link failover might interrupt a conversation or session, I would very much like to have the option to send duplicate streams down multiple links and have Flexiwan produce the single stream at the other end from the best available data. At least two commercial players in this space have some variation on this capability. Fortinet SDWAN has the "config duplication" parameter within "config system sdwan". Cisco (Viptela) SDWAN also has a similar feature, allowing duplication of selected streams down multiple data paths.

This would be helpful in both site-to-site applications as well as client-to-site where I might have an endpoint with a "vpn client" and multiple simultaneous internet connections available.

Can anyone point me to this on the roadmap?

Thanks in advance!!

[Brian Stamper]

I think what is being referenced here is FEC (Forward Error Correction).  Standard on many SDWAN solutions.  The ability to utilize multiple links to "protect" traffic in the case of loss or high latency.  In other solutions this can be set where I can send FEC or Parity packets down redundant links at a ratio of 1:1, 1:4 etc.  It, in my opinion is one of the most sought after features of SDWAN and is really the magic behind taking cheaper internet circuits and making them perform like MPLS. It covers the loss/latency we can see on the internet.