Working Experience with ROE
- Route Object Editor -
Joachim Schmitz, DFN-NOC
RIPE 25 / 23. Sep. 96
ROE - what is it?
ROE is a
- C++/Tcl/Tk program
 - to view and manipulate route objects
 - registered at any IRR
 - and to compare them to real life routes
 
ROE was written by Cengiz Alaettinoglu
(cengiz@isi.edu) as part of the RA Toolset
http://www.isi.edu/~cengiz/software/. In this presentation version 3.3.2 is studied.
ROE - what does it?
ROE works on routes as
- objects from IRRs
 - determined from routers
 
for a given AS.
ROE may be used to
- add
 - delete
 - update
 - compare
 
route objects in IRRs and to
them against router BGP tables
ROE - what does it show?
Given an AS number and a BGP table
ROE allows to determine whether
- routes are
   
   - not registered
   
 - single/multi registered
   
 
   in a set of IRRs
 - BGP table entries exist for route objects
 - route objects are
   
   - single homed to your AS
   
 - single homed to another AS
   
 - multihomed
   
 
 - route objects which are
   
   - less specific
   
 - more specific
   
 
   than a selected route, are registered in a set of IRRs
 
[ screen shot of ROE ]
ROE - working experience
- ROE is relatively easy to install
   
 - ROE is easy to use
   
   - pull down menus
   
 - mouse selection
   
 - action buttons
   
 
 - ROE could have more configurable parts
   
   - list of IRRs
   
 - list of maintainers
   
 
 - ROE should be more verbose
   
   - what is going on?
   
 - which IRR data is used?
   
 
 - ROE might need quite some resources
 - ROE is slow
   
   - availability/load of IRR servers
   
 - network performance
   
 
 
ROE - recommendation
ROE is particularly useful to
- check for consistency of routes and
    corresponding object entries in IRRs
 - synchronize route object entries in
    different IRRs
 - find erroneous route objects in IRRs
 - detect missing or superfluous routes
    or route objects
 
because it compares
- large sets of data
 - in a clear presentation
 
and working on IRR data is simplified by
- easy selection
 - and usage of templates
 
=> conclusion: ROE is a "must" for ISPs
Thanks to Cengiz Allaettinoglu and the
RA Project for supplying the RA ToolSet
which includes ROE.