Cisco Event-Driven Automation with Shangxin Du

Shangxin Du, a technical marketing engineer from Cisco’s data center switching team, discusses Event-Driven Automation (EDA) in network operations. EDA is a method that automates network configuration changes in response to specific events, aiming to streamline repetitive tasks and mitigate risks during network incidents.

Initially, Shangxin outlines how customers currently manage network configuration, using tools like Ansible, Terraform, Python, or SSH to automate tasks individually or through controllers like Cisco’s ACI for more centralized management. He also touches on the concept of Infrastructure as Code (IaC) and CI/CD pipelines for more integrated change management.

Next, he discusses network observability, emphasizing the importance of monitoring the network for operational data, which is vital for understanding the network’s real-time status. He explains how Cisco’s Nexus OS supports streaming telemetry, and how ACI uses a centralized controller (APIC) to manage configurations and operational data.

Shangxin then introduces the concept of Event-Driven Automation, which combines configuration automation with monitoring to automatically respond to network events. This can help in automating low-risk repetitive tasks, remediating incidents, and enriching support tickets with relevant data for quicker resolution.

He provides a demonstration of EDA using Ansible Rulebooks, which define sources, rules, and actions based on network events. The demo includes two use cases:

1. Auto-segmentation in ACI, where endpoints are automatically moved to the correct Endpoint Group (EPG) based on MAC address mapping.
2. Auto-remediation in Nexus OS, where a leaf switch is removed from the forwarding path if multiple uplinks go down, to prevent it from affecting network traffic.

Shangxin concludes that EDA offers limitless possibilities, allowing any source of events to trigger any automation response, depending on the rules defined. He also answers a question about the possibility of implementing a low-code solution for EDA in the Nexus world, similar to what’s available in other Cisco solutions like DNA Center. He suggests that while it’s a good idea, the current approach is to use existing tools and infrastructure for automation due to the diversity of customer preferences and practices.