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Connection Profile#

SDC offers versatile connection capabilities with devices, supporting multiple protocols like NETCONF and gNMI. It is designed to accommodate a range of devices and security needs. The connection details are comprehensively outlined in the TargetConnectionProfile CustomResource. For further information, please refer to here.

Understanding Supported Protocols in SDC#

SDC seamlessly integrates two key protocols - NETCONF and gNMI - for device communication. Configuring connection profiles in SDC involves both general attributes and protocol-specific ones.

General Connection Attributes#

  • protocol: Determines the connection protocol, with options being netconf or gnmi.
  • connectRetry: The interval between retries after a connection failure, defaulting to 10 seconds.
  • timeout: The duration for attempting initial connection establishment, set by default to 10 seconds.

Protocol-Specific Attributes#

NETCONF Connection Attributes#

For connections via NETCONF, the protocol needs to be set to netconf. Specific attributes include:

  • port: The designated SSH port for NETCONF sessions, usually 830.
  • includeNS: When enabled, XML tags incorporate their namespace as an attribute.
  • operationWithNS: Activates proper namespacing for the edit-config RPC operation attribute in NETCONF.
  • useOperationRemove: If set to true, SDC utilizes the NETCONF operation remove rather than delete.
  • preferredNetconfVersion: Selects between NETCONF versions 1.0 or 1.1.
  • commitCandidate: Selects the datastore on the target for applying the config to. Defaults to candidate, but can be set to running if the target does not support a candidate datastore.
apiVersion: inv.sdcio.dev/v1alpha1
kind: TargetConnectionProfile
metadata:
  name: netconf
  namespace: default
  labels:
    dummy: dummy
spec:
  port: 830
  protocol: netconf
  skipVerify: true
  includeNS: true
  operationWithNS: true

gNMI Connection Attributes#

For gNMI protocol connections, set protocol to gnmi. Key attributes for gNMI are:

  • port: The default TCP port for gNMI sessions is 57400.
  • encoding: Specifies the encoding format for gNMI (JSON, JSON_IETF, PROTO).
  • skipVerify: If enabled, SDC secures the connection without validating device certificates.
  • insecure: Establishes an insecure gNMI connection when set to true.

Example gNMI Configuration with Skip-Verify:

apiVersion: inv.sdcio.dev/v1alpha1
kind: TargetConnectionProfile
metadata:
  name: gnmi-skipverify
  namespace: default
spec:
  port: 57400
  protocol: gnmi
  encoding: JSON_IETF
  skipVerify: true
  insecure: false