In this first part of a 5-part series of supplemental video tutorials we take a closer, and much needed, look, at Virtual Routing & Forwarding (VRF) in the context of VRF-Lite. We begin by comparing and contrasting VRF and VRF-Lite, explain why you often hear that “VRF-Lite means no MPLS”, walk through the legacy configuration command syntax using ‘ip vrf’ and then transition to the *new* VRF Address Family (AF) CLI syntax of ‘vrf definition’. This opens up the configuration of our first VRF-Lite use case which is dedicated individual links between two (2) routers. We configure VRF-Lite between two (2) Cisco 3945-E routers and then transition to the configuration of VRF-aware OSPFv2 for our three (3) customers: RED, BLUE, and GREEN. This leads to seeing how the router ID is impacted along with the OSPF Process ID (PID) value when configuring multiple VRF-aware instances of OSPF for each of our customers. We wrap things up by looking at each of the RIB/FIB instances for each VRF and see how the routing tables are segmented/separated on a per-VRF basis. In Part #2 of the 5-part series (which will post tomorrow) you will see our next use case of configuring VRF-Lite on a single physical interface that has been broken into three (3) sub-interfaces to support our customers. Enjoy, and for those of you celebrating Christmas, I hope you have aa very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all!
***This video is an in-depth tutorial and is far more than simply an answer key to the aforementioned Packet Tracer activity. This tutorial is being made to assist my UMGC CMIT-455 learners in their journey through the ENCOR v8 material so, if you are just looking for a shortcut or easy answers for the activity, this is not the video you should watch. However, if you are looking to gain a deeper understanding on inter-VLAN routing configuration and designs, my hope is that this will increase your comprehension and help you to become a better and more effective network engineer. Enjoy!
*This techtorial/Packet Tracer activity is all done running Cisco Modeling Labs (CML) v2.1.1-b19, some physical routers in my Evil Command Center Lab and/or Packet Tracer version 7.3.1.0362 (for the Mac) which was just recently released! The MINIMUM version you can use for any of the new CCNAv8 curriculum activities is Packet Tracer v7.3.0! Be sure to leave your feedback and questions below and I hope I have earned the privilege of your time!