Mininet Docker Image
This contains the files to construct a mininet docker image that can execute mininet simulated networks.
Prerequisites
Make sure your kernel supports Openvswitch and load the ovs module with sudo modprobe openvswitch.
Privileged Mode
It is important to run this container in Privileged mode (--privileged) so that if can manipulate the network interface properties and devices. I suspect this can also be achieved with the capabilities (--cap-add) features of docker, but this has not been investigated.
Overview
This container by default executes the the mininet (mn) executable with the options to the docker run command passed as parameters to the mininet processes.
Process Execution
If the first option to the docker run command begins with a /, it is assumed that this references a path to an executable and that executable is invoked with any other run time options to the docker container.
URL Download and Execute
If the first option to the docker run command is a URL, hueristically determined, the file the URL references is downloaded and executed with any other run time options to the docker container. It is assumed that the URL references a python mininet script, but this is not verified.
Security Concerns
Because this container can be use to download and run any executable from a given URL there are some security concerns as the downloaded executalbe could be malicious. As such please use caution when specifying a URL to download and run.
Docker Compose
A sample docker-compose entry for this container
fabric:
image: ciena/mininet
container_name: fabric
privileged: true
stdin_open: true
tty: true
environment:
MININET_SCRIPT: http://networks.company.com/fabric.py
MININET_SCRIPT_OPTIONS: -switch_cnt 5
links:
- controller_1:primary_controller
- controller_2:backup_controller1
- controller_3:backup_controller2
labels:
org.onlabs.cord.name: fabric
org.onlabs.cord.type: fabric