Cisco Spine-leaf Network Topology | Cisco CCNA 200-301

[@navin123ful]

Keith is the all-time best tutor. Thank you very much. Because of you, millions of people started their networking careers. I am one of them.

[@semtex6412]

oh man, .. running 3 years now and this vid is still nifty. Keith Barker's channel is a goldmine!

[@99bablefish]

this is the best networking video I've watched. Clearly explained, illustrated, diagramed and labbed. Well done!

[@KeithBarker]

Wow, thanks!

[@weavingthevaluess]

agreed!! amazing video thanks so much

[@dimea.atomic.seijin]

Keith, greatest explanation of Spine-Leaf network topology in the internet. Greatest teacher in the internet after all. Thnx

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you Dime Atomic!

[@hcetc]

Thanks Keith. This is one of the clearest videos on the spine-leaf architecture that I have had the privilege to watch. Good job.

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you Samuel Chege!

[@leoshi6277]

I watched this vedio with out login, and then I logged in only to click a like. that's really awesome, mate, you use 20 mins saved my whole career.

[@AnkitTripathi]

Keith is the best teacher I have come across in the network industry

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you ANKIT TRIPATHI!

[@ewsdneax61eaxe10]

There are only two Keiths that i really admired in teaching networking 1. Keith Barker and the other 2. Keith Boggart. Thank you Sirs you really helped me passed my Cisco exams👍👍👍

[@madjedsolt5878]

And Chuck Keith

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you TRAXX!

[@parimi001]

Clarity makes all the difference. You simple inspire tons of people to learn.

[@carlosmalovini5319]

Man, I can't thank you enough for all you do for us.

[@KeithBarker]

Happy to do it, thanks for the feedback Carlos Malovini.

[@susmitamazumder8390]

@@KeithBarker hi good morning. After 23rd you are not uploading any quiz videos. only I see the office hour videos. Is it possible to upload the quiz videos. I checked on discord. they are not even there. thanks in advance . and please upload.

[@lara400notout]

Wow. What a video that was. I am not a network person but had an email from networking team stating "spine and leaf", me being me I wanted to understand what that is and this video just blew my mind with all the details and the presentation. You have earned a new subscriber!

[@salihahassan7029]

Thank you very much for this transparent description of datacenter modle network, I have just started working in data center and this really helped me .

[@KeithBarker]

You are welcome!

[@snawuma7]

Keith Barker is the most awesome IT skills teacher who has a very deep knowledge of Networking and even better explaining skills. You are the one whose finger i have held in my journey in the Networking world. Hats off for you Sir...Please show eve-ng lab setup with the configuration to further master this technology.

[@somasisrakkhit5605]

That was really a great session Keith! You are not only a very good teacher, but also a very good human being. Love your advice at the end - Be happy and treat everybody well!

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you Somasis Rakkhit!

[@somanathsshenoy]

I have been following many of your videos. They are highly educational. I observed in this video you look tired. Please take good care of yourself / your health. Every enthusiastic student is highly indebted to you. We need you.

[@Androcentus]

Keith continue to be the best at explaining how things work, regardless of complexity. Him and Jeremy are the best! Thank you.

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you!

[@majiddehbi9186]

realy thanks Mr Barker , u couldn't imagine a such respect and estim that u have here in Afric and in Algeria

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you majid dehbi!

[@jaffatherealest]

"YOUVE GOT TO KNOW WHEN TOO HOLD THEM..... KNOW WHEN TO FOLD THEM" - this song is so good. Reminds me of your STP video. Thanks for your service to this wonderful community. More cisco!

[@KeithBarker]

Glad you enjoyed it

[@BryanPike]

Thanks Keith! You are not the only one who may get a bit overly excited when stuff just works out of the gate. This was a fantastic refresher for me.

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you Bryan Pike!

[@erothwell]

I love it when technology is explained in an easy-to-understand way (with illustrations 😁) and Keith Barker is on my top three MVTs (Most Valuable Trainers)

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you @erothwell!

[@Kiran-vq7jx]

I like Keith Barker and Jermy Coira for there best teachings. They explain with real world examples thts the best way to understand and when we are actually working on the project we can apply those concepts easily. Thanks 🙏 to both of them and all other best tutors of CBTnuggets

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you Kiran!

[@owenmorgan857]

Such a great explanation as always Keith

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you Owen Morgan!

[@kevinjohnson2380]

Happy new year, it’s been a while since I have seen your CCNA nuggets. The content is exactly what I expect from you, first class. All the best Jedikj95

[@KeithBarker]

Happy new year!

[@advi_and_amma]

You are the best, Keith!

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you @advi_and_amma!

[@IceSmacker123]

Thanks a lot Keith! I'm engaging in the CCNP Data Center and that's my first video i'm watching!

[@KeithBarker]

Welcome!

[@CiscoSaeed]

I am always find you the best explanation and configuration in every network concepts! Alwaays

[@KeithBarker]

I appreciate that!

[@venkatesh4760]

Thanks Keith for this very clear explanation!

[@KeithBarker]

Glad it was helpful!

[@billmutombomasanka9793]

Thank you Mr Keith Parker, I really appreciate thats amazing friend, Wow !

[@jerrysanchez8361]

Wow you my man are a goat . I haven’t done networking in some time just got bored reviewed this video and got the sync I needed

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you @jerrysanchez8361!

[@ve55]

Perfect .. .we're getting new cisco datacenter switches in spine/leaf style in a few months. This gives a lot of information about how this works! Thank you.

[@KeithBarker]

Best of luck!

[@G1rlyG33k]

Great way to explain Spine/Leaf and VxLAN's ... Perfect timing for me to learn. Thank You

[@KeithBarker]

Glad you liked it!

[@sayantanmitra4879]

Excellent video Keith.. If someone need to clear the basics of Vxlan it is the ultimate choice.

[@charlesyaw6514]

Love your countdown design Keith. Well and simply explained

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you Charles Yaw!

[@ericktapia775]

Wonderful training, thanks Keith 😊

[@nox78]

Love you Keith!!!

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you Pablo Busto!

[@popquizzz]

This is brilliant using UDP for the delivery of the packet, not having to care if it gets there or not because the higher level TCP protocol is still in tact from the original frame. This seems to be a brilliant way to flatten a network in a homogenously environment like a datacenter. Do you see VXLAN technology being used external uf the DC?

[@clippy3656]

Great video, very well explained!

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you!

[@joxyrahbasilio1805]

thanks Keith always awesome

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you @joxyrahbasilio1805!

[@Movieman257]

Great job explaining the subject matter! Thank you.

[@KeithBarker]

Happy to do it, thanks for the feedback Skater Jeff.

[@Michael-er8dh]

super amazing explanation!!!

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you Michael!

[@mdram]

Great explanation of vxlan and it's usage!

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you MDRam!

[@pace1134]

Great explanation of spine/ leaf as well as vxlan, would love to see a follow up video on how to lab this up using eve-ng

[@rumesh.official6850]

Wonderful explanation Keith

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you Rumesh.Official!

[@jepotsalvatore2748]

Awesome video! Thanks!

[@jermaineautumn9837]

great video watched and understandable

[@profileman1083]

Great explanation. You are an expert

[@KeithBarker]

I appreciate that!

[@elhec110]

Thank you Keith for this great explanation

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you Hector Mena Gutierrez!

[@hamzaghazi7485]

Thanks Keith, now I understood TOR switches and their purpose and how we use them in Spine/Leaf Topology. Looking forward to more videos, related to Data center networking topics.

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you Hamza Ghazi!

[@jalewando9214]

Wow… thank you !!!

[@KeithBarker]

You are welcome!

[@matthewcardinal4186]

You are a gentleman and a scholar :)

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you Matthew Cardinal!

[@riff1175]

Thank you Keith , so much knowledge in this video, it's amazing !

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you RiFF!

[@elsilonsilva5379]

Wonderful explanation of the Spine-Leaf architecture. Could you provide the configuration script and mounted images of the spine and leaf switches in the EVE LAB. I want to play the same.

[@yannelanga6010]

beautiful, waiting for the configurations on the spine side.

[@ryanrrothwell]

Thanks Keith!

[@KeithBarker]

Happy to do it, thanks for the feedback Ryan Rothwell.

[@Roaming_Rahul]

Amazing content. Keith is a real guru ❤

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you @RahulChaudhary-cw9rn!

[@david_108]

impressive explanation!

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you David Lopez!

[@redadz9105]

Hey, Keith, thx. Are we supposed to know these details at CCNA Level?

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you for the question Reda DZ. The blueprint doesn't ask for the nitty gritty details, but rather wants the CCNA to be able to: Describe characteristics of network topology architectures 1.2.a 2 tier 1.2.b 3 tier 1.2.c Spine-leaf 1.2.d WAN 1.2.e Small office/home office (SOHO) 1.2.f On-premises and cloud Hope that helps, and happy studies.

[@alejandroherreraulloa1055]

awesome video Keith, thanks a lot... with you this topic is more simple now :D

[@KeithBarker]

Glad it was helpful!

[@sibinkuttan]

Thanks Keith. you are just amazing!

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you sibin k!

[@YouSharp1]

Fantastic!

[@THEWolf-bz6ot]

I want to thank you very much , it's amazing !!

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you THE Wolf!

[@fergeraci]

Excellent vid. Thank you.

[@KeithBarker]

Very welcome

[@abdelrahmangamalmahdy]

Thanks so much for the demo. But I think there's a small misunderstanding at 20:10 as it's normal that the response to the first ping request to get lost due to ARP broadcasting. Even though there are two ECMP paths, each L4 socket will go through the same path due to hashing which helps the packets come in the same order they were sent in

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you @abdelrahmangamal5875!

[@ajithraveendran8024]

Thanks Keith. 🙇

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you Ajith Raveendran!

[@nguyenuckien1168]

This is the best video

[@KeithBarker]

Thank You!

[@muhammaduzairahmed8694]

Thank you sir!

[@KeithBarker]

You are welcome!

[@m-electronics5977]

7:01 but then the routing process is in both of the Switches? In leaf and spine? Because when some host is connected to the ToR / LEAF Switch of Rack 3 this Switch must be the gateway for that address?

[@randallpittman3498]

Awesome explanation, vxlan makes loads more sense now. I wonder what the routing pattern and typical connection layout would be for a dual ToR system.

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you @randallpittman3498! That is a good question.

[@zulhilmizainudin]

Very useful. Thanks!

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you for watching!

[@AhmadShrif]

anyone knows the name of the lab software used here, it is really cool.

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you for the question @AhmadShrif. I use a few. For this one it was Eve-NG.

[@jubrilak]

great explanation

[@KeithBarker]

Glad it was helpful!

[@michaelgodwin7702]

What type of connections should be between the spines and leaves? Trunk with no specified allowed vlans?

[@aliabdulrazaq3852]

Thanks for the great video as usual Keith, can you post the documentation to do such config? Thanks

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you for the question Ali Abdulrazaq. these are my working notes, from that video. conf t boot nxos bootflash:nxos.9.3.6.bin end copy run start !Spines and Leafs conf t feature nv overlay nv overlay evpn feature ospf feature bgp feature vn-segment-vlan-based system jumbomtu 9216 router ospf 1 int e1/1-6 no switchport no shutdown ip router ospf 1 area 0 int loop 0 ip router ospf 1 area 0 end ! Leaf-3 only conf t int nve1 source-interface loopback0 member vni 6783 no ingress-replication protocol bgp no host-reachability protocol bgp member vni 6783 ingress-replication protocol static peer-ip 10.10.10.6 no shutdown exit interface e 1/7 switchport switchport access vlan 9 no shutdown exit vlan 9 vn-segment 6783 end ! Leaf-6 only conf t int nve1 source-interface loopback0 member vni 6783 no ingress-replication protocol bgp no host-reachability protocol bgp member vni 6783 ingress-replication protocol static peer-ip 10.10.10.3 no shutdown exit interface e 1/7 switchport switchport access vlan 9 no shutdown exit vlan 9 vn-segment 6783 end ! spine conf t router bgp 123456 router-id 10.10.10.x address-family ipv4 unicast address-family l2vpn evpn neighbor 10.10.10.3 remote-as 123456 update-source loopback0 address-family l2vpn evpn send-community both route-reflector-client address-family ipv4 unicast update-source loopback 0 end conf t router bgp 123456 address-family ipv4 unicast address-family l2vpn evpn neighbor 10.10.10.4 remote-as 123456 update-source loopback0 address-family l2vpn evpn send-community both route-reflector-client address-family ipv4 unicast update-source loopback 0 end conf t router bgp 123456 address-family ipv4 unicast address-family l2vpn evpn neighbor 10.10.10.5 remote-as 123456 update-source loopback0 address-family l2vpn evpn send-community both route-reflector-client address-family ipv4 unicast update-source loopback 0 end conf t router bgp 123456 address-family ipv4 unicast address-family l2vpn evpn neighbor 10.10.10.6 remote-as 123456 update-source loopback0 address-family l2vpn evpn send-community both route-reflector-client address-family ipv4 unicast update-source loopback 0 end ! leafs conf t router bgp 123456 router-id 10.10.10.x address-family ipv4 unicast neighbor 10.10.10.1 remote-as 123456 update-source loopback0 address-family ipv4 unicast address-family l2vpn evpn send-community send-community extended neighbor 10.10.10.2 remote-as 123456 update-source loopback0 address-family ipv4 unicast address-family l2vpn evpn send-community send-community extended end show nve peers detail show nve vni show run | include vlan|6783 show nve peers show nve peers detail show ip route 10.10.10.3

[@MansourSarr]

Thanks alot for making it so simple, hat-off

[@KeithBarker]

Happy to do it, thanks for the feedback Mansour Sarr.

[@julianpalmer-oy9mt]

Do you know where I can find more CISCO ACI videos by Barker like this? All the other videos I have watched have been focused on the GUI APIC and don't explain it as well as Keith.

[@rjnasr8078]

Great job, It was great that you explained this from the hosts point of view. Would it be possible to share the YAML file please.

[@xrellikgr]

Instead of VMs connected to the layer 3 switches you can also have layer 2 switch and you can isolate any loops that happen to a single rack.

[@changoramos5571]

Hello Keith, are these vids part of a series and can one purchase these?

[@helinaemeru2174]

the best video

[@indianinaustralia4421]

Awesome.. it would have been great if initial arp packets were captured as well.. I'll try doing that :)

[@rick777888]

Can't the 9K spine switches be connected with a keepalive link and peer link, so as to create a shared backplane for VPC?

[@jovsta]

What are you using as a whiteboard?

[@manuelaraica3216]

Thanks Keith! It is an understatement to say how much we learn from your videos. Cant thank you enough.

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you Manuel Araica!

[@lahirupriyankara2183]

this guy rocks

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you Lahiru Priyankara!

Great video! I appreciate you taking time to explain spine-leaf topology. I would like to learn more about spine-leaf and VXLAN. Could you please recommend some books or any other learning material about this stuff? Thank you!

[@EnriqueVillarMavila]

Hi. I understand when a tenant have a vlan 3 and a vni 3000 and other tenant have a vlan 5 and vni 5000. But what happens when I have a tenant 1 with vlan 3 and another tenant with vlan 3? Thanks!

[@uvarbt]

In this scenario When using the VNI interface is configured and and vlan 9 associated with it for an access interface and a the VM is communication are ok. But is this still be possible in case of VMware VM which is having NSX as a sdn? Or it's not appropriate to use both ? Or both can be used ? Could you please post a vblog in this ?

[@pacoz5359]

This explanation was very interesting, why would we need two servers or endpoints to be on the same vlan? what is the benefit?

[@MinisterOfGuam]

at what point, if ever would you consider vPC between two leaf switches?

[@Mes21211]

This is awesome explanation of VXLAN, may I know K9 and leaf switches versions?

[@albert54505]

Awesome video! Can you make a video how did you setup your EVE-NG and ACi?

[@KeithBarker]

Yes, soon

[@mw9463]

Excellent video! One question. Communication between switches is L3. So each switch is maintaining routing table. Maybe there is ospf there between leaves and spines. What if we have that situation from the film that we want to use vxlan to connect with l2 two different segments? Routing table on spine/leaf switches will show the route to the same subnet but via morę than one different interfaces? On the spines it will be interfaces towards sw3 and sw6. And on sw3 there will be 3 entries to that subnet: directly connected, via spine1 and via spine2. My brain is confusing something so please explain it to me :) best regards!

[@zaksteve4942]

If I want to add firewall & WAN connections, where it would be the interconnection, on the leaf or spine? Unfortunately, I saw both but I belive it must be on the leaf. would you please verify this point? thanks

[@TheRealOGChill]

Which packet tracer lab on your website follows along with this video if you happen to have one? I am a little confused about the two different networks, do I need one network on the left side and another network on the right side, or am I misunderstanding something?

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you for the question @TheRealOGChill. I didn't use Packet Tracer for the spine-leaf video.

[@p.v.kkishore8986]

Thanks Keith. Please let me know the images used for this eve-ng lab

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you for the question p.v.k kishore. I used Nexus 9K images from CML.

[@p.v.kkishore8986]

@@KeithBarker Are all the images 9K? If so, then you should be having a super computer.

[@majorburly2007]

6783 is The OG of IT and probably still has an IBM 101 KB ✌

[@comayo07]

Thank you

[@KeithBarker]

Thank you CA se!

[@aaronriggan2373]

This is my first introduction to Spine-Leaf / VXLANs and all I can say is WOW. There's definitely a few possibilities this opens up! How does inter-vlan (inter-vxlan?) routing work at this stage? Is it VRRP or similar to virtualize the gateway address, or is there a different mechanism altogether?

[@kellymoses8566]

I like to think of VXLAN as a replacement for STP.

[@Marbell26]

The Leafs have the default gateways for each subnet correct? If so, are you using Anycast gateways so that the same gateway exists on each Leaf? Or is that something that is proprietary for Cisco ACI?