ACI Simulator License?

[ammann9113]

Good afternoon everybody

I'd like to get into the SDN topic. I've come across Cisco's Application Centric Infrastructure Simulator after a short Google journey... Since I really like my VIRL setup I hoped to get the ACI Simulator up and running in my environment. Unfurtunately I am not entitled to download the ISO.

So, what kind of license do I need to be able to use the ACI Simulator? Is there even a similar (license-wise) approach to the ACI Simulator or is it just for those guys who already have the "real thing" (meaning they bought the hardware and just got the simulator as kinda bonus)?

And while we're at it; is there even a similar solution to VIRL for software-defined networking? Not limited to Cisco btw.

Thanks and have a good day!

[Robert Burns]

The ACI Simulator ships as a Hardware appliance only.  You can order the PID using "ACI-SIM-S2".   It comes fully licensed (nothing additional to purchase).

There is a VM version (OVA), but this is not made publicly available at this time. 

Robert

[Claudia de Luna]

The hardware simulator is a very good investment if that is an option for you.  You can tie it to an external switch and even to some compute.  It does not have a data plane but if you are working on training or modeling or scripting its a great investment. We have about half a dozen and we use them for all of the above. We have a set that we keep on various versions of ACI to test backward compatibility for some of our scripts.  

As to your other question, I don't know of anything quite like VIRL but you can get really far with Vagrant and some of the virtual switches that are out there.  I've built entire spine/leaf topologies using that mechanism although I have to say nothing beats ACI as a 'turnkey" fabric.    Also, check out Jason Edelmans new company and the labs that are offered there.   I'd be happy to discuss further off line if you like - claudia.deluna@dimensiondata.com