SGNOG is pleased to partner Nokia in organising a 2-day Building Next-Gen DC fabrics with Containerlab workshop.
Date : 13-14 October 2025 (Monday-Tuesday)
Time : 0900hrs – 1800hrs
Cost: $200 (proceeds will go toward SGNOG’s community development efforts)
Participants: up to 40
For more information, please contact the SGNOG organising committee at oc@sgnog.net.
Building Next-Gen DC fabrics with Containerlab
Synopsis
The workshop explores how to use Containerlab to build and simulate a Data Center fabric topology. Participants will deploy an underlay IPv6 addressing scheme and work with key technologies like EVPN and VXLAN to enable scalable, efficient interconnection. By the end, participants will understand how to leverage Containerlab for building robust, next-gen network infrastructure.
For this session, we will use the open-source Containerlab tool. This is a beginner-level hands-on workshop that introduces Containerlab, an environment that provides a CLI for orchestrating and managing container-based networking labs. It starts the containers, builds a virtual wiring between them to create lab topologies of user’s choice, and manages labs lifecycle.
These hands-on workshops will cover:
- Installation
- Container images (container-native and VM-based NOSes)
- Topology file
- Basic lab deployment workflow
- Connectivity to the nodes
- Lab lifecycle
- VM-based lab
- Sharing the lab
- Troubleshooting and Wireshark pcaps
- Exploring the catalog of existing labs
Takeaways
- Apply knowledge and skills in a Lab as code environment for enhanced productivity through versioning, sharing and collaboration via hands-on lab using Containerlab to build and simulate Data Center topologies
- Understand fundamentals of modern DC fabrics: BGP underlay/overlay, EVPN, Telemetry/gnmi with Grafana/Prometheus
- Open to beginners—no prior experience with Containerlab required
- A good starting point to get ready for the "Nokia Certified Data Center Fabric Professional" (https://www.nokia.com/networks/training/dcf/certification/dcfp/)
Requirements
Participants are advised to bring their own laptop with an SSH client.
VMs or Bare Metal will be provided for attendees to have their own environment.
Target Audience
Not limited to: IP Routing System Architects, Network team leaders, Network Engineers/administrators, Validation/Test engineers, NOC Engineers /administrators from ISPs, Webscales or Enterprises. Students in IT computing or telecommunications fields are also welcome to join.
