
Creating a Virtual Connection with AWS Direct Connect
Creating a Virtual Connection with AWS Direct Connect
You can find additional resources on Product Documentation and Product Readiness.
Product Documentation – https://docs.equinix.com
Product Readiness – https://readiness.equinix.com
Content
15.3 -> Hey guys, it's Joey again from the technical
account management team. When we last left off,
19.8 -> we'd wrapped up with creating virtual connections
to an Azure ExpressRoute from our Network Edge
24 -> device, and we'd also looked at configuring
BGP. I wanted to take a slight detour here
29.22 -> while we already have this nice Network
Edge device built and available to us,
32.4 -> to look at AWS Direct Connect. Now this
isn't really going to be a deep dive into
37.02 -> the differences between these two offerings, but
rather just a quick overview of the differences
41.64 -> in virtual connection process--specifically as
it pertains to the Equinix side of the house.
46.68 -> So if you'll recall earlier when we created
our Azure ExpressRoute virtual connections,
51.06 -> the Fabric portal prompted us for the ExpressRoute
service key before it would let us go any further.
56.46 -> Basically we needed to have had the ExpressRoute
built and ready to go before we're able to really
61.08 -> get too far on the Equinix side. And so AWS,
on the other hand, can be thought of as working
66.12 -> the other way around. We're actually going to
provision the virtual connection, or connections,
70.44 -> we want from the Fabric portal to AWS, and
choose which metro we want them to land on,
75.84 -> so to speak. And so from there we'll head over to
the AWS portal and work backwards. One of the main
81.72 -> reasons I mention this is that the same principle
is going to apply to the de-provisioning of these
86.16 -> types of connections as well. While Azure
won't let you delete the ExpressRoute with
90.48 -> virtual connections still active, the Fabric
portal won't let us delete virtual connections
94.44 -> to AWS without a little bit of cleanup on the AWS
side. So with that out of the way, let's go ahead
100.26 -> and navigate to the Fabric portal once again
and we'll head over to ‘Virtual Connections.’
107.94 -> Which we should be pretty familiar with by now,
and I'm going to scroll down and look for AWS.
113.04 -> There we go. Now one thing you might notice is
that while Azure's ExpressRoute SLA asks us to
119.58 -> create redundant connections by default. Here
we have the option to choose between single
123.72 -> or redundant ourselves. But since we're only
using one device on the A-side here anyway,
127.86 -> I'm just going to opt for the single
connection for simplicity's sake.
133.68 -> So here we're going to have a little
foreshadowing of the steps I mentioned earlier,
136.56 -> where you can see that the Fabric portal
is letting us know that the connection
139.38 -> we're building here is going to land, so to
speak, in AWS for us to accept ourselves.
147.72 -> Next I'm going to go ahead and
find our Network Edge device,
150.9 -> which if you remember was in the Chicago metro.
158.46 -> And you'll notice that the details for our
Z-side have updated a little bit. To kind
162.48 -> of suggest that we have this Direct Connect
Object Land over here on what AWS refers to as
166.98 -> “US-East-2,” as you can see. So I'll go ahead
and click that, and then I'll select ‘Next.’
176.52 -> Now we're going to be prompted to name this and
I'm just going to stick with the same sort of
180.12 -> naming format that we've used so far. And I
want to make sure that I specify an interface
185.76 -> that we're not using. In this case that's going
to be 5. And then we're going to be asked for
192.36 -> this AWS account ID. So getting that is as easy
as heading over to the AWS portal and clicking
199.62 -> up in the top right corner by your account. And
just copying that account ID to your clipboard.
211.02 -> So so far you can see a few differences here.
Again, not only are we initiating this process
215.1 -> from the Equinix side of the house, but we're
also using this account-specific ID from AWS
220.56 -> rather than an object-specific service key for a
specific ExpressRoute the way Azure does things.
228.96 -> I'm going to go ahead and select the lowest
bandwidth here. Again, this is simply for
232.5 -> a demonstration, and click ‘Next.’ And then
‘Submit.’ So with our connection provisioned,
239.88 -> let's head over to the AWS portal here. And
now the first thing I want to do is verify
244.32 -> that I'm looking at the region that corresponds
with where we wanted that Direct Connect object
248.52 -> to sit. In this case that was “US-East-2.” And
it looks like we're good to go. Now in the same
253.62 -> vein as the ExpressRoute portion of this series,
I've gone ahead and taken the liberty of creating
257.76 -> most of the equivalent objects here in the AWS
portal. Which include the virtual private cloud,
262.8 -> and the virtual private gateway attached
to it. And so with that established,
266.52 -> we're going to look at Direct Connect--which can
again be thought of as the Amazon equivalent of
270.66 -> the Azure ExpressRoute. So to do that, I'm going
to go ahead and click ‘Services,’ here. And I see
276.18 -> this ‘Direct Connect,’ under my recently visited.
But if you don't you can simply query It up above.
283.26 -> And we're going to look for ‘Connections.’
And as you can see we have this one right
287.82 -> here “Community_AWS,” and it's showing
as ordering, waiting for us to accept it.
293.58 -> So let's do exactly that. I'm going to select
the checkbox here. View details and accept.
306.12 -> All right so it's been about a minute or two
now, and the state here has gone from showing
310.02 -> “pending” to “available.” Which means now we
can go ahead and create our virtual interface.
315.24 -> I'm going to leave this on ‘Private,’
and we're going to name this.
319.02 -> You'll go with “Community Virtual Interface.”
And the connection is already selected.
326.94 -> I'm going to select ‘Virtual Private Gateway,’
here under Gateway type, and select the virtual
331.56 -> private Gateway that I built previously for this
demonstration. And this VLAN value here is already
336.78 -> populated because we're viewing the direct connect
object when we went to go and create this virtual
341.52 -> interface. But do note that if you create it
from the broader virtual interface section,
345.54 -> this won't auto-populate. You'll just need to go
grab that value from the object itself. So here
351.9 -> under BGP ASN, we're going to use our Equinix BGP
ASN. I'm going to expand for additional settings
360.18 -> and I'm going to use a value of:
363.36 -> 172.16.3.1/30
370.08 -> And on this side, we'll have 172.16.3.2
375.78 -> So here we need to give this a passphrase, and
I'm just going to go with “Community,” here.
382.26 -> This will be redeemed later within our
Network Edge device to bring up BGP.
387.36 -> And all that's left to do now is hit ‘Create.’
393.96 -> So now we're going to head back to the Equinix
side of things. And if you've been following
397.74 -> along, you'd know that the next thing that we
need to do is configure that fifth interface
401.1 -> on our Network Edge device where that AWS
connection is sitting. So let's do exactly that.
406.8 -> And I've already connected to the device. And
as you can see here, that fifth interface is
411.12 -> down with no IP. So let's fix that first.
I'm going to go ahead and enter config mode,
417.78 -> “interface gigabitethernet5.” Let's
get that IP address 172.16.3.1
435.9 -> And lastly, “no shut.” And
if that was done correctly…
445.86 -> We should see that up with the IP now. Perfect!
449.7 -> All right so let's head back
into configuration mode.
455.22 -> And follow that by “router BGP 65100”
As the ASN for us here at Equinix.
464.28 -> So the first thing we need to do is that neighbor
statement of “neighbor 172.16.3.2 remote-as”
476.88 -> And this is going to be the AWS ASN of “64512.”
484.56 -> So next we're going to redeem that passphrase
we made in the AWS portal by typing “neighbor
491.04 -> 172.16.3.2”
494.76 -> “Password,” and then the password
that we made, which is “Community.”
500.88 -> And last, but not least, our Network
statement which is going to be:
505.26 -> “172.16.3.0 mask 255.255.255.252”
515.22 -> Awesome!
517.92 -> So we've added our neighbor statement
and our network statement, and we've
521.16 -> authenticated our BGP connection here
on our device. So let's back out again.
527.58 -> And let's do a quick “sho ip bgp summary.” All
right so we've been up for a few minutes now.
537.9 -> And if we look over here on the AWS portal
we're showing available as well, which is
542.94 -> great. And so we've gone ahead and we've built
VCs, virtual connections, to AWS using Direct
548.22 -> Connect and the Fabric portal. And we've shown how
to configure BGP. And the last thing I want to do
553.62 -> is demonstrate how to go ahead and de-provision
this type of connection. So to show the sort of
559.08 -> error that you might bump into when doing this the
wrong way, let's look at the virtual connection
562.44 -> we made in the Fabric portal. I'm going to go
back to the portal, ‘Connections Inventory.’
570.42 -> And let's click on that
‘Community_AWS’ connection.
575.76 -> And let's see what happens when
we click ‘Delete Connection.’
584.76 -> Now you'll see what happens here when I try
to delete that connection, is that I'm given
588.12 -> a prompt that the virtual connection can't be
deleted until the virtual interface is deleted.
592.74 -> So let's do exactly that. And we'll
head back over to the AWS portal,
598.62 -> where we can simply delete this virtual interface.
607.32 -> Great so now with that fully deleted,
609.12 -> we can now initiate the de-provisioning process
for the virtual connection on the Equinix side.
616.5 -> And shortly after that, we'll see that that
Direct Connect object we have will show deleting.
627.24 -> All right so let's head back over to
AWS and look for that. And there we are.
632.64 -> And there you have it guys, we've covered
creating and deleting a virtual connection
636.24 -> with AWS Direct Connect and some
basic Layer 3 configuration.
640.68 -> I hope that this has been informative,
and I'll see you guys next time.
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QRRmSvu-Ozs