Deploying a Freifunk Hochstift backbone POP with Netbox Scripts

Some weeks ago Network to Code held the first (virtual) Netbox Day (YouTube playlist, Slides repo on github). John Anderson gave a great NetBox Extensibility Overview and introduced me to Netbox Scripts (Video, Slide deck, Slide 28) which allow to add custom Python code to add own procedures to netbox. I was hooked. About three to four hours of fiddling, digging through the docs, and some hundred lines of Python later I had put together a procedure to provision a complete Freifunk Hochstift Backbone POP within Netbox according to our design. I’m going to share my proof of concept code here and  walk you through the key parts of the script.

Netbox scripts provide a great and really simple interface to codify procedures and design principles which apply to your infrastructure and fire up complex network setups within netbox by just entering a set of config parameters in a form like the following and a click of one button.

Provision Backbone POP form
Provision Backbone POP form

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Building your own Software Defined Network with Linux and Open Source Tools

Nearly two years ago, I started thinking about a next generation design for the Freifunk Hochstift backbone infrastructure, motivated by the limits and design choices made before (we were young and didn’t know better.. or didn’t listen..).

This post is the starting point of a series of posts about building a software defined wireless ISP network with Linux, a fistful of Open Source tools and low cost hardware.

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