Welcome to Netkit version 2.8.


WHAT IS NETKIT
--------------

Netkit is a self-contained environment that makes it easy and costless to
emulate complex network configurations on a single host machine. The idea
underlying Netkit is that each network device is implemented by a virtual
machine running the appropriate software. Virtual machines can then be
interconnected as desired by configuring virtual collision domains.

Interconnected machines may be organized to form a laboratory (lab), which can
be used to emulate the behavior of a particular service or protocol (e.g., DNS).
The configuration of the lab can be saved to ease its distribution and
replication.

Netkit, in itself, is an open source project aiming at integrating different
other open source products. See the THANKS section for a brief list of the
software resources integrated into Netkit.

The project was born (and is still carried on) with the main purpose of
supporting teaching of networking subjects with realistic experiences.


SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS
-------------------

Netkit virtual machines can be configured in a flexible way, so that you can
decide how many system resources on the host machine should be allocated to
them. System requirements are not very strict. Netkit can run on a personal
computer with:

- An i386/amd64 architecture (read: Pentiums and AMDs are fine). For best
  performance, CPU frequency should be above 600MHz. Netkit works fine also on
  slower systems, but this may impact usability. If your host runs a 64-bit OS,
  you may need to install 32-bit compatibility libraries (most notably,
  libc6-i386 and ia32-libs).
- At least 256MB of RAM (this mainly depends on the requirements of the Linux
  installation you are using: Netkit virtual machines may consume slightly more
  than 32MB each).
- At least 1GB of free hard disk space (this is required to install the
  virtual machines filesystem that is distributed with Netkit); even if not
  explicitly required, it is *strongly* recommended that Netkit is installed on
  an ext2/ext3 partition. Not doing so is likely to result in performance losses
  and/or malfunctions.  
- A Linux operating system installation running a 2.6 kernel (2.4 kernels
  may still be supported though); the installation should be capable of
  running a graphical session (read: should include a configured X server);
  this is not strictly required, but it eases running multiple virtual machines
  a lot.

Due to the particular nature of the User Mode Linux kernel (which Netkit is
based on), Netkit cannot be natively run on operating systems which are
different from Linux.


DOCUMENTATION
-------------

Netkit documentation is available in two separate forms: the Netkit environment
is fully described by man pages (you can start your reading from 'man netkit'),
while some other documentation and the description of the labs are provided as
slides. Standard Netkit documentation is included in the Netkit package itself.
Additional documentation can be downloaded from http://www.netkit.org/.


BUG REPORTING
-------------

Being an integration of different software products, Netkit is a somewhat
complex product. We are doing our best to make it be a stable, fast, solid and
reliable product. However, due to the complex interactions between the various
components, misbehaviors or malfunctions may occur in the presence of particular
configurations. We put our effort in trying to fix these bugs as fast as
possible (remember that this is not the only activity in our lives ;) ). In
turn, we expect users to signal them so that we can improve the quality of
Netkit as time goes on.

Please make sure you have carefully read the documentation (including man pages
and FAQs, if available) before submitting a bug report. Instructions for doing
this are provided in the man pages. Bug reports should be sent to
<[email protected]> or submitted for public discussion to
<[email protected]>.


CREDITS AND CONTACTS
--------------------

This distribution has been released by the Computer Networks (CompuNet) Research
Group at the University of Roma Tre (http://www.dia.uniroma3.it).  People
involved in the project include (but are not limited to):
Giuseppe Di Battista
Maurizio Patrignani
Stefano Pettini
Maurizio Pizzonia
Fabio Ricci
Massimo Rimondini

The project has been carried on in the past with significant contributions from
the Linux User Group "LUG Roma Tre" (http://www.lugroma3.org).

Apart from people from CompuNet and from the LUG, another special mention is due
for contributions provided by Andrea Cecchetti, Lorenzo Colitti, Federico
Mariani, and Flavia Picard.

The current official Netkit site is http://www.netkit.org/. Here you can find the
Netkit distribution itself and also some additional resources (e.g., some labs).
Contact information is provided as well. You can reach the Netkit team by
writing to <[email protected]> or by subscribing to the mailing list
<[email protected]>.


THANKS
------

Netkit is a software integration project. Hence, we would like to thank at least
the following people for having made all this possible:

- Linus Torvalds for Linux
- All the people working on the Linux kernel
- James R. Leu and Ramon Casellas for their work on MPLS routing
- Jeff Dike, Paolo Giarrusso, and the other contributors for User Mode Linux
  specific resources
- Kunihiro Ishiguro, Paul Jakma, and the other developers for the Zebra/Quagga
  routing daemon
- Lennert Buytenhenk and the other people working on bridge sources and
  utilities at http://bridge.sourceforge.net
- many many others...