ByteBlower Server/Meeting Point Changelog - 2.21

The ByteBlower 2.21 release includes a mjor new feature for Endpont testing: Real-time results 

This allows users the option to receive results during the test in the realtime view in the GUI. 

In order to use this feature, the server, Endpoint and GUI must be updated to 2.21.

Furthermore, the Endpoint must be allowed to communicate with the MeetingPoint during the test by enabling the "Heartbeat" mode in the project settings.

Accessing them is the same as with a regular ByteBlower Port object.  Just call the Refresh() on the corresponding History objects. 

Important to note:

• If you upgrade the server to 2.21, you will no longer be able to use ByteBlower Endpoint 2.16
• Clients running the ByteBlower Endpoint application 2.19 are now deprecated. 
• The 2.21 versions of the ByteBlower Server/MeetingPoint are the last versions to support these older versions of the Endpoint.

We highly recommend updating all ByteBlower features to the latest versions as this improves performance and reduces the probabiltiy of unusual behavior arising from different versions.

2.21.2

ByteBlower Version 2.21.2 ensure no more communication hiccups. Here are some release highlights:

Synchronised Reporting:
ByteBlower's latest release boasts enhanced clock synchronization by the MeetingPoint. Even in cases of significant clock differences, rest assured that you'll receive results that are both accurate and reliable.

Endpoint Persistence Improved:
Experience uninterrupted testing! Our latest release guarantees that Endpoints stay active until every single result is gathered and processed. Say goodbye to disruptions during crucial testing phases and enjoy a seamless testing experience. We've addressed a scenario where Endpoints were erroneously marked as unavailable during lengthy test result processing. Stay seamlessly connected throughout extended test runs, ensuring a reliable and efficient testing environment.

SSH Upgrade Hassle Resolved:
Upgrade with confidence! We've tackled a troublesome issue where SSH configuration impeded ByteBlower 5100 series server upgrades. Now, enjoy the smooth and uninterrupted process of upgrading servers without any hitches.

Upgrade to ByteBlower Version 2.21.2 now and witness a new level of precision, reliability, and uninterrupted performance in your network testing endeavors!

Happy Testing!

2.21.0

Improvements

Alongside the real-time Endpoint results, we have made further improvements to the server in terms of performance and configurability.

Out-of-sequence

The out-of-sequence trigger now also provides counters for packet loss detection. This means that packet loss can be detected from one trigger without having to compare to a Tx stream.

In addition, the performance of Frame Blasting flows with out-of-sequence detection has been improved. 

Interval snapshot

When combined with a 2.21 ByteBlower Endpoint, the snapshot interval can now be configured.   For older endpoints, this remains fixed at 1 second.

Fixes

The meeting point information handling has been improved by reducing the amount information reset when an Endpoint re-registers

TCP will now correctly send an ACK in response to TCP Keep-Alive messages even if they have no payload.

2.20.2   (2023-04-03)

Fixes

When the Scenario Heartbeat interval was set after Prepare() was executed on

an Endpoint, the new Scenario Heartbeat interval value was not propagated to the Endpoint.

The MeetingPoint could mark an Endpoint as "unavailable" when a test longer

than 1 minute was running.

This could lead to the ByteBlower GUI stopping a scenario while the test was

(rightfully) still running

2.20.0   (2023-02-27)

New features 

• The server now provides latency histograms over time when using the latency distribution trigger. This allows to have latency histograms per configured measurement interval.   
  This feature is useful when measuring the QeD performance of a specific flow. 

Enhancements 

• The TPID (EtherType) of a VLAN tag can now be configured through the API. 
• Faster filtering for traffic containing multiple VLAN tags. 
• The ByteBlower 2100 and ByteBlower 4100 server series did not support 4 stacked VLAN tags as the other series did.  Now all systems have the same limit. 
• The MeetingPoint will now automatically query the ByteBlower Endpoint for the test results when the Endpoint returns after a test. 
• The MeetingPoint needed up to 5 seconds for initial registration of an Endpoint.  The MeetingPoint now temporarily lowers the communication interval so this procedure finishes earlier. 

• The MeetingPoint tagged unverified ByteBlower Endpoint platforms as “Unsupported”.  The tag is renamed to “Unverified”, which means Excentis did not have tested this platform. 

Bugs fixed 

• The MeetingPoint stopped accepting API calls when an “Unavailable” ByteBlower Endpoint was addressed.  This did not only influence the calling test, but also effected other tests and users with “Available” Endpoints.  The only remedy for this was restarting the ByteBlower MeetingPoint service on the ByteBlower server. 

This installer will install the basic ByteBlower system.

For more information on how to install ByteBlower on your server, see this article.

We encourage everybody to update to the latest version!

Changes

• This installer is generic for all ByteBlower versions.
• Complete new ByteBlower update and restore implementation.
• Version indepedent: after the install, the server will sync with our download server to retrieve the latest possible version.

Version 2.8.2

• Update to updater version 3.6.11
• Fix series detector for 1200 and 1300 systems

Version 2.3.2

• Update to updater version 3.5.2

Version 2.3.0

• Added IPv6 support
• Update to updater version 3.5.0

Version 2.2.0

• Update to kernel version 4.4.12-rt19
• Update to updater version 3.3.0

Version 2.1.10

• Boot time has been speed up.
• Fixed some system boot order
• Improved boot output
• Fixed some error handling
• Update to updater version 3.2.6

Version 2.1.6

• Updated kernel: Add support for TPM modules

Version 2.1.4

• Creating rock-ridge enabled ISO files.
• Decreased disk size (use symbolic links instead of copies for series images)
• Added support for 3100 series

Version 2.1.2

• ByteBlower interfaces where not activated at boot

Version 2.1.0

• Upgrade to latest ByteBlower updater
• Better network card detection.

Download

You can download this version of the Server Installer from this location:

[[SecureDownload:ByteBlower/Server/installer/byteblower-installer-disk-2.8.2-r201.iso:ByteBlower Server Generic Installer]]

If you are unsure whether you need complete re-installation of your system, please contact support!

More information on how to create your CD-rom or USB install disk, can be found in this article.

Get your CD-rom or stick

If you are unable to create the CD-rom or USB install disk, please request your copy by sending you message to: support.byteblower@excentis.com

2.10.8 (2019-08-29)

Enhancement

• Add support for ByteBlower 3200 Gen2

2.10.6 (2019-08-14)

Fixes

• Unintended traffic on the management interface TCP port 9002 could cause the ByteBlower daemon to stop. We've made it robust against these packets
• MLD Listening Reports could in some rare cases cause the ByteBlower to stop. This is resolved.
• Some tools couldn't handle the lacking of a dongle. Now those tools report a correct error when the dongle is missing.

2.10.4 (2019-08-08)

Fixes - Configurator

• The IPv4 gateway was already optional in the management interface configuration, due to an input validation bug, it seemed required
• When adding a route, an error was thrown when looking for the correct interface to add the route on.

Fixes - ByteBlower

• ByteBlower is now able to correctly handle fragmented IPv4 packets
• Improved TCP performance when sending from 10G to 1G and the switch has small buffer sizes and latency is high

Fixes - Meetingpoint

• New networkinterface on wireless devices was created over time. Info is now updated instead of creating a new interface

2.10.2 (2019-07-04)

Fixes

• Server: TCP: Fix long performance drops that sometimes occurred in situations with high packet loss.
• MeetingPoint: Add iOS 13 as supported device
• Configurator: When the network configuration is corrupt, throw a more adequate error with more information instead of an obscure out_of_range.
• Configurator: When a custom port configuration is used, the interface was not marked as trunking
• Configurator: Fixed an issue when the ByteBlower interfaces could not be configured after a fresh install.

2.10.0 (2019-04-24)

Enhancements

ByteBlower

• Adding support for NBase-T (2.5Gbit and 5GBit) interfaces.
• Added an option to restart the TCP on a wireless endpoint. A TCP session will automatically restart if its been dropped by a bad Wi-Fi connection.
• Multiclient TCP API [Beta]

Fixes

• The server could crash when the FrameTag (Time/Sequence) was requested before the frame bytes were set.
• Creating a frameblasting flow with ARP packets could cause the server to stop. This is fixed.
• Restored our /legal directory which was lost in a previous release.

This page contains the changelog for version 2.11 of the ByteBlower. How to update your ByteBlower server is explained in following article:

• https://support.excentis.com/index.php?/Knowledgebase/Article/View/74/51/how-to-update-a-byteblower-server

2.11.8 (2020-06-25)

Fixes

• Fixed an issue where the performance of a 3x00 server dropped significantly on v2.11.6
• Adding timestamps to the standard output / error logs for the ByteBlower and MeetingPoint
• DHCP protocol implements the elapsed time value. DHCP servers which rely on this field for high availability will now work as expected.

2.11.6 (2020-04-15)

Fixes

• Improve the transmit time accuracy of Frame Blasting flows.
• The "Port.Create" method now works again on the ByteBlower 1200 series.
• The ByteBlowerPort's result history counters can now be consumed by multiple ByteBlowerPort objects (each ByteBlowerPort contains its own copy of the result history.)
• Configurator: IPv4 address validation failed when configuring static IP addresses on a management interface

2.11.4 (2020-02-20)

Fixes

• Fixed a bug which used unicast addresses in the DHCP requests. This could confuse some bridging devices which dropped the requests.

Misc

• To help our support engineers, we now add the server and meetingpoint version to the logs.

2.11.2 (2020-02-11)

This release primarily focusses on bugfixes.

One of the fixes changes the default behaviour of the DHCP client running on a ByteBlower Port.  The DHCP Client used the broadcast DHCP-technique to obtain its IPv4 address.  As some customers noticed, some devices flagged this DHCP traffic as a broadcast storm when performing DHCP on multiple ByteBlower Ports.  This change in the ByteBlower DHCP client changes the default DHCP technique to the unicast technique, working around the limitation imposed by these devices.  The DHCP technique (broadcast/unicast) can be configured using the ByteBlower API.

Enhancements

• Server: Added the possibility for the DHCP client to disable the BROADCAST bit in the DHCP flags.  The ByteBlowerPort will then use unicast packets when possible.
  Please note that this is now the default behaviour.  Using our API it is possible to revert to the older broadcast technique when needed.
• Server: Added extra DHCP timing statistics (timestamps when the DHCP discover/offer/request/ack, DHCPv6 solicit, advertise, request, reply are sent or received)
• MeetingPoint: Android 10 is now added to the list of supported operating systems.

Fixes

• Server: Fixed a crash when a ByteBlowerPort was being destroyed and the IGMP or MLD protocols needed to transmit messages.
• Server: Fixes for IGMPv1 and IGMPv2 where an incorrect back-off interval was used.
• Server: Fixed an issue where IGMPv1 did check the group address too much.
• Configurator: Fixed a crash when the network configuration reached an inconsistent state.
• MeetingPoint: Fixed a crash when the process got an interrupt signal

2.11.0 (2019-12-04)

Enhancements

• The meetingpoint is aware of SSID, BSSID, RSSI, WiFi Channel and WiFi transmit rate on supported devices. To use these features you will also need to update the Wireless Endpoint on the device and the ByteBlower API installed  on your computer
• The 24 port NBASE-T swtich for ByteBlower has been added to the byteblower-configurator. This makes it much easier tconfigure it.
• Unsupported Operating Systems and devices can be registered at the MeetingPoint. This makes them available for test-runs. To make it clear that we've not yet tuned our code for the system we do add the 'unsupported' to the name of the device.

Fixes

• When requesting the result history on a Wireless Endpoint, all results were returned instead of only the new ones.  This resulted in growing histories (and thus memory usage) over time.
• Improve TCP performance for flows that have a high number of packets in flight.
• Fix packet duplication in Streams that have a small number of frames configured.

This page contains the changelog for version 2.12 of the ByteBlower. How to update your ByteBlower server is explained in following article:

• https://support.excentis.com/index.php?/Knowledgebase/Article/View/74/51/how-to-update-a-byteblower-server

2.12.14 (2021-05-19)

Fixes

• The ByteBlower GUI was unable to use the Wireless Endpoint due to missing service-UUIDs on the server. (5100 series only)

2.12.12 (2021-04-28)

2.12.10 (2021-03-17)

2.12.8 (2021-02-18)

2.12.6 (2021-01-22)

2.12.4 (2020-12-07)

Enhancements

• The ByteBlower 5100 server can now also update from the console
• The ByteBlower configurator will warn on an invalid port configurations. Such configurations are mostly encountered during installation of the system.
• The ByteBlower configurator now also checks the port configuration against the Security license on the server. A warning is given in case of a mismatch, the ByteBlower Server software wouldn't run for such configs.

Fixes

• Fixed an issue where the ByteBlower configurator did not start when using PTP as a time synchronisation source (2100 and 4100 series only)
• Fixed an issue where the ByteBlower configurator did not start when an invalid ByteBlower port configuration was set.
• The login banner (console/ssh) was never updated with the recent information (5100 only)
• The login banner (console/ssh) was always showing that the updates couldn't be retrieved (5100 only)
• The OS sometimes provisioned the traffic interfaces with an IP address, even when the configuration told not to. This is fixed (5100 only)

2.12.2 (2020-12-01)

Enhancements

• The ByteBlower License now supports more than 255 ports on a trunking interface
• Performance improvement on stateful TCP testing when using IPv6 ports.
• Improved filtering performance for triggers with a BPF filter containing multiple payload content checks.

Fixes

• An incorrect timezone configuration could crash the ByteBlower configurator
• On recent ByteBlower 1300 series servers, ARP failed on trunking interfaces

2.12.0 (2020-11-04)

Warning: This release marks the ByteBlower 1200 server as end-of-life.  The last version supporting this server is 2.11.8

Enhancements

• Added support for multiple trunking interfaces to the same ByteBlower switch. Please contact support if you're interested in this feature
• First version with support for the new 100Gbit/s ByteBlower server (ByteBlower 5100)
• Performance improvements
• Default value for the ReceiveWindow Scaling Value has been changed from 3 to 8
• Default value for the SlowStartThreshold has been changed from 65535 to 16776960
• MeetingPoint: Marking Ubuntu 20.04 as a supported version

This page contains the changelog for version 2.13 of the ByteBlower. How to update your ByteBlower server is explained in following article:

• https://support.excentis.com/index.php?/Knowledgebase/Article/View/74/51/how-to-update-a-byteblower-server

2.13.0 (2021-06-30)

Fixes

• The Wireless Endpoint Stream and TriggerBasic Interval results did not have the TimestampFirst and TimestampLast available.
• The Wireless Endpoint NetworkInfoResultHistory was missing intervals when using intervals not aligned to a second.
• The MeetingPoint did not implement a stub for SamplingIntervalDurationSet for the supported triggers, stream and frame. This resulted in a Technical error while ConfigError is more appropiate.
• Fix occasional spikes in latency measurements on the ByteBlower 4100. This completes the same bugfix in the previous version.
• The TCP MSS (Maximum Segment Size) option in a SYN-ACK now advertises the maximum segment size the TCP can receive. It is no longer affected by the MSS option in the original SYN request it is replying to.

Enhancements

• The alpha implementation of the latency Distribution trigger for the Wireless Endpoint is now available.

Operating System changes

The machine-id of the system was the same for all systems, causing multiple ByteBlower servers obtain the same IP address through DHCP. It is now generated at first boot time, fixing the symptoms. (5100 only)

On this page you find the changelog for version 2.14 of the ByteBlower server. How to upgrade to this version can be read in the following article:

• https://support.excentis.com/index.php?/Knowledgebase/Article/View/74/51/how-to-update-a-byteblower-server

Server 2.15.0  (2022-02-17)

Fixes

• Fixed a performance regression in HTTP flows between non-trunking interfaces on newer generations of the ByteBlower server hardware.

Server 2.16.4  (2022-05-25)

Enhancements

• The ByteBlower support tool (byteblower-support-tool) now collects additional information to better investigate the ByteBlower update system.  The following items are now added:
  • The HTTP Proxy configuration of the ByteBlower server
  • Logging of the ByteBlower update system (ByteBlower 1300, 2100, 3100, 3200 and 4100 series servers)

Fixes

• The ByteBlower update system could not handle an empty HTTP Proxy configuration, resulting in a crash.
  • The ByteBlower Update system did not parse some old style version numbers correctly.  In this case the server was not able to update.
    This issue only occurs when such a specific version was installed on the server earlier on.
• The ByteBlower Update system sometimes required updating twice.
• The ByteBlower 5100 server series now allows having a trunking interface with less than 3 interfaces.

Server 2.16.2  (2022-04-28)

Fixes

• Fixed a MeetingPoint crash when Wireless Endpoint results came in after the GUI cleaned up its resources.

Server 2.16.0  (2022-04-11)

Enhancements

• Configuration of standard port configurations of the ByteBlower server has been made easier.

            → It is now possible to select the current interface and change it (Trunk ↔ Non-Trunk) and apply a preset.

            → This allows the user more control and flexibility in assigning interfaces and the view in the ByteBlower GUI.

Fixes

• Fixed a configurator crash when the interface link status could not be queried.
• Fixed a configurator crash when the IP configuration of a management interface was being altered.
• Fixed an issue where the pre-2.14.0 server configuration could not be converted automatically due to configuration errors.
• Fixed a configurator crash when the ByteBlower license could not be read from the hardware key.
• Fixed an issue where the configuration wrongfully warned about the configuration not being allowed by the server license.

Server 2.19.0 (20/10/2022)

Highlights

• The ByteBlower MeetingPoint now supports stopping a ByteBlower Endpoint from the ByteBlower API or ByteBlower GUI. 
  This feature allows the user to stop a ByteBlower Endpoint app in a way it was already possible with a classic ByteBlower Port.

New Features

• Adding support for ByteBlower Endpoints who keep communicating during the test.
• Adding support to stop a ByteBlower Endpoint during the test.  In order for this feature to work, the ByteBlower API or ByteBlower GUI must be configured so the ByteBlower Endpoint keeps communicating during the test.  This feature requires a ByteBlower API or ByteBlower GUI updated to version 2.19.0 or higher and a ByteBlower Endpoint running at least 2.19.0.

Improvements

• Adding iPadOS 15 as a supported platform.
  Note: In order not to break existing scripts, iPadOS is announced as iOS towards the customer.

Fixes

• The ByteBlower MeetingPoint could crash when a ByteBlower API disconnected when a ByteBlower Endpoint was executing specific API calls. 
  These calls are used when:
  • Preparing a ByteBlower Endpoint for test execution
  • Starting a test on a ByteBlower Endpoint
  • Gathering results for an executed test.

Misc

• The ByteBlower 5100 Linux kernel is updated from Debian version 4.19.0-18 to 2.19.0-21
• The ByteBlower 3100 and ByteBlower 3200 server network interface drivers are updated so they don't lose network connectivity under high traffic loads.
• The ByteBlower 5100 system can now update the firmware for the used traffic interfaces.

2.9.26 (2019-03-18)

Fixes

Server

• Fix TCP performance drops that sometimes occurred when the "SACK" option is enabled

Meetingpoint

• Support for Android 9.
• Added support for Fedora 28 | 29

2.9.24 (2019-02-27)

Fixes

Server

• byteblower-configurator marked the ByteBlower interfaces as unusable when the port configuration was missing.

Meetingpoint

• The meetingpoint did not allow to run tests on newer Linux distributions except Ubuntu.  Now Debian 9 is also marked as supported.

2.9.20 (2019-02-05)

Fixes

Server

• Your capture could contain frames from before you started the capture. Those where old packages that where still in the buffer. These packages are now discarded
• Added support for Napatech NT-20E3-PTP cards
• Added support for 4100 with new motherboard
• Latency doesn't work when combined with size modifiers. Timestamp was injected at the wrong position. This is fixed by placing the timestamp again at the end of the frame
• Multiple queries of IGMP and MDL could result in a crash of the system. This is resolved 

2.9.18 (2018-12-04)

Fixes

Server

• Fixed a crash when an Nbase-T enabled port was created outside the standard range.

2.9.16 (2018-11-20)

Fixes

Server

• Improved performance of triggers (IPv6) when multiple flows with the same frame are generated by the GUI.

Enhancements

Server

• Improved TCP Delayed ACK

2.9.14 (2018-11-20)

Fixes

Server

• Improved performance of triggers when multiple flows with the same frame are generated by the GUI.
• Fixed IPv6 source address selection. This caused problems in e.g. multicast.

2.9.10 (2018-10-29)

Fixes

Server

• Fixed TCP Delayed Ack on ByteBlower 3100 and 3200 series servers

Enhancements

Meetingpoint

• A wireless endpoint running on macOS Mojave is now supported by the Meetingpoint.

2.9.8 (2018-10-04)

Fixes

MeetingPoint

• Meetingpoint could report a device in starting-state. But this device was already running. The state stayed in starting and resulted in a GUI that kept on running. This is resolved

Server

• Fixing a server crash when setting a frame which was 0 bytes long. Now an ConfigError is thrown.
• The timestamp injected for latency measurement on a 2100 and 4100 ByteBlower server could be off when Software Timestamping was enabled in the ByteBlower server preferences. This issue is fixed.
• Fixed an issue where it was impossible to add a size modifier on the stream when the MTU of a port was set smaller than 1500 bytes.

Enhancements

MeetingPoint

• Added support for iOS12

2.9.6 (2018-09-13)

Fixes

MeetingPoint

• When canceling a scenario and restarting, the meetingpoint could crash due to incorrect cleanup. This memory issue is fixed

Server

• Running the configurator could cause traffic to stop on 1300/3100/3200

2.9.4 (2018-09-04)

Fixes

MeetingPoint

• Having multiple API/GUI-clients could result in failure of the wireless tests. Lock of a device wasn't guaranteed. This is now fixed

Server

• Schedule groups now start all streams again
• TCP will select the correct IPv6 address to use depending on the destination. Unique Local or Global address

2.9.2 (2018-08-07)

Enhancements

Meetingpoint

• Added support for Ubuntu 18.04

Operating system and updater

• Configurator
  • Providing progress when reading the current configuration at start-screen
  • Minimize the number of reads of the current configuration. Making the configurator to load faster

Fixes

Operating system and updater

• Fixed the series detector. Now correclty detects the 1300 and 1200 systems again
• Configurator
  • In rare cases the configurator of the 1300/3100 would hang on its welcome-screen.

2.9.0 (2018-07-03)

Enhancements

Server Application

• Improved performance and stability on all series
• Greatly improved performance on 3100/3200 series.
• 2100 and 4100 series now perform software-based timestamp injection. This enables us to fix the L4 checksum after timestamp injection. The trade-off is that the timestamps are less precise. A config file option is provided to re-enable hardware timestamping if desired.
• New capture API (PacketDump) that enables packet capture of all packets (Rx and Tx) on a ByteBlower interface

Operating system and updater

• Improving the update handling. Updates from the GUI will be faster in future releases.
• European law (GDPR) specifies we should inform you about the statistics we collect during update and the support uploads. The server informs you at login now.
• byteblower-update now supports the --help option
• byteblower-configurator now shows the API name of the ByteBlower-Interface in the port configuration
• Updater-texts and -Menu items are more user-friendly now

Fixes

Server Application

• No more "Scheduling Conflict" errors on 2100 and 4100 series. Under the new scheduling system this error cannot happen anymore.
• Fixed hang that sometimes occurred when starting an ICMP (ping) session.
• Fixed crash that could occur when a HTTP client session was destroyed while in "Connecting" state.

Operating system and updater

• Protection against modification of startup-scripts. At boot original scripts are restored
• Updater
  • You now get a confirmation when the update succeeded
  • Answering NO to the question "Are you sure you want to update" resulted in a closing of the updater-shell. This is fixed and you return to the main menu

ByteBlower 1100 End Of Life

ByteBlower 1100 has been marked as EOL. The latest supported version for this system is 2.8.2

NOTE: As of ByteBlower 2.9 the Meeting Point has been incorporated into the server. From that version on, you can find the changelog for the Meeting Point in the changelog of the server.

ByteBlower Meeting Point 1.1 brings new features and improved stability of the Wireless Extension solution of ByteBlower. 

For more information about ByteBlower Wireless testing, please check our KB articles:

• How to: Getting started with the Wireless Endpoints
• GUI tutorial: Frame blasting on Wireless Endpoints

Changelog

1.1.10 (2017-11-29)

• Add support for iOS 11
• Add support for macOS High Sierra

1.1.6 (2017-06-27)

Fixes

• Improve stability in the meetingpoint communication with the App

1.1.4 (2017-05-30)

Fixes

• Improve stability in the meetingpoint communication
• Correctly calculating the timeshift between App & Server

1.1.2 (2017-04-21)

Fixes

• Automatic clear results at start of test
• Ignore old results received from WE.

1.1.0 (2017-04-06)

Fixes

• Improved stability
• Improved communication with Wireless Endpoints
  • Takes into account the clock-difference between WE and Meetingpoint
  • Improved stability against incorrect messages from WE
• Improved error-handling:
  • Added clear error messages
  • Improve validation of flow configuration

Enhancements

• Support for IPv6 flows
• Support for latency flows
• Support for Network information of the Wireless Endpoints

NOTE: As of ByteBlower 2.9 the Meeting Point has been incorporated into the server. From that version on, you can find the changelog for the Meeting Point in the changelog of the server.

We are happy to announce the first release of the ByteBlower Meeting Point!

For more information about ByteBlower Wireless testing, please check our KB articles:

• How to: Getting started with the Wireless Endpoints
• GUI tutorial: Frame blasting on Wireless Endpoints

The meeting point is available since ByteBlower Server 2.5 and ByteBlower GUI 2.5.

1.0.6 (2017-03-03)

Fixes

• Fixed race conditions related to security key access from multiple applications.

1.0.4 (2016-12-05)

Fixes

• Fixed OS detection of iOS devices.

1.0.2 (2016-12-01)

Fixes

• Fixed startup issues in combination with ByteBlower Server and USB dongle.
• Fix log level configuration parsing.

Enhancements

• No longer logging EOF as an error.
• Handle future wireless endpoint parameters.
• Frame result counters are now available.

1.0.0 (2016-11-17)

• Initial release

2.7.10 (2017-12-20)

Fixes

Server

• Improved bidirectional TCP performance.

Server Environment and Update

• Due to a new iteration of certain hardware items, the new 3100 chassis was not detected as such.  So we updated the detection code to recognize this hardware.

2.7.8 (2017-12-11)

Fixes

Server

• While reverting back from TCP "half-closed" in version 2.7.6, wireless Endpoints failed to perform TCP. The old TCP behaviour was not reverted completely.This is now fixed

Server Environment and Update

• ByteBlower Update and byteblower-configurator: Some ByteBlower 3100 where not recognized as a 3100 and thus failed to update.

2.7.6 (2017-11-29)

Fixes

Server

• HTTP flows no longer make use of the TCP "half-closed" state because it appears to cause problems in combination with NAT. This fixes the problem where sessions become inactive after a few minutes.
• Fixed crash that occured when receiving invalid RPC messages.

Server Environment and Update

• byteblower-configurator: Fixing a crash when unknown network interfaces are found.
• ByteBlower Update and byteblower-configurator: Fix for update failure due to incorrect parsing of the HTTP proxy configuration.

2.7.4 (2017-10-30)

Fixes

Server

• Greatly improved TCP stability when running many flows at the same time.
• Configuring a high window-scale factor no longer results in very high round-trip times.
• Fixed a rare crash that sometimes happened when running HTTP scenarios from the GUI.

Server Environment and Update

• Adding support for new ByteBlower management NICs.

2.7.2 (2017-10-03)

Fixes

Server

• Fix crash that occurred when trying to bind two HTTP servers to the same port.
• Improve bidirectional TCP performance by reducing the number of TCP ACKs.

2.7.0 (2017-08-31)

Enhancements

Server

• The server can now retrieve the line speed of a ByteBlower interface
• Improved performance on ByteBlower 1100, 1200 and 1300 series servers.

Server environment

• byteblower-configurator
  • support for Time Synchronisation configuration.  Supporting NTP and PTP (depending the server type)
  • support for Timezone configuration
• message of the day
  • Redesigned the output of the message of the day, so it shouldn't confuse the user
• byteblower-update: provide more detailed progress information.

Fixes

Server

• Parsing IANA correct

Server environment

• byteblower-update
  • fixed a crash when the repository and the local environment were out of sync
  • apply the new proxy configuration immediately instead of require a logout and login

2.6.6 (2017-06-27)

Enhancements

Server environment

• byteblower-configurator: Generate a less dramatic Message of the Day.

Fixes

Server

• When renewing DHCPv6, take the unicast option into account.

Server environment

• byteblower-configurator
  • Fixed IP parsing when a very bad syntax was given.
  • Adding hostname syntax validation.
  • Fixed an issue where the ByteBlower interfaces could not be configured correctly
  • When the network configuration is invalid, suggest a correct fix
  • Updating messages and labels to be more clear.
• Updater:
  • A restorepoint can now be correctly be restored
  • Removed outdated functionality
  • The factory reset resets to the Excentis Factory defaults
  • Updating feedback messages

2.6.4 (2017-05-31)

Enhancements

Server environment

• byteblower-configurator: Make it less verbose at some points.

Fixes

Server

• Fixed assertion failure when receiving IGMPv3 Group-Specific Membership Query in (IGMPv1/IGMPv2) host compatibility mode.
• Fixed accepting IPv4 address with trailing string.

Server environment

• byteblower-configurator
  • Fixed processing unavailable network interface in network configuration file.
  • Fixed issue with parsing (static) network configuration.
  • Fixed crash when ByteBlower server configuration file did not exist.
  • Updated some button labels.
• Updater:
  • Fixed issue with parsing (static) network configuration.

2.6.2 (2017-04-21)

Enhancements

Server

• Add "log rotation" of collected (filter) statistics to limit the total file sizes over time.

Server environment

• More up-to-date status information in login prompt and "Message Of The Day" (MOTD):
      - Updated during boot
      - Updated after running byteblower-configurator
• Update environment
  • The proxy configuration is now applied immediately, logout is not required anymore.

Fixes

Server

• Fixed collecting filter statistics

Server environment

• byteblower-configurator
  • Fixed running on systems with non-standard NICs.
  • Fixed some issues with (static) network configuration.
  • Added extra user input validation.
• Updater:
  • Updating from ByteBlower GUI did not work.
  • Fixed some issues with network configuration related to static IPv4 addressing.

2.6.0 (2017-04-06)

Enhancements

Server

• Collecting filter statistics for later filtering improvements.
  • This can be opt-out using the byteblower-configurator.
• The server uses the new capability system to announces its capabilities (latency: tagged packet generation / receive-side processing, out-of-sequence, etc.).

Server environment

• The server environment now supports management via IPv6.
• Configurator redesign. It allows to configure:
  • IPv6 address configuration
  • proxy server configuration
  • root password
  • Opt-out for collecting filter statistics
• The server login prompt now shows the active management IPv4/IPv6 addresses.
• After login at the server, a service status overview is shown (message of the day).
  • Current version
  • Whether or not the service is active
  • What the current and latest version of the server environment are
  • Whether network configuration is fine (gateway, DNS and update server reachable)
• The updater now shows progress bars during download of the updates.

Fixes

Server

• PPPoE header length field was not updated with frame size modifier.
• 2x00/4100 series: Fixed issue incorrect processing of Ethernet Flow Control / PAUSE frames which causes transmission slow down in some test scenarios.
• 2x00/4100 series: Fixed unstable TCP performance on ''back-to-back'' tests.

Server environment

• Fixed static routing configuration in byteblower-configurator.
• Fixed very long timeout in byteblower-support-tool when the update server is not reachable.
• Fixed issue with persisting network configuration in update environment.

2.5.10 (2017-03-03)

Fixes

• Small bugfixes in TCP
• Fixed bug when increasing "buffer interval duration" on "result history" of PacketCounter and SequenceTracker.
• 2x00/4100 series: Fixed possible server crash when working with very large number of streams (> 8192).
• Fix Meeting Point shutdown when restarting server application.
• Fixed race conditions related to security key access from multiple applications.
• Fixed some minor issues with logging configuration check.

2.5.8 (2017-01-23)

Enhancements

• 1x00 series: Improved TCP performance on systems using NICs with multiple RX and TX queues.
• 3x00 series: Improved TCP performance on non-trunk to non-trunk tests.

2.5.6 (2016-12-01)

Fixes

Enhancement

• TCP loss recovery improvements in case you have very low latency.

Server

• Fixed startup issues in combination with Meeting Point and USB dongle.
• 2x00 series and 4100 series: Fixed incorrect frame size distribution statistics.
• 4100 series: Fixed growing size modifier when the number of frames on a stream has specific values.
• Fixed returning incomplete frame size distribution (was limited to 1455B packets instead of 1514B).
• Frame size modifier results: No longer throwing exception when no packets received
  and obtaining number of packets below minimum or number of packets above maximum.
• Growing size modifier: Fixed floating point exception when step was bigger than maximum - minimum.
• Fix possible crash when an exception occurred while creating a ByteBlowerPort.

2.5.4 (2016-11-17)

Fixes

Server

• Some 1x00 series servers used the 'Generic offload' function of the nic, causing issues with our stack implementation.
• Changed thread balancing on 1x00 systems.
• Fixed an issue with multiple ARP sessions to the same unreachable destination.
• Fixed assertion failure when receiving an invalid MLD query.

Server environment

• Improved support for the ByteBlower Meeting Point.
• Update of the GPU driver which could hang on some system configurations.

2.5.2 (2016-10-28)

Fixes

Server

• Fixed rate limiting issue on ByteBlower 4100 and 2100.
• Fixed VLAN offloading issue on ByteBlower 1x00 systems.

2.5.0 (2016-10-18)

Enhancements

Server

• Added support for ToS/DSCP (IPv4) and TrafficClass (IPv6) on the protocol stack:
  • HTTP Client (IPv4 and IPv6)
  • ICMP (IPv4)
  • ICMPv6 (IPv6)
• Implemented PPPoE Client including IPCP/IPv6CP and PAP/CHAP

Server environment

• Update to kernel 4.4.12-rt19.
• Server update can be initiated using the GUI.
• Security dongle tools support the ByteBlower Meeting Point license.

Fixes

• 3x00 series: Fixed info in support tool.
• 2x00 series and 4100 series: Fixed possible server crash when using streams transmitting many frames simultaneous.
• Unikey security key: Fixed kernel warnings "sending ioctl 2285 to a partition!"
• Fixed issue where ByteBlower client sessions were not cleaned up properly: Enabled TCP keep-alive on management connection.
• Added better value checks on HTTP client/server receive window scaling factor enable and value and initial receive window size.

ByteBlower Server 2.2 changelog

2.2.6

Enhancements

• No longer return zero timestamps over RPC. If a counter is not available then it is not included in the mapping. (So the client can throw UnavailableException.)
• "First time" events in interval snapshots now return first time the event occurred in the interval. (They used to return value from cumulative snapshot.)
  • Rx.Timestamp.First.Get
  • Tx.Timestamp.First.Get
• Added method HasSession to HTTP server. This is needed because we can't assume as server session will once the client is in connected state.
  • Example: $httpServer HasSession [ $httpClient ServerClientId.Get ]
• Once a TCP session is established HTTP immediately starts sending. (There used to be a 10ms delay.)
• The server will return a result code "HTTP/1.1 200 OK\r\n\r\n" when receiving a PUT request. (It used to return nothing.)
  This means that the HTTP client snapshots will now have Rx values (Rx.Timestamp.First/Last and Rx.ByteCount.Header/Total).
• Server logs a warning message if router advertisement was rejected. The message also includes the reason why was rejected.
  e.g.
  
  • Rejecting router advertisement because its source IP is not link-local address
  • Rejecting router advertisement because its hop limit is not equal to 255
  • etc..
    
• Server logs an info message for each prefixes found in a router advertisement.
  • Prefix entry has the L-flag set. We can use this prefix for on-link determination.
  • Prefix entry has the A-flag set. We can use this prefix fox stateless autoconfiguration.

Fixes

• Fixed an issue on the ByteBlower 4100 which could case negative loss.
• Fixed an invalid assertion on snapshot processing
• Fixed handling of certain DHCPv6 messages

2.2.4

Enhancements

• Improved TCP SACK efficiency.
• 4100 series: Improved timing stability at line rate transmission with multiple streams.

Fixes

• 4100 series: Fixed incorrect timing in mulitple burst timing modifier.
• 2200 series: Fixed time synchronization of second network adapter to first one.
• 2x00 and 4100 series: Fixed possible error during startup while obtaining network adapter time.
• Reimplemented DHCP and DHCPv6 release.
• Telnet client: Fixed hang trying to connect to remote IPv6 address when configured with local IPv4 address.
• Fixed HTTP SessionInfo returning incorrect request type and value when performing time-based TCP test.

2.2.2

Enhancements

• Improved TCP performance for devices with TCP ACK suppression.
• Improved TCP rate limiting algorithm.
• Minimized RPC overhead for result history.
  
  • Not returning any values which would be invalid (e.g. when no packets received)
  • Not returning snapshots when nothing received in a given interval (missing snapshots are generated at client-side since 2.2.0)

Fixes

• Fixed incorrect assertion on 2100 series in some rare conditions.
• Fixed possible threading issue when changing stream configuration during run (applies on all but 4100 series)
• Fixed possible memory corruption in TCP when running high number of sessions (> 10000)
• Fixed server crash when TCP received RST
• Fixed issue where HTTP PUT received more data than transmitted.
• Out-of-sequence detection: fixed sequence number reset when packet counters were cleared
• Fixed DHCP and DHCPv6 handling maximum number of retransmissions as maximum number of transmissions.
• 4100 series: Fixed stream history results returning incorrect snapshot with timestamp value 0
• All but 4100 series: Fixed applying stream timing modifiers. Timing modifiers were no longer applied in 2.2.0.
• Now throwing "InProgressError" instead of "ConfigError" when trying to configure objects which are currently "active".
  Applies to stream, TCP, HTTP

ByteBlower environment and update

• ByteBlower configurator: Fixed button labels
• ByteBlower configurator: Fixed default selected button when "discarding changes"
• Fixed issue in updater: Clearing cache partition did not work which
  caused ByteBlower environment still running old version after update.

Known issues

• 4100 series: multiple burst timing modifier timing is not correct.

2.2.0

Enhancements

• Add 2200 series support
• Telnet client protocol support is enabled again.
• ARP, DHCP and DHCPv6 can now be inialized in parallel.
• Implemented CUBIC TCP congestion avoidance algorithm (extension).
• Improved TCP performance on all systems.
• Improved general protocol stack performance on 4100 series for some test conditions.
• Removed auto-announcement on the network (Avahi / zero-conf). This is no longer used since 2.0.0 clients.
• Improved transmission stability on the 1x00 series.

Fixes

• Fixed destruction of captures.
• Fixed issue in out-of-sequence history result timestamps.
• Fixed incorrect counters in IGMP and MLD protocol.
• Fixed incorrect processing and possible assertion failure when receiving older-version IGMP queries.
• Fixed some assertion failures for rare test conditions on 4100 series.
• Fixed some assertion failure on 2100 series for specific test setup.
• Fixed hang of server when performing test with > 10000 TCP sessions.
• Fixed issue where Tx.Stream::Result.Get could take up to 30ms (when performin test with very low traffic rate).

ByteBlower environment and update

• ByteBlower configurator now processes different notations for multiple DNS servers.
• Add support in ByteBlower configurator for multiple adapters in 2200 series.

2.4.6

Enhancements

• TCP: Improved performance behind devices which perform TCP Ack Suppression.

Fixes

• TCP: Fixed long delays after retransmission timeout.

2.4.4

Enhancements

• TCP: Improved/faster loss recovery.
• TCP: Rate limiting is less bursty.
• 4100/3100 series: Improved performance of protocol stack for tests from trunking to trunking interfaces.

Fixes

• 2x00/3100/4100 series: Fixing crashes during application shutdown.
• Fixed possible assertion failure in TCP.

2.4.2

Enhancements

• 2x00/4x00: Add support for 2100 series generation 3 and 4100 series generation 2 server hardware.

2.4.0

Enhancements

Server

• 2x00 series: Improved performance for protocol stack.
• 2x00 series: Improved performance when using multiple streams.
• 2x00 series: Stricter timing on transmission.
• 2x00/4100 series: Improved performance on non-trunking interfaces.
• 2x00/4100 series: Adapter filters are cleared at startup.
  So a restart of the server won't fail when it was not stopped correctly before.
• The server now detects when another instance is already running and shuts down again with a warning.

Server environment

• byteblower-support-tool now accepts additional arguments:
  • '-y': autmatically answer questions with "yes"
  • '--exclude-coredumps': Don't include any core dump in the support archive.
  • '--limit-coredumps=<count>': Override the default number of core dumps (3) included in the support archive.
  • '--add-directory=<path>': Collect user provided data from the given directory.
• 2x00/3x00/4100 series: Updated GPU driver.
• The BMC is now forced to use the dedicated IPMI network interface at server boot time.

Fixes

• 2x00 series: Fixed issue with combining packets from frame blasting and protocol stack.
• 2200 series: Fixed possible assertion failure at receive side.
• 3x00 series: Fixed maximum MDL value of ByteBlowerPort.
• Fixed filtering 'ip host' on 2x00 series, 3x00 series and 4100 series.
• Fixed regression in TCP performance.
• DHCPv6 renew is now sent to the "All DHCP Servers multicast address".
• Fixed HTTP POST header with IPv6 address.
• Fixed return value of HTTPServer ReceiveWindow.InitialSize.Set.

2.3.2

Enhancements

• 1300 series: Fixed performance issue when system boots with hyper threading (incorrectly) enabled.
  Seen on 1300 series of the second generation.
• 3100 series: Added relevant information to the support archive.
• Added tool to force BMC to use dedicated IPMI interface (if available).

Fixes

• Fixed an issue with incorrect counter values for multi-session HTTP PUT.
• Fixed issue with multicast when a single querier sent multiple Membership queries in one second (for example during querier restart).
• Fixed rare crash in TCP on LocalAdvertisedWindow.
• 3100 series: Multi-session HTTP GET did not finish.
• 3100 series: Fixed incorrect Maximum MDL value of ByteBlowerPort.
• 1x00 and 3100 series: Fixed incorrect time source for stream and frame counters.
• 2x00 and 4100 series: Updating service application core binding on newer 20-core platforms.

2.3.0

Enhancements

• Added support for VLAN stacking (QinQ)
• Don't start udev on 2100 and 4100 servers.
• Frames and flows can't be altered during execution.
• Added support form frame field modifiers.
• Snapshot size is now configurable. Default is still 1 second.
• Added call to get the current server time. Usefull in multi-server configurations.
• Added more information to the ByteBlower version output.
• Added log rotation for stdout and stderr output.

Fixes

• Fixed an issue when setting an empty frame.
• Fixed different issues in the HTTP and TCP implementation.
• Removed duplicate snapshots in the results.
• Clear history when filter is changed.
• Fixed bad average latency in last snapshot.
• Cleanup of unused libraries.

ByteBlower Server 2.1 changelog

2.1.4

Fixes

• Fixes issues in TCP implementation.
• Fixed limitation on the 4100 series trunking interfaces to 950Mbps instead of 1Gbps.
• Fixed issue where simultaneous remove and add of filtering objects could lead to incorrect results.
  • Packets matching old filter could be counted to new filter.
  • Related to basic trigger, latency counters, out-of-sequence counters and captures.
• ByteBlowerPort counters now work again on 1100, 1200 and 1300 series.

2.1.2

Fixes

• Fixes issues in DHCPv4 and DHCPv6 implementation
• Added the renew message in the DHCPv6 client implementation
• Checking the minimum and maximum value of the size of the frame size modifiers.
• Added synchronized start.
• Improved exception handling and communication towards the client.
• Fixed issue when combining frame blasting and TCP sessions (4100)
• Fixed multi-user issue.
• Fixed multiple wrong assertions.
• Improved TCP performance on multiple trunking interfaces (4100)
• Fixed an out-of-resources issue with multiple frames on one stream.
• Improved port counter implementation.
• Improved TCP scalability (number of parallel sessions)

2.1.0

Enhancements

• Added support for the ByteBlower 3100 server.
• Added TCP slow start threshold parameter.
• Many TCP performance tuning.
• Improved scheduling on 4100 series.
• Improved realtime counter implementation.
• We don't allow to change to Mac address of a port when active.
• We don't allow to change the Vlan ID of a port when active.

Fixes

• Fixed issues in DHCPv4 and DHCPv6 implementation.
• Disabling sequence tag or time tag didn't reset the value.
• Disable flow configuration during transmit.
• Verify frame size is between minimum and maximum supported frame size of the interface.
• A ByteBlower port did not join the Solicited Node Multicast Address Group when DAD succeeds
• Average frame size on growing size flow was invalid once the total size exceeded 2³²
• Fixed some ICMP issues.
• Throw exception when using a TCP port which is already in use.
• SLAAC uses prefix form Invalid Router Advertisement

ByteBlower environment and update

• The login prompt sometimes took a lot of time.
• The ByteBlower updater now supports a proxy server.
• The ByteBlower updater checks the disk space available.

ByteBlower Server 2.0 changelog

2.0.18

• Fixed deadlock on 4100 series while getting realtime statistics.
  This is especially triggered when using non-zero initial time to wait on TX streams.
  I.e. in the GUI: Scenario with start time > 0

2.0.16

• Fixed server crash on 2100 and 4100 series when a packet was received with Ethernet alignment or CRC error

2.0.14

• Fixed filter issue on ByteBlower 2100 and 4100.
• DHCPv4 message parsing fix.

2.0.12

• IPv4 protocol crashed when to many sessions where opened.
• Add update logs to the support archive.

2.0.10

• Stability improvements for 1x00 and 2100 series.

2.0.8

• 4100 series: Fixed major TCP performance issue for flows with a trunking interface as source.
• 4100 series: Major stability improvements.
• 4100 series: Server no longer requires link on both its dedicated data interfaces to function.
• ARP protocol now marks messages with a 'zero' source MAC or source IP address as invalid. Fixes a server crash in such situations. ARP Probes are still supported.
• TCP protocol calculates its Maximum Segment Size (MSS) as the minimum of the local configuration and the announced remote MSS, instead of simply taking the first.

2.0.6

• TCP Window Scale value is now correctly applied per TCP session, instead of accross all configured sessions.
• Increased TCP performance.
• Improved stability on the 4100 series.
• DHCP client implementation now always includes option 54 (Server Identifier option) in the request, since this is expected by some DHCP servers.
• Known issue (4100): TCP performance on trunked (i.e. switched) 10 Gigabit interfaces is very low. This will be fixed in release 2.0.8.

2.0.4

• Vlan tagged frames with a priority code are now accepted on the trunking interface ( ByteBlower 4100 ).
• Unexpected frames are now logged and don't cause an assertion error.
• Improved memory management in the ByteBlower stack.
• Fixed wrong UDP checksum during DHCP renew.

2.0.2

• DHCP client now always asks for default gateway and netmask values explicitly, through DHCP option 55 (Parameter Request List). Because of this, it now works with DHCP servers that don't provide these values by default.
• Creating ByteBlower ports on 2100 or 4100 servers with more than one trunking interface should no longer give an unexpected error.

2.0.0

• Complete new server installer and update mechanism.
• New TCP/IP stack implementation.
• Realtime results and results over time for packet counters, latency and out-of-sequence counters.