The failure drill feature of Express Connect allows you to simulate failure scenarios and perform failure drills. For example, you can simulate the failure scenario in which an Express Connect circuit fails and the network traffic is automatically switched to a redundant Express Connect circuit. You can use the failure drill feature to test and verify the reliability of your hybrid cloud networking established by using Alibaba Cloud resources.
The resources that are used in a failure drill task are disabled to simulate failure scenarios. Make sure that redundant resources are configured to prevent service interruption.
During a failure drill task, the status of resources is displayed with latency in the Express Connect console. This does not affect the underlying status switching of resources.
Scenarios
Verify the reliability of Express Connect circuits: When you create Express Connect circuits to connect your data center to Alibaba Cloud and want to verify the reliability of the Express Connect circuits, you can use the failure drill feature to check whether disaster recovery is implemented as expected.
Fault diagnosis: If an Express Connect circuit fails, you can troubleshoot the connection by using the failure drill feature to simulate faults in different segments and identify the cause of failure.
Resources that support failure drills
Resources that support failure drills include Express Connect circuits, virtual border routers (VBRs), and Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) peers.
During a failure drill task, the status of the Express Connect circuit changes to Unavailable.
During a failure drill task, the status of the VBR changes to Unavailable.
During a failure drill task, the status of the BGP peer changes to UnEstablished.
Limits and quotas
Limits
Only one failure drill task can be performed at a time in each region within an Alibaba Cloud account.
Only one failure drill task that is not in the Finished state can exist for each resource.
Failure drills cannot be performed on an Express Connect circuit, a VBR, and a BGP peer that are associated with each other at the same time.
The failure drill feature is not supported in the following scenarios:
More than one hosted connection is created over or more than one cross-account VBR is associated with the dedicated Express Connect circuit on which you want to perform failure drills. To perform such failure drills, contact the customer manager.
No VBR is associated with the hosted connection over an Express Connect circuit on which you want to perform failure drills.
More than one Express Connect circuit is associated with the VBR on which you want to perform failure drills.
Quotas
For more information, see Express Connect quotas.
Failure drill process
Create a failure drill task
Log on to the Express Connect console.
In the top navigation bar, select a region.
In the left-side navigation pane, click Failure Drill.
On the tab of the Failure Drill page, click Create Task.
On the Create Task page, configure the parameters that are described in the following table and click OK.
Parameter
Description
Task Name
The name of the failure drill task.
Region
The region to which your resources belong.
Drill Resource
The resources that you want to use in the failure drill task. Valid values: Express Connect Circuit, VBR, and BGP Peer.
Instances
The instances that you want to use in the failure drill task. The instances that you select are displayed in the Selected Instances section.
NoteThe instances that are overdue or are being used in a failure drill task cannot be selected.
Drill Mode
The mode in which you want to perform the failure drill task. Valid values:
Start Now: immediately performs the failure drill task after the task is created.
Do Not Execute Drill: does not perform the failure drill task after the task is created.
Drill Duration
The duration of the failure drill task. The default duration is 180 minutes. You can specify the duration in the range of 1 minute to 72 hours.
Description
The description of the failure drill task.
View a failure drill task
Log on to the Express Connect console.
In the top navigation bar, select a region.
In the left-side navigation pane, click Failure Drill.
On the page, find the failure drill task that you create and view the task status in the Task Status column. A failure drill task can be in one of the following states:
Finished: The failure drill task is finished. The failure drill task is complete or manually finished.
In Drill: The failure drill task is being performed. You can manually finish the failure drill task.
Ending: The failure drill task is finished and the status is being changed.
Starting: The failure drill task is being started.
Pending Drill: The failure drill task is created and is to be started.
More operations
Modify a failure drill task
Log on to the Express Connect console.
In the top navigation bar, select a region.
In the left-side navigation pane, click Failure Drill.
On the tab of the Failure Drill page, find the failure drill task that you want to modify.
Move the pointer over the
icon in the Drill Duration column to set the drill duration. Click Edit in the Actions column to modify the task name, resources, drill duration, and description.
NoteOnly the tasks in the Pending Drill state can be modified.
Start a failure drill task
Log on to the Express Connect console.
In the top navigation bar, select a region.
In the left-side navigation pane, click Failure Drill.
On the tab of the Failure Drill page, find the failure drill task that you want to perform and click Start Drill in the Actions column.
In the message that appears, click Start Drill.
NoteOnly the tasks in the Pending Drill state can be started.
Finish a failure drill task
Log on to the Express Connect console.
In the top navigation bar, select a region.
In the left-side navigation pane, click Failure Drill.
On the tab of the Failure Drill page, find the failure drill task that you want to finish and click End Drill in the Actions column.
In the message that appears, click OK.
NoteOnly the tasks in the In Drill state can be finished.
Delete a failure drill task
Log on to the Express Connect console.
In the top navigation bar, select a region.
In the left-side navigation pane, click Failure Drill.
On the tab of the Failure Drill page, find the failure drill task that you want to delete and click Delete in the Actions column.
In the message that appears, click OK.
NoteOnly the tasks in the Finished and Pending Drill states can be deleted.
View failure drill task records
Log on to the Express Connect console.
In the top navigation bar, select a region.
In the left-side navigation pane, click Failure Drill.
On the Failure Drill page, click the Drill Records tab.
On the Drill Records tab, you can view the records of failure drill tasks and perform the following operations:
Delete the record of a failure drill task: Find the record that you want to delete and click Delete in the Actions column.
Duplicate a failure drill task: Find the record of the task that you want to duplicate and click Copy and Create in the Actions column.
Export the records of failure drill tasks: Click the
icon in the upper-right corner.
References
If you want to migrate from transit router connections to Express Connect Router (ECR) connections to connect a data center to Alibaba Cloud, you must use the failure drill feature to migrate the transit router connections one by one. For more information, see Migrate from transit router connections to ECR connections to connect a data center to Alibaba Cloud.