RIPE NCC IXP Tools Hackathon

Please note that the deadline for applications to participate in this hackathon was 12 November 2016.

Event Information

Event Date: 22-23 October 2016

Time: Saturday: 10:00-21:00, Sunday: 10:00-21:00 (including social event)

Location: Melia Castilla Hotel, Madrid, Spain

This will be the fourth hackathon the RIPE NCC has hosted, and we've learned that these events are a great way to bring together developers, operators and designers to come up with creative new tools and visualisations that benefit the entire Internet community.

This time, we'll be focusing on developing tools related to Internet Exchange Points (IXPs). While the past three hackathons have specifically focused on RIPE Atlas, this hackathon will include other data sources as well, such as the Routing Information Service (RIS) and the PeeringDB.

Focus on IXP Tools

Together, we want to use any openly available data to develop useful analytical tools for the benefit of network operators and the IXP community.

Some potential focus areas could include:

  • Tools that IXPs can use to demonstrate potential performance improvements if operators peer with IXP members
  • Improving the IXP Country Jedi tool and determining the impact of IXPs on connectivity between networks, depending on whether they peer with one IXP vs. another
  • Improving the integration of the IXP Manager (an open-source tool) with RIPE Atlas data, which was started at previous RIPE NCC hackathons
  • Improving work done at previous RIPE NCC hackathons on IXP traceroutes, BGP traceroutes, etc.
  • Determining the best places for building new IXPs based on exiting measurement data
  • Anything else you think would help IXPs, operators who want to peer, researchers, etc. – include your idea in your application!

Participants

We are specifically looking for:

  • Developers familiar with Python, PHP, etc.
  • UX and UI experts
  • Graphic designers
  • Network engineers
  • People with knowledge of BGP, traceroute, TCP/IP
  • Colleagues from Internet Exchanges
  • Network operators who can give feedback about what would be useful to them

You'll have the chance to work alongside RIPE NCC developers, meet others in your field, and exchange knowledge and experience.

Timeline

The deadline for applications is 15 September. The jury will review the applications and will make final selections about successful participants. All applicants will be informed by 21 September.

Funding

Travel funding will be available for 10 participants, in the amount of €500 per person. Applicants will be informed about whether they qualify for funding when they are informed about their applications status on 21 September. The jury will make all final decisions about who receives funding; however, preference will be given to applicants from "least developed countries", those working for not-for-profits, and those contributing to free and open-source software and projects.

Format and Prizes

Small teams will work with RIPE NCC developers to meet one of two goals:

  • Work on furthering existing ideas developed at previous hackathons and by the community
  • Work on developing entirely new tools for use in the IXP community

At the end of the two-day event, we aim to have completed tools or advanced prototypes.

All this work will culminate in short presentations to the jury on Sunday afternoon. Food and drinks will be provided throughout the weekend.

All source code developed during the hackathon will be publicly licensed and available on GitHub, and available for the entire community to use.

Participants will receive the usual "swag": t-shirts, stickers and a few surprises. The winning team's work will be presented at the Connect Working Group session during the RIPE 73 Meeting, and one more person will be selected by the jury to receive a paid trip to either IXP-workshop at the next Euro-IX meeting in Krakow, or to the next hackathon.

Sponsors

The RIPE NCC is grateful for our sponsors' generous support of the IXP Tools Hackathon:

Comcast Logo

Internet Society Logo

Facebook

Supporting Organisation

Euro-IX

For Participants

Datasets

BGPStream, CAIDA

BGPStream is an open-source software framework for live and historical BGP data analysis, supporting scientific research, operational monitoring, and post-event analysis. BGPStream allows users to quickly inspect raw BGP data from the command-line, develop Python apps, or build complex systems using a C/C++ API. BGPStream provides seamless and live access to both the Route Views and RIPE RIS data archives. For the BGP Hackathon, experimental live access is available to a stream of BGP data generated by BMP-enabled Route Views collectors.

Euro-IX JSON Data

The Euro-IX Data is available on GitHub

Geolocation (Open IP Map)
PCH BGP Data

PCH Routing Data

PeeringDB

PeeringDB is a non-profit organisation focused on facilitating a neutral platform for peering coordinators, Internet Exchanges and facilities to exchange information about peering.

PeeringDB provides a single centralised source where peering networks can maintain their own information for all exchange points and private interconnection facilities worldwide. By providing the end user networks with a single source, and a simple and automated web interface, we hope that they will be able to easily provide and maintain this information over the long term.

You can find the reference for the API and Tools at the bottom of this webpage.

RIPE Atlas

RIPE Atlas is an active Internet measurement network with over 9000 vantage points. Data provided by RIPE Atlas include description about existing measurements and vantage points, as well as measurement results in downloadable and real-time streaming formats.

Members of the RIPE Atlas team will support the participants with information, use cases, and most importantly, credits that can be used to execute measurements on the fly, for example to correlate BGP events with data plane changes or compare control/data plane.

RIPE RIS (Routing Information Service)

RIPE NCC's BGP collector service; similar to RouteViews. BGP RIB dumps and update messages are available as downloadable dumps, as well as an experimental real-time streaming format (including custom filtering for peer, ASN, prefix, etc.) via WebSockets.

RIPEstat

RIPEstat is a web-based interface that provides "everything you ever wanted to know" about IP address space, Autonomous System Numbers (ASNs), and related information for hostnames and countries in one place. It presents registration and routing data, DNS data, geographical information, abuse contacts and more from the RIPE NCC's internal data sets as well as from external sources, such as other Regional Internet Registries and IANA. RIPEstat's main web-based interface presents this information in the form of widgets that can be embedded on any webpage. It also provides an API to access the raw data for use in advanced applications.

Existing Projects
Helpful Tools

An open-source repo for responsive dashboard templates

Participants

Note: All applicants have been informed about their application.

  • Sebastian Castro
  • Vasileios Giotsas
  • Matthew Stone
  • Matthias Hannig
  • Michael Cardell Widerkrantz
  • Daniel Melani
  • Petros Gigis
  • Khoudia Gueye
  • Milolidakis Alexandros
  • Guillermo Cicileo
  • Andrea Beccaris
  • Edward Medvedev
  • Benedikt Rudolph
  • Matthew Walster
  • David Barroso
  • Alexander Ilin
  • Barry O'Donovan
  • Jan Paul Dekker
  • Edwards Mukasa
  • Cooper Lees
  • James Reilly
  • Flavio Luciani
  • Eric Nghia Nguyen-Duy
  • Marios Isaakidis
  • Mathias Handsche
  • Daniel Quinn
  • Arnaud Fenioux
  • Orlin Tenches
  • James Paussa
  • Daniel Karrenberg
  • Mikhail Grishin
  • Hannes Adollarsson

Facilitators

  • Vesna Manojlovic, RIPE NCC
  • Robert Kisteleki, RIPE NCC
  • Michela Galante, RIPE NCC

Subject Experts

There will also be a number of RIPE NCC staff and others on hand throughout the hackathon to help teams develop their ideas and access relevant data sources:

  • Arnold Nipper, PeeringDB
  • Emile Aben, RIPE NCC (Research and analysis)
  • Iñigo Ortiz De Urbina Cazenave, RIPE NCC (Routing Information System)
  • Johan ter Beest, RIPE NCC (RIPE Atlas)
  • Massimo Candela, RIPE NCC (RIPE Atlas)
  • Adam Castle, RIPE NCC (User interface and experience)

Jury

  • Florence Lavroff - Chair, RIPE Connect Working Group
  • Remco van Mook - Chair, RIPE Connect Working Group
  • Brendan Cleary - Network Infrastructure Engineering Manager, Facebook
  • Drew Taylor - Network Systems Engineer, Comcast
  • Richard Yule - Project Manager, Euro-IX
  • Jane Coffin - Director of Development Strategy, Internet Society
  • Vesna Manojlovic - Community Builder, RIPE NCC