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Quickstart for teams

Your team lead has set up a GCP host with containerlab and the vJunos image. Here's how to start practicing.

SSH to the host

gcloud compute ssh clab-lab --zone=us-central1-a
(Adjust the zone if your host is elsewhere.)

You should land at an Ubuntu shell. Verify containerlab is installed: 

containerlab version
docker images | grep -i vjunos

Clone the lab repo

git clone https://github.com/etherhtun/netforge-labs.git
cd netforge-labs

Deploy a lab

./scripts/deploy.sh 01-ospf-ibgp

This boots the bare 2×2 fabric (no configs yet). Wait 5–8 minutes for nodes to come up.

In another terminal, watch boot progress: 

docker logs -f clab-evpn-fullmesh-spine1

Choose your path

Follow the lab guide and type the config yourself. This is how you actually learn.

  1. Open the complete guide: Lab 01 README
  2. SSH into a node and apply each step's config: 
    ssh admin@clab-evpn-fullmesh-leaf1     # password admin@123
  3. Run the step's verify command, confirm the checkpoint, move to the next step

Path 2: Push the full config at once

Skip the hand-typing and deploy the working config: 

./scripts/switch.sh 01-ospf-ibgp

Then inspect the running fabric and do the break-it exercises to learn failure modes.

Capture packet traces (optional)

./scripts/capture.sh leaf1 eth1 01-underlay-ospf 'ospf'

This saves a .pcap in labs/01-ospf-ibgp/pcaps/. Download it to your laptop and open in Wireshark.

Reset or start over

./scripts/reset.sh 01-ospf-ibgp    # destroy and redeploy the topology

When you're done

Stop the GCP host to save cost (lab data persists): 

# on your laptop:
gcloud compute instances stop clab-lab --zone=us-central1-a

Start it again later: 

gcloud compute instances start clab-lab --zone=us-central1-a

Questions?