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Christian Manivong 5f8a4ef975 docs: design notes for a Redfish/IPMI BMC driver

No code yet. The README explains why one Redfish driver with vendor quirk
modules beats a Supermicro-only IPMI driver, and keeps IPMI over LAN as a
read-only fallback. docs/ holds a draft for a new ManagementController
role base in napalm-device-types, the getter-to-resource map, the first
test device (Supermicro X10DRL-i, Redfish firmware 3.91), the security
points (IPMI RAKP hash disclosure, power control, credentials) and the
test plan with DMTF mockups and fixtures to record.

2026-10-13 01:15:57 +02:00

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napalm-redfish

NAPALM driver for server baseboard management controllers (BMCs) over DMTF Redfish, with a read-only IPMI fallback for boards that predate Redfish. Built on napalm-device-types. Written for netOrk.

Status: planning. There is no code yet. This repository holds the design so far. The first test device is a Supermicro X10DRL-i (BMC firmware 3.91, Redfish).

Why Redfish, and why not one driver per vendor

Redfish is the DMTF's REST API for management controllers. Supermicro (X10 with Redfish firmware, X11 and later), Dell iDRAC, HPE iLO and Lenovo XCC all implement it. One driver with small vendor quirk modules covers all of them; a napalm-supermicro-ipmi would cover one.

IPMI over LAN stays a read-only fallback for boards without Redfish. Its IPMI 2.0 RAKP handshake hands the password hash to anyone who asks (CVE-2013-4786), so netOrk should not depend on it. Finding IPMI over LAN enabled is itself worth reporting, see docs/security.md.

Layout (planned)

Entry point	Transport	Scope
`redfish`	HTTPS, Redfish REST (session token or basic auth)	Read, plus power control and BMC reset
`ipmi`	IPMI 2.0 over LAN (UDP 623) via `pyghmi`	Read-only: facts, sensors, power state, SEL

Vendor quirks (Supermicro, Dell, HPE, Lenovo) live in one module per vendor, selected from the service root's Vendor/Oem data and Manager.Model. No separate entry point per vendor.

Documents

docs/role.md: the role base this needs in napalm-device-types (draft)
docs/redfish-map.md: getters mapped to Redfish resources
docs/supermicro-x10.md: first test device, its Redfish level, IPMI
docs/security.md: credentials, IPMI over LAN, power control
docs/testing.md: DMTF mockups, emulators, fixtures to record
docs/references.md

Building without hardware

Unlike most drivers in this organisation, much of this one can be built and tested without a device: the DMTF publishes complete mockups of Redfish services (DSP2043), and both the DMTF Redfish-Mockup-Server and OpenStack's sushy-tools serve them over HTTP. Recorded output from the X10DRL-i then covers what the mockups do not: an old Redfish 1.0.x implementation and Supermicro's quirks.

Conventions

These follow the other drivers in the NAPALM organisation:

Role bases declare, they never implement. Generic logic goes into napalm-device-types, vendor mechanics stay here.
Parsing lives in pure functions, tested on recorded responses under tests/fixtures/<vendor>-<model>-<firmware>/, with a COMMANDS.txt (here: the request paths) listing what produced each file.
napalm-device-types is not on PyPI: install it from git+https://git.netork.io/NAPALM/napalm-device-types.git before this package.

License

Apache License 2.0, see LICENSE.

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