Description

The customer was in the process of configuring eBGP peering on their aggregation router (MX2020, running Junos OS version 19.4R3-S7.3) with the following peers:

  • ASBR01
  • ASBR02
  • ASBR03
  • ASBR04

As part of this setup, they defined three BGP groups:

  • ipv4-u: IPv4 unicast advertisements
  • ipv4-lu: BGP-LU advertisements
  • ipv6-u: IPv6 unicast advertisements


Upon establishing neighborship with ASBR01, IPv4 and IPv6 routes were advertised immediately. However, BGP-LU route advertisements were delayed by over 15 minutes.


This delay was only observed with the first peer (ASBR01); subsequent peers (ASBR02–ASBR04) did not exhibit the same issue.

Symptoms

Model: mx2020

Junos: 19.4R3-S7.3


labuser@re0-labrouter> show bgp summary | match 42XX

96.XX.XX.154  42XXXXXX21     9     7    0    0    2:51 Establ

96.XXX.XX.190  42XXXXXX21     27    5692   100    0    2:47 Establ

2001:558:XXX:XXX::2 42XXXXXX21     20    2431   100    0    2:49 Establ



No BGP route advertisement to BGP LU peer

labuser@re0-labrouter> show bgp neighbor 96.XX.XX.154

Peer: 96.XX.XX.154+33619 AS 42XXXXXX21 Local: 96.XXX.XX.153+179 AS 42XXXXXX20

 Description: asbr01.XXX

 Group: ipv4-lu Routing-Instance: master

 Forwarding routing-instance: master 

 Type: External  State: Established  Flags: <Sync RSync>

 Last State: EstabSync   Last Event: RsyncAck

 Last Error: None

 Export: [ LEGACY-TO-LU-OUT DENY-ALL ]

 Options: <Preference AdvertiseInactive AuthKey LogUpDown AddressFamily PeerAS Multipath PrefixLimit LocalAS Rib-group Refresh>

 Options: <MtuDiscovery BfdEnabled DropPathAttributes Protection>

 Options: <GracefulShutdownRcv MultipathAllowProtection>

 Authentication key is configured

 Address families configured: inet-labeled-unicast

...

 Table inet.0 Bit: 2000c

  RIB State: BGP restart is complete

  Send state: in sync

  Active prefixes:       0

  Received prefixes:      0

  Accepted prefixes:      0

  Suppressed due to damping:  0

  Advertised prefixes:     0

 Last traffic (seconds): Received 30  Sent 2  Checked 180

 Input messages: Total 9  Updates 1 Refreshes 0   Octets 237

 Output messages: Total 7  Updates 0 Refreshes 0   Octets 133

 Output Queue[1]: 0      (inet.0, inet-labeled-unicast)

 Trace options: state

 Trace file: /var/log/ipv4-lu-unicast-logs size 10485760 files 10


At the same time, BGP route advertisement is happening towards IPv4 Unicast and IPv6 Unicast Peer

labuser@re0-labrouter> show bgp neighbor 96.XXX.XX.190

Peer: 96.XXX.XX.190+34875 AS 42XXXXXX21 Local: 96.XXX.XX.189+179 AS 42XXXXXX20

 Description: asbr01.XXX

 Group: ipv4-u Routing-Instance: master

...

 Table inet.0 Bit: 2000d

  RIB State: BGP restart is complete

  Send state: in sync

  Active prefixes:       8

  Received prefixes:      70

  Accepted prefixes:      70

  Suppressed due to damping:  0

  Advertised prefixes:     24683

  

labuser@re0-labrouter> show bgp neighbor 2001:558:XXX:XXX::2

Peer: 2001:558:XXX:XXX::2+33451 AS 42XXXXXX21 Local: 2001:558:XXX:XXX::1+179 AS 42XXXXXX20

 Description: asbr01.XXX

 Group: ipv6-u Routing-Instance: master

...

 Table inet6.0 Bit: 50007

  RIB State: BGP restart is complete

  Send state: not in sync

  Active prefixes:       8

  Received prefixes:      66

  Accepted prefixes:      66

  Suppressed due to damping:  0

  Advertised prefixes:     37335


  

About 20+ minutes later, We see successful advertisement to the LU Peer

labuser@re0-labrouter> show bgp neighbor 96.XX.XX.154  

May 21 05:30:00

Peer: 96.XX.XX.154+33619 AS 42XXXXXX21 Local: 96.XXX.XX.153+179 AS 42XXXXXX20

 Description: asbr01.XXX

 Group: ipv4-lu Routing-Instance: master

...

 Table inet.0 Bit: 2000c

  RIB State: BGP restart is complete

  Send state: in sync

  Active prefixes:       0

  Received prefixes:      0

  Accepted prefixes:      0

  Suppressed due to damping:  0

  Advertised prefixes:     1113



Solution

The delay was caused by the export policy LEGACY-TO-LU-OUT configured on the ipv4-lu BGP group. This policy evaluates all BGP routes (approximately 1 million in customer environments) and filters those with the community *:1305 before advertising them to other peers.

 

set protocols bgp group ipv4-lu export LEGACY-TO-LU-OUT

set protocols bgp group ipv4-lu export DENY-ALL

 

set policy-options policy-statement LEGACY-TO-LU-OUT term permit-lu-prefixes from protocol bgp

set policy-options policy-statement LEGACY-TO-LU-OUT term permit-lu-prefixes from community BGP-LU-COMM

set policy-options policy-statement LEGACY-TO-LU-OUT term permit-lu-prefixes then accept

set policy-options policy-statement LEGACY-TO-LU-OUT then next policy

 

set policy-options community BGP-LU-COMM members *:1305

set policy-options policy-statement DENY-ALL then reject

 

This behavior is expected. When a BGP group is activated, based on the export policy, the system must evaluate all BGP routes to determine which ones to advertise. If there are already active peers in the group and a new peer is added, the evaluation is quicker.

Modification History

2025-08-12 : Article Created