The switch is a Linux server.
BISDN Linux integrates the switching ASIC into standard Linux. Every switch port becomes an ordinary net-device. Your team keeps using ip, tcpdump, systemd-networkd, FRR and Ansible, the tools it already knows.
No new dialect for every vendor.
Network teams learn a separate, closed command language for every switch vendor. That ends here: the ASIC is bound into a standard Linux, the ports appear as regular interfaces, and configuration runs on the tools that work on any server.
Your tools stay
Ansible, systemd-networkd, FRR for routing. Anyone who knows Linux can run this switch. No certification, no training budget.
Community toolchain
Built on OpenEmbedded and Yocto, with no in-house build system only we understand. If you want to build the image yourself, you can.
Eleven platforms, several vendors
Off-the-shelf whitebox switches with Broadcom ASICs. You can view the list without a sales call.
What is open, and what is not
The source code, where to obtain it, and the two components supplied as binaries.
Open
- BISDN Linux source code, including the Broadcom OpenBCM SDK GPLv2 for most components, alongside GPLv3, LGPL, Apache 2.0, BSD, MIT and MPL
- Sources: github.com/bisdn ↗, with bisdn-linux ↗ and meta-bisdn-linux ↗ for building, OpenBCM ↗ as the SDK, meta-ofdpa ↗ with OF-DPA as a binary, and basebox ↗ as the controller. GPL sources for each release are archived at repo.bisdn.de ↗
- Reproducible build system based on OpenEmbedded ↗ and the Yocto Project ↗
- Configuration and automation through standard Linux tooling
- Bill of materials for the software components
Shipped as a binary
- Broadcom OF-DPA, supplied as a binary. We hold the source code and make it available for an audit.
- Firmware files for Trident-3 switches, supplied as blobs in the SDK
Three simple steps
Check
Look in the hardware list for your switch
Fetch
Download the image, with its checksum alongside. No sign-up or email address required. Installation uses ONIE, the same method used by the vendor software.
Learn
The interactive self-study course walks through installation, configuration and operation at your own pace
Get notified about new releases
New versions and security advisories
Sign up via email for release notifications and security advisories
Talk to the people who build it.
A technical question gets a technical answer, from someone who wrote the code.