GNS3 Architecture

GNS3 Is Splitted In 4 Part

1. The GUI (project gns3-gui, gns3-web)

2. The controller (project gns3-server)

3. The compute (project gns3-server)

4. The emulators (qemu, iou, dynamips...)

Note

• The controller pilot everything it’s the part that manage the state of a project, save it on disk. Only one controller exists.

• The GUI display the topology. The GUI has only direct contact with the controller.

• The compute are where emulator are executed. If the compute is on the same server as the controller, they are in the same process.

• For each node of the topology will start an emulator instance.

A Small Schema

+---------------+                  +----------+     +------+
|               |                  | COMPUTE  +-----> QEMU |
|  GNS3 GUI     |              +---> SERVER 1 |     +------+
|  QT interface +-----+        |   +----------+
|               |     |        |                    +---+
+---------------+    +v--------++               +--->IOU|
                     |CONTROLLER|               |   +---+
      +---------+    +^--------++  +---------+  |
      | GNS3 WEB+-----+        |   | COMPUTE +--+
      +---------+              +---> SERVER 2+--+   +--------+
                                   +---------+  +--->DYNAMIPS|
                                                    +--------+