# Release 0.26
:material-calendar: 2022-05-03

## Nokia SR Linux banner
Little things with big impact - this is what SR Linux banner addition is. Starting with 0.26 release, containerlab will add a banner message to all SR Linux nodes with all necessary pointers such as:

* docs site
* release notes PDF
* YANG browser URL
* repository where we keep container images
* links to our cozy discord server and coordinates of ~~ISS~~ our sales representatives

```
❯ ssh admin@clab-srl-srl
Warning: Permanently added 'clab-srl-srl,3fff:172:20:20::f' (ECDSA) to the list of known hosts.
................................................................
:                  Welcome to Nokia SR Linux!                  :
:              Open Network OS for the NetOps era.             :
:                                                              :
:    This is a freely distributed official container image.    :
:                      Use it - Share it                       :
:                                                              :
: Get started: https://learn.srlinux.dev                       :
: Container:   https://go.srlinux.dev/container-image          :
: Docs:        https://doc.srlinux.dev/21-11                   :
: Rel. notes:  https://doc.srlinux.dev/rn21-11-2               :
: YANG:        https://yang.srlinux.dev/v21.11.2               :
: Discord:     https://go.srlinux.dev/discord                  :
: Contact:     https://go.srlinux.dev/contact-sales            :
................................................................

Using configuration file(s): []
Welcome to the srlinux CLI.
Type 'help' (and press <ENTER>) if you need any help using this.
--{ running }--[  ]--                                               
```

Now everything you need to get started is just one click away.

## Topology export
Our partner in crime @bortok added a nice feature titled "topology data auto export" for his [graphite](https://github.com/netreplica/graphite) project in #850. What now happens is that on each lab deployment you will find a file called `topology-data.json` inside the lab directory that contains most important topology information that can be consumed by external tools.

Read more about what data is dumped [here](../manual/inventory.md#topology-data).

In addition to the auto-export functionality, users are now able to provide their own Go template file describing the desired output format for topology export. This is possible with the newly added [`export-template`](../cmd/deploy.md#export-template) flag.

And even that is not all :D To be able to easily refer to the files located in a lab directory[^1] a new [magic variable has been added](../manual/nodes.md#binds) - `__clabDir__`.

## Keysight IXIA-C
Keysight folks added support for their open source traffic generator appliance - ixia-c - to containerlab. Meet [`keysight_ixia-c-one`](../manual/kinds/keysight_ixia-c-one.md) kind!

This addition allows you to write and run traffic-based tests using open-source production-grade traffic generators all inside the container runtime setting. There is a lot to be said about this integration, and we plan to record a few videos with Keysight; for now you can hack it on your own.

## Env files
Our own @steiler is back and added support (#847) for env files that you can use with [`env-files`](../manual/nodes.md#env-files) node container.

## Labels as env vars
Now every label that you (or containerlab) defined for a node gets promoted to an env var. With this it is possible to let scripts running inside the container access to metadata information we attach via clab files #841.

## Sysctls
And if you wanted to configure sysctls for a node - it is now possible with [`sysctls`](../manual/nodes.md#sysctls) container #856.

## Bridge forwarding
When clabbers used linux bridges in their topologies it was common to see traffic to be dropped when entering a bridge. This was in line with the default iptables rules which prevent forwarding over the bridge by default.

Now containerlab will add the relevant [iptables rule](../manual/kinds/bridge.md#using-bridge-kind) to allow forwarding over the bridges #871.

## Miscellaneous
* next-ui-based graph works better with long image names in tooltips #834
* added json-rpc example for [nokia sr linux](../manual/kinds/srl.md)
* better runtime mtu detection #840
* Arista cEOS nodes now will wait for all veth interfaces to first be present inside the container, before starting the main startup scripts #854
* added PauseContainer runtime method #843
* containerlab will not attempt to deploy labs with sr linux nodes if SSE3 cpu instruction set is not found #846
* better cleanup procedure for veth between container and host namespaces #862
* new [community](../community.md) posts

## Patches

### 0.26.1
* scrapligo updated to mitigate long ceos boot times #879
* better handling of file paths #877
* support for ceos `et` interfaces in wait script #881

### 0.26.2
* fix concurrent calls to iptables #884

[^1]: that is the one that is named as `clab-<lab-name>`.