Live Page

Live Page

The Live tab lets you view and filter real-time information for the traffic that passes through the Barracuda CloudGen Firewall. You can also manage the traffic sessions. To access the Live page, click the FIREWALL tab and select the Live icon in the ribbon bar.

In addition to the 'user traffic' that must be managed, the firewall needs to send special traffic in certain situations that can be classified as 'assistive traffic' in order to manage its main task. For performance reasons, Firewall Admin does not show this special traffic on the Live page. This affects the following traffic classes and ports:

  • Web Log Streaming (port 514 UDP)

  • Firewall Session Sync (port 689 UDP)

  • TINA ports are used for "high-performance settings" (port 691 - 723 UDP)

Video

To get a feel for how to use the FIREWALL > Live page in Firewall Admin, watch the following video: https://campus.barracuda.com/to/10O6

The Live Tab

The Live tab provides three separate sections

  • Session Details

  • Work Processes

  • Traffic Meter


The Live page provides the following information for each session:

  • ID – The icons indicate the amount of traffic (Low to High...). The number provided is the unique access ID for the connection.

  • Status – The connection status: One-way traffic; connection established (TCP); two-way traffic (all other); connection could not be established; closing the connection. The icon next to the status symbol indicates the application policy.

  • IP Protocol – The protocol used. If the protocol can be determined only by the source/destination port, it is displayed in light-gray. If the protocol was detected by the firewall engine it is displayed in black. For example, TCP, UDP, or ICMP.

  • Application – The name of the affected application, e.g., Web browsing, Ubuntu Update.

  • Application Context – The context of the affected application., e.g., www.barracuda.com

  • Rule – The name of the affected firewall rule.

  • Type – The origin, as specified by the following abbreviations:

    • LIN – Local In. The incoming traffic on the box firewall.

    • LOUT – Local Out. The outgoing traffic from the box firewall.

    • LB – Loopback. The traffic via the loopback interface.

    • FWD – Forwarding. The outbound traffic via the Forwarding Firewall.

    • IFWD – Inbound Forwarding. The inbound traffic to the firewall.

    • PXY – Proxy. The outbound traffic via the proxy.

    • IPXY – Inbound Proxy. The inbound traffic via the proxy.

    • TAP – Transparent Application Proxying. The traffic via stream forwarding.

  • Source – The source IP address.

  • Src. Port – The source port.

  • Destination – The destination IP address.

  • Port – The destination port (or internal ICMP ID).

  • User – The username of the affected user and group.

  • bit/s – The bits per second (during the last second).

  • Idle – Time since the last data transfer.

  • Total – The total number of bytes transferred over this connection.

  • In – The total number of bytes transferred over this connection from the source.

  • Out – The total number of bytes transferred over this connection to the source.

  • Start – Time since the connection was established.

  • SNAT – The source NAT address.

  • DNAT – The destination NAT address.

  • Output-IF – The outgoing interface.

  • Policy – The affected policy. For descriptions of the available policies, see the Policy Overview section below.

  • QoS – QoS band that is used in this session.

  • FWD Shape – The forward Traffic Shaping (IN/OUT). The shape connectors for ingress and egress shaping, respectively, are in the forward direction. Ingress shaping takes place at the inbound interface. Egress shaping takes place at the outbound interface.

  • REV Shape – The reverse Traffic Shaping (IN/OUT).

  • Protocol – The affected protocol.

  • User Agent  User agent for HTTP and HTTPS connections.

  • Src. Named Network – The compound string of a named network used for a source.
    Example: example.com///Location-51/Department-18/Devices-3

  • Dst. Named Network – The compound string of a named network used for a destination.
    Example: example.com///Location-51/Department-18/Devices-3

  • Src. VR Instance – The source IP address of a virtual router instance.

  • Dst. VR Instance – The destination IP address of a virtual router instance.

  • Source Info – Source Info is a compound string of multiple partial names/symbols and relates to the template:

    • Source Geo: An icon that is either

      • a flag symbol that relates to the state at the given geo-location

      • a symbol of a house that stands for a private IP address

    • EITHER:

      • Source IP: the source IP address that is associated with the geographical information (Geo-IP).
        Example:

    • OR:

      • Named Network: If the IP address is defined by a named network, then the name of the Named Network is used.

  • Destination Info – Destination Info is a compound string of multiple partial names/symbols and relates to the template:

    • Destination Geo: An icon that is either

      • a flag symbol that relates to the state at the given geo-location

      • a symbol of a house that stands for a private IP address

    • EITHER:

      • Destination IP: the destination IP address that is associated with the geographical information (Geo-IP).
        Example:

    • OR:

      • Named Network: If the IP address is defined by a named network, then the name of the Named Network is used.

  • Interface – The name of the interface is a compound of multiple partial names and relates to the template:

    • Output interface (see also Output-IF in this list)

    • "@"

    • (Optional): Name of the tunnel

    • Name of the box

    • "_"

    • (Optional): Name of the cluster

    • "_"

    • (Optional): Name of the range
      Example: pvpn0@PGRP-MYBOX_Cluster2_1

  • Status – The status of the connection. For descriptions of the available status types, see the heading "Status Overview" below.

  • Src. Geo – The geographic source of the active connection.

  • Dst. Geo – The geographic destination of the active connection.

  • SD-WAN ID – The transport rating setting (Bulk, Quality, or Fallback with IDs 0-7). For more information, see SD-WAN below.

  • URL Category – Category of the destination URL.

 

Column Control

Each of the upper information category names prefixes a column as the column name in the Live view. Such a collection of columns is derived from the Factory Default configuration setup and handled by Barracuda Firewall Admin as a directly related configuration setup after your first login to a specific firewall.

When you log out from the firewall, all changes made to the columns during the last session are automatically saved to this configuration and will be automatically reloaded when you log in back to your firewall again.

By that way, Barracuda Firewall Admin manages such all such setups for every administered firewall.

Handling of Individual Setups

By right-clicking on the name of a column, a pop-up menu is displayed with the list entry Column at the bottom. By selected this entry, another pop-up menu is displayed depending if your firewall is operating in Policy Profiles mode or not. At that point, you have the option to select from 5 entries by which you can control how Barracuda Firewall Admin handles the changes to the defaults and whether these defaults should be used by only a specific or by all firewalls.

 

Non-Policy-Profile Mode

Policy-Profile-Mode

 

Non-Policy-Profile Mode

Policy-Profile-Mode

Live View

column_defaults_live_view_no_policies.png

 

column_defaults_live_view_for_policies.png

 

History View

column_defaults_history_view_no_policies.png

 

column_defaults_history_view_for_policies.png

 

Threat View

column_defaults_threat_view_no_policies.png

 

column_defaults_threat_view_for_policies.png

 

 

The common naming parts for all the upper 6 options with their meaning are:

  1. Restore Default Columns…: Restores the column setup from your last actively saved favorite setup. This configuration setup can be used on any firewall to which you connect with Barracuda Firewall Admin. Note that when you log out from a specific firewall while using this restored setup, this setup will be stored as your firewall related default setting and will be reloaded upon your next login on the same firewall.

  2. Save as Default Columns…: Saves the current selection of columns as your favorite setup. This setup can be used on any other firewall on demand by clicking Restore Default Columns… .

  3. Factory Default Columns: Restores the preset factory setup of columns to the view. This will overwrite your currently used setup and can not be undone!

  4. Optimize All Columns: Optimizes all columns to consume a minimum width within the view. This can cause an empty area to the right side of the view.

  5. Adjust All Columns: Adjusts all columns to fit into the total width of the visible view.

 

Filter Options

You can filter the list of sessions by traffic type, status, and properties. Click the Filter icon on the top right of the ribbon bar to access the filtering options.

  1. Click the Filter icon.

  2. Select New Filter. The Traffic Selection section opens on the top left of the list.

  3. Expand the Traffic Selection drop-down menu and select the required checkboxes:

    • Forward – Sessions that are handled by the Forwarding Firewall.

    • Loopback – System internal data exchanged by the loopback interface.

    • Local In – Incoming sessions that are handled by the box firewall.

    • Local Out – Outgoing sessions that are handled by the box firewall.

    • IPv4 – IPv4 traffic.

    • IPv6 – IPv6 traffic.

  4. From the Status Selection list, you can select the following options to filter for certain traffic statuses:

    • Closing – Closing connections.

    • Established – Established connections.

    • Failing  Failed connections.

    • Pending – Connections that are currently being established.

  5. You can set additional filters based on the content of the menu list when you click the '+' symbol in the blue ribbon bar. Although these filters are displayed together in a common menu list for selection, they belong to two groups of filters:

    1. "Single filter" – A single filter relates directly to a single column name in the table view of the window, e.g., IP Protocol, Port, Source, Destination.

    2. "Compound filter" – A compound filter relates to two columns of the table, e.g., Source/Destination, Any Interface, VR Instance (Src/Dst), that have a certain category in common, e.g., an IP address, a Named Network Object. You can regard such a filter as consisting of two separate filters (e.g., Source and Destination) that are linked to each other with a logical 'OR' operator and substituted by the filter (Source/Destination).

firewall_live_filter_compound_filter_active.png

These additional filters can be used both on visible and blanked-out columns. As an example, you can activate a certain compound filter, e.g., Source/Destination, and the table view will display all matching records even if the column Destination is not visible.

firewall_live_compound_filter_active_with_only_source_column.png

Currently, there are the following compound filters you can select: Source/Destination, Any Interface, VR Instance (Src/Dst).
When you click the '+' icon in the blue ribbon bar, the menu list is created at runtime. The menu list first displays the filters that relate to the visible columns in the table view, followed by all remaining filters whose related columns are not visible. The following menu list is an example of the contained filters:

  1. Select the requested filter category from the list.

  2. Enter the exact value into the edit field of the filter criterion you want the data to match against, e.g., filter Source, filter value 10.17.84.65:

firewall_live_filter_individual_filter_configured.png

Some fields allow the use of wildcards (*?; !*?). Example: !Amazon* excludes all entries starting with Amazon; Y*|A* includes all entries starting with "Y" or "A". Clicking the Sync Filter icon on the top right of the ribbon bar above the filters allows you to switch to the  History view but with the same filters applied.

Managing Sessions

You can view additional information for a specific session by double-clicking an entry.

You can control, copy, print, export, and organize the sessions listed on the Firewall > Live page. When you right-click a session, you are provided with the following options:

  • Terminate Session  - Ends the session.

  • Abort Session (No TCP RST)  - Ends the session without a TCP request.

  • Change QoS / Reverse QoS  - Let's you change the QoS band. For more information, see Traffic Shaping below.

  • Change SD-WAN Settings  - Let's you change the SD-WAN settings. For more information, see SD-WAN below.

  • Show Session Details  - Displays the session details.

For more settings, see: Barracuda Firewall Admin

Work Processes

In the lower left of the Live page, you can view and control firewall-related processes and workers. To access the status, click >> Show Proc on the lower left of the window.

The entry Active displays the currently active worker processes. The feature Kill Selected is used for terminating single workers. 

The entry on the right of the Kill Selected button shows the status of the synchronization in case of active transparent failover. For more information, see High Availability.

The following possible states are available: 

  • Active Sync (UP) – Shown on active HA partner; synchronization works.

  • Active Sync (DOWN) – Shown on active HA partner; sync would work, but box firewall is down.

  • Passive Sync (UP) – Shown on passive HA partner; synchronization works.

  • Passive Sync (DOWN) – Shown on passive HA partner; sync would work, but box firewall is down.

The window provides the following information about the processes: 

  • PID – System process ID.

  • Connections – Number of connections handled by the worker process.

  • bps – Bytes per second (during the last second).

  • Heartbeat – Time in seconds the process stopped to answer. Should never be more than 2.

  • PID  System process ID. Allows viewing on PID and fully extended description column.

  • Description – Role description of the worker process.

Traffic Meter

A traffic meter is integrated on the lower right of the page. The firewall engine samples the amount of traffic over 10 seconds, and the traffic meter displays it based on the traffic origin (Forward, Loopback, Local, Total). Traffic can be displayed as Bits/sec, Bytes/sec, or Packets/sec.

The second available view is TF Sync (click the Traffic drop-down arrow) which contains detailed information concerning the Transparent Failover function of an HA Forwarding Firewall. The pull-down menu for the statistics type (with the options Bits/secBytes/sec, and Packets/sec) has no function for this type of view. The display consists of the following entries: 

  • My Sync Addr – IP address and connection port for synchronization of this box.

  • Partner Sync Addr – IP address and connection port for synchronization of the HA partner box.

  • Synced Sessions – Number of sessions successfully synchronized.

  • Pending Sessions – Number of pending sessions not synchronized.

Status Overview

This table provides descriptions of the possible statuses displayed in the Status column for each session on the Firewall > Live page:

Status Name

Origin

Description

Status Name

Origin

Description

FWD-NEW 

TCP Packet Forwarding Outbound

The session is validated by the firewall ruleset. Traffic has not been forwarded yet.

FWD-FSYN-RCV 

TCP Packet Forwarding Outbound

The initial SYN packet received from the session source was forwarded.

FWD-RSYN-RSV

TCP Packet Forwarding Outbound

The session destination answered the SYN with a SYN/ACK packet.

FWD-EST 

TCP Packet Forwarding Outbound

The SYN/ACK packet was acknowledged by the session source. The TCP session is established.

FWD-RET 

TCP Packet Forwarding Outbound

Either source or destination is retransmitting packets. The connection might be dysfunctional.

FWD-FFIN-RCV 

TCP Packet Forwarding Outbound

The session source sent a FIN datagram to terminate the session.

FWD-RLACK 

TCP Packet Forwarding Outbound

The session destination answered the FIN packet with a FIN reply and awaits the last acknowledgment for this packet.

FWD-RFIN-RCV 

TCP Packet Forwarding Outbound

The session destination sent a FIN datagram to terminate the session.

FWD-FLACK 

TCP Packet Forwarding Outbound

The session source answered the FIN packet with a FIN reply and awaits the last acknowledgment for this packet.

FWD-WAIT 

TCP Packet Forwarding Outbound

The session was reset by one of the two participants by sending an RST packet. During a waiting period of five seconds, all packets belonging to the session will be discarded.

FWD-TERM 

TCP Packet Forwarding Outbound

The session is terminated and will be removed from the session list.

IFWD-NEW 

TCP Packet Forwarding Inbound

The session is validated by the firewall ruleset. Traffic has not been forwarded yet.

IFWD-SYN-SND 

TCP Packet Forwarding Inbound

A SYN packet was sent to the destination initiating the session. Note that the session with the source is already established.

IFWD-EST 

TCP Packet Forwarding Inbound

The destination replied to the SYN with a SYN/ACK. The session is established.

IFWD-RET 

TCP Packet Forwarding Inbound

Either source or destination is retransmitting packets. The connection might be dysfunctional.

IFWD-FFIN-RCV 

TCP Packet Forwarding Inbound

The session source sent a FIN datagram to terminate the session.

IFWD-RLACK 

TCP Packet Forwarding Inbound

The session destination answered the FIN packet with a FIN reply and awaits the last acknowledgment for this packet.

IFWD-RFIN-RCV 

TCP Packet Forwarding Inbound

The session destination sent a FIN datagram to terminate the session.

IFWD-FLACK 

TCP Packet Forwarding Inbound

The session source answered the FIN packet with a FIN reply and awaits the last acknowledgment for this packet.

IFWD-WAIT 

TCP Packet Forwarding Inbound

The session was reset by one of the two participants by sending an RST packet. During a waiting period of five seconds, all packets belonging to the session will be discarded.

IFWD-LWAIT

TCP Packet Forwarding Inbound

An RST was received which sequence number is within the receive window but does not exactly match the next expected sequence number.

IFWD-TERM 

TCP Packet Forwarding Inbound

The session is terminated and will be removed from the session list.

PXY-NEW 

TCP Stream Forwarding Outbound

The session is validated by the firewall ruleset. Traffic has not been forwarded yet.

PXY-CONN 

TCP Stream Forwarding Outbound