Hello all:

I run a small ISP, and have two Mikrotik routers. Currently I have a single upstream ISP that both routers establish BGP sessions to (IPv4 and IPv6), one currently prepending itself as secondary. That ISP has two upstream feeds for redundancy. I am in the process of getting a second direct feed (from HE, not that it should matter), and as a "practically free" add-on, connect to the local IX as well (directly). Eventually, i want to get a connection to the SIX (Seattle IX).

My current BGP setup is very basic / minimal. I haven't done much more with BGP than this, but have been researching and trying to learn more. As I make the jump to truly multiple neighbors, I suspect I should re-engineer my BGP configuration, and it has been suggested that I use BGP communities to help organize my routes. I also have been wondering if I should receive full tables or just default routes from my internet-connected peers (the IX will use a route server, and I'll have to have individual routes for anyone on the IX).

Any recommendations on how I should design my BGP setup? How would I use communities? I'd like to have the ability to share my IX routes with my current peer (another small, local ISP), but in a way that they can separate my IP blocks from the IX routes on their end.

Thanks for advice, insight, and shared experience!