Determining readiness for switchover operations for network devices

A system comprising:

• a set of processing units;
• and
• a non-transitory machine-readable medium storing instructions that when executed by at least one processing unit in the set of processing units cause the at least one processing unit to:
• receive a policy definition specifying a set of criteria and a set of instructions specifying which of the set of criteria must be satisfied for a first supervisor module to be determined to be ready for a switchover operation;
• based on the set of instructions, determine whether the first supervisor module is ready for a switchover operation based on the set of criteria,
• wherein the switchover operation comprises placing a second supervisor module configured as a backup to the first supervisor module in an active mode taking over for the first supervisor module;
• determine whether a set of conditions are satisfied;
• and
• when the set of conditions are determined to be satisfied and after the first supervisor module is determined to be ready for the switchover operation, trigger the switchover operation to cause the second supervisor module to be in the active mode.

A network device comprising:

• a set of hardware modules configured to receive and forward network data;
• a first supervisor module configured to control the set of hardware modules when in an active mode;
• and
• a second supervisor module configured as a backup to the first supervisor;
• and
• wherein the first supervisor module is further configured to determine whether the first supervisor module is ready for a switchover operation based on a policy definition,
• said policy definition specifying:
• a first set of criteria and a set of instructions specifying which of the first set of criteria must be satisfied for the first supervisor module to be determined to be ready for the switchover operation,
• wherein the switchover operation comprises placing the second supervisor module in the active mode configured to control the set of hardware modules taking over for the first supervisor module.