[ovs-discuss] What is the 'internal' port and interface for?

Reid Price rprice at nicira.com
Wed Aug 21 01:35:30 UTC 2013


Hi Tudor,

This internal device with the same name as the bridge (the local port) is
hooked up to the IP stack.  It is useful for several things (such as
setting an IP address).

For example, see:

Q: I created a bridge and added my Ethernet port to it ...

In the FAQ:

http://git.openvswitch.org/cgi-bin/gitweb.cgi?p=openvswitch;a=blob_plain;f=FAQ;hb=HEAD

  -Reid


On Tue, Aug 20, 2013 at 6:30 PM, tudor <tudor at tudorholton.com> wrote:

> **
>
> Thanks.  That answers the first question.
>
> Second question was How is the "local" port used?
>
> If it were internal to the bridge, then surely it wouldn't need to be
> shown, since it would be implementation detail.  There must be a reason why
> it's exposed.  Is it able to be used in some way?
>
> Cheers,
> Tudor.
>
> On 2013-08-21 11:10, Reid Price wrote:
>
> Because it is the "local" port for a bridge. A bridge always has a port
> with the same name.
>
> There is a patch [1] by Ben that changes this message from
>     ovs-vsctl: no port named br-eth1
> to
>     ovs-vsctl: cannot delete port br-eth1 because it is the local port for
> bridge br-eth1 (deleting this port requires deleting the entire bridge)
>
> [1] patch info
> title:  ovs-vsctl: Improve error message for "ovs-vsctl del-port"
> link:  http://openvswitch.org/pipermail/dev/2013-June/028634.html
>
> Hope this helps.
>
>   -Reid
>
>
>
> On Tue, Aug 20, 2013 at 5:30 PM, tudor <tudor at tudorholton.com> wrote:
>
>>  Hi all,
>>
>> Complete newbie question for which I can't seem to find an answer
>> anywhere in the docs or website.  (Yes, I have searched but, being new,
>> perhaps not searching for the right thing!)
>>
>> Why does each bridge need to have a port and interface with the same name
>> marked as type "internal"?
>>
>> If I attempt to delete them, for example, it says that the port does not
>> exist. How else are they used?
>>
>> e.g.
>>
>> $ovs-vsctl show
>> e1bbbcb1-e20d-48e5-ae89-823c1a485625
>>     Bridge br-tun
>>         Port br-tun
>>             Interface br-tun
>>                 type: internal
>>         Port patch-int
>>             Interface patch-int
>>                 type: patch
>>                 options: {peer=patch-tun}
>>     Bridge br-int
>>         Port br-int
>>             Interface br-int
>>                 type: internal
>>         Port "int-br-eth1"
>>             Interface "int-br-eth1"
>>         Port patch-tun
>>             Interface patch-tun
>>                 type: patch
>>                 options: {peer=patch-int}
>>     Bridge "br-eth0"
>>         Port "phy-br-eth0"
>>             Interface "phy-br-eth0"
>>         Port "eth0"
>>             Interface "eth0"
>>         Port "br-eth0"
>>             Interface "br-eth0"
>>                 type: internal
>>     Bridge "br-eth1"
>>         Port "br-eth1"
>>             Interface "br-eth1"
>>                 type: internal
>>         Port "eth1"
>>             Interface "eth1"
>>     ovs_version: "1.4.0+build0"
>>
>> $ovs-vsctl del-port br-eth1
>> ovs-vsctl: no port named br-eth1
>>
>>
>> Cheers,
>> Tudor.
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> discuss mailing list
>> discuss at openvswitch.org
>> http://openvswitch.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
>>
>>
>
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://openvswitch.org/pipermail/ovs-discuss/attachments/20130820/760e217c/attachment.html>


More information about the discuss mailing list