[ovs-discuss] Deleting port on one bridge changes MAC address of unrelated bridge

[Ben Pfaff]

On Fri, May 23, 2014 at 02:54:45PM -0400, Lars Kellogg-Stedman wrote:
> On Fri, May 23, 2014 at 11:30:46AM -0700, Ben Pfaff wrote:
> > >     ip link set br-ex addr $MACADDR
> > 
> > Yeah, generally the MAC address of the bridge is derived from the MAC
> > addresses of the ports on the bridge.
> 
> Well, that I expect.
> 
> What is surprising is that setting it explicitly with the "ip" command
> doesn't "stick".  I don't understand the difference between using 'ip
> link set' and 'ovs-vsctl set bridge', since they both seem to update
> the 'mac_in_use' field for the bridge.
> 
> I've raised a bug against Fedora, since I think the network scripts
> should Do the Right Thing for OVS devices, but I also wonder if this
> is infact the desired behavior for this devices -- why not permit
> standard tools like "ip" or "ifconfig" to persistently modify the
> bridge?

How is OVS supposed to tell that you modified it and that the value
you gave it should stick?