[ovs-discuss] OVS drops all packets on ESX RHEL6.5 VM

[Ben Pfaff]

That might not help and might hurt; see the FAQ:

Q: Does Open vSwitch support configuring a port in promiscuous mode?

A: Yes.  How you configure it depends on what you mean by "promiscuous
   mode":

      - Conventionally, "promiscuous mode" is a feature of a network
        interface card.  Ordinarily, a NIC passes to the CPU only the
        packets actually destined to its host machine.  It discards
        the rest to avoid wasting memory and CPU cycles.  When
        promiscuous mode is enabled, however, it passes every packet
        to the CPU.  On an old-style shared-media or hub-based
        network, this allows the host to spy on all packets on the
        network.  But in the switched networks that are almost
        everywhere these days, promiscuous mode doesn't have much
        effect, because few packets not destined to a host are
        delivered to the host's NIC.

        This form of promiscuous mode is configured in the guest OS of
        the VMs on your bridge, e.g. with "ifconfig".

      - The VMware vSwitch uses a different definition of "promiscuous
        mode".  When you configure promiscuous mode on a VMware vNIC,
        the vSwitch sends a copy of every packet received by the
        vSwitch to that vNIC.  That has a much bigger effect than just
        enabling promiscuous mode in a guest OS.  Rather than getting
        a few stray packets for which the switch does not yet know the
        correct destination, the vNIC gets every packet.  The effect
        is similar to replacing the vSwitch by a virtual hub.

        This "promiscuous mode" is what switches normally call "port
        mirroring" or "SPAN".  For information on how to configure
        SPAN, see "How do I configure a port as a SPAN port, that is,
        enable mirroring of all traffic to that port?"

On Tue, Oct 14, 2014 at 01:01:23PM +0000, Federico Iezzi wrote:
> Did you try to allow “promiscuous mode“  on vSwitch configuration?
> 
> --------------------------------------------
> This email and any files transmitted with it are confidential and intended solely for the use of the individual or entity to whom they are addressed. If you have received this email in error please notify the system manager. This message contains confidential information and is intended only for the individual named. If you are not the named addressee you should not disseminate, distribute or copy this e-mail. Please notify the sender immediately by e-mail if you have received this e-mail by mistake and delete this e-mail from your system. If you are not the intended recipient you are notified that disclosing, copying, distributing or taking any action in reliance on the contents of this information is strictly prohibited.
> 
> Il giorno 14/ott/2014, alle ore 00:59, Chen Weiwen <chenww at hotmail.com<mailto:chenww at hotmail.com>> ha scritto:
> 
> Dear Pro,
> 
> I see OVS drops all packet on RHEL 6.5 VM booted from ESX. Here is the configuration:
> 1)   Created a port group (4095) on the vCenter, where the ESX host was added to a cluster, and provided the NIC configured above as an uplink.
> 2)   Booted a VM(which is supposed to be setup as Management host) with RHEL 6.5 and provided the port group created in Step 1 to this VM
> 3)   Run vconfig command and it can ping gateway:
> a.  # vconfig add eth0 1
> b.  # ifconfig eth0.1 10.1.216.57/18
> c.  # ping 10.1.192.1 --- This is gateway and worked
> 4)   Run ovs command:
> a.   ovs-vsctl add-br mybr
> b.   ovs-vsctl add-port mybr eth0
> c.   ovs-vsctl add-port mybr test tag=1 – set interface test type=internal
> d.   ifconfig test 10.1.216.57/18
> e.   ping gateway will fail: 10.1.192.1
> f.  Change mtu on test port and eth0 to 1504, compared to default 1500. No good
> 5)   Remove eth0 from OVS and do following, ping still fail:
> a.  # ovs-vsctl del-port mybr eth0
> b.  # vconfig add eth0 1
> c.  # ifconfig eth0.1 10.1.216.57/18
> d.  # ping 10.1.192.1 will fail
> 6)  Remove OVS, ping will work:
> a.  # ovs-vsctl del-br mybr
> b.  # service openvswitch stop
> c.  # ping 10.1.192.1  --- it works
> 
> Here is the RHEL 6.5 Kernel version: 2.6.32-431.el6.x86_64
> I tried both OVS 1.11 and 2.3, exactly same behavior.
> 
> BTW, I have no problem with RHEL6.5 on baremetal system at all to have OVS configured exactly like above.
> Help for thoughts?
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> discuss mailing list
> discuss at openvswitch.org<mailto:discuss at openvswitch.org>
> http://openvswitch.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
> 

> _______________________________________________
> discuss mailing list
> discuss at openvswitch.org
> http://openvswitch.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss