7 .TH ovs\-vswitchd 8 "June 2009" "Open vSwitch" "Open vSwitch Manual"
11 ovs\-vswitchd \- Open vSwitch daemon
18 A daemon that manages and controls any number of Open vSwitch switches
21 The mandatory \fIdatabase\fR argument specifies the
22 \fBovsdb\-server\fR from which \fBovs\-vswitchd\fR's configuration
23 should be retrieved. It takes one of the following forms:
24 .so ovsdb/remote-active.man
26 \fBovs\-vswitchd\fR retrieves its configuration from \fIdatabase\fR at
27 startup. It sets up Open vSwitch datapaths and then operates
28 switching across each bridge described in its configuration files. As
29 the database changes, \fBovs\-vswitchd\fR automatically updates its
30 configuration to match.
32 Upon receipt of a SIGHUP signal, \fBovs\-vswitchd\fR reopens its log
33 file, if one was specified on the command line.
35 \fBovs\-vswitchd\fR switches may be configured with any of the following
39 L2 switching with MAC learning.
42 NIC bonding with automatic fail-over and source MAC-based TX load
49 Port mirroring, with optional VLAN tagging.
52 NetFlow v5 flow logging.
58 Connectivity to an external OpenFlow controller, such as NOX.
61 Only a single instance of \fBovs\-vswitchd\fR is intended to run at a time.
62 A single \fBovs\-vswitchd\fR can manage any number of switch instances, up
63 to the maximum number of supported Open vSwitch datapaths.
65 \fBovs\-vswitchd\fR does all the necessary management of Open vSwitch datapaths
66 itself. Thus, external tools, such \fBovs\-dpctl\fR(8), are not needed for
67 managing datapaths in conjunction with \fBovs\-vswitchd\fR, and their use
68 to modify datapaths when \fBovs\-vswitchd\fR is running can interfere with
69 its operation. (\fBovs\-dpctl\fR may still be useful for diagnostics.)
71 An Open vSwitch datapath kernel module must be loaded for \fBovs\-vswitchd\fR
72 to be useful. Please refer to the \fBINSTALL.Linux\fR file included in the
73 Open vSwitch distribution for instructions on how to build and load
74 the Open vSwitch kernel module.
77 .IP "\fB--mlockall\fR"
78 Causes \fBovs\-vswitchd\fR to call the \fBmlockall()\fR function, to
79 attempt to lock all of its process memory into physical RAM,
80 preventing the kernel from paging any of its memory to disk. This
81 helps to avoid networking interruptions due to system memory pressure.
83 Some systems do not support \fBmlockall()\fR at all, and other systems
84 only allow privileged users, such as the superuser, to use it.
85 \fBovs\-vswitchd\fR emits a log message if \fBmlockall()\fR is
86 unavailable or unsuccessful.
88 .IP "\fB--fake-proc-net\fR"
89 Causes \fBovs\-vswitchd\fR to simulate some files in \fB/proc/net/vlan\fR
90 and \fB/proc/net/bonding\fR that some legacy software expects to
91 exist. This option should only be used if such legacy software is
92 actually in use. It requires the \fBbrcompat_mod.ko\fR kernel module
96 .SS "Public Key Infrastructure Options"
98 .so lib/ssl-bootstrap.man
101 .so lib/leak-checker.man
103 .SH "RUNTIME MANAGEMENT COMMANDS"
104 \fBovs\-appctl\fR(8) can send commands to a running
105 \fBovs\-vswitchd\fR process. The currently supported commands are
106 described below. The command descriptions assume an understanding of
107 how to configure Open vSwitch.
108 .SS "BRIDGE COMMANDS"
109 These commands manage bridges.
110 .IP "\fBfdb/show\fR \fIbridge\fR"
111 Lists each MAC address/VLAN pair learned by the specified \fIbridge\fR,
112 along with the port on which it was learned and the age of the entry,
115 .IP "\fBbridge/dump-flows\fR \fIbridge\fR"
116 Lists all flows in \fIbridge\fR, including those normally hidden to
117 commands such as \fBovs-ofctl dump-flows\fR. Flows set up by mechanisms
118 such as in-band control and fail-open are hidden from the controller
119 since it is not allowed to modify or override them.
121 These commands manage bonded ports on an Open vSwitch's bridges. To
122 understand some of these commands, it is important to understand a
123 detail of the bonding implementation called ``MAC hashing.'' Instead
124 of directly assigning Ethernet source addresses to slaves, the bonding
125 implementation computes a function that maps an 48-bit Ethernet source
126 addresses into an 8-bit value (a ``MAC hash'' value). All of the
127 Ethernet addresses that map to a single 8-bit value are then assigned
129 .IP "\fBbond/list\fR"
130 Lists all of the bonds, and their slaves, on each bridge.
132 .IP "\fBbond/show\fR \fIport\fR"
133 Lists all of the bond-specific information about the given bonded
134 \fIport\fR: updelay, downdelay, time until the next rebalance. Also
135 lists information about each slave: whether it is enabled or disabled,
136 the time to completion of an updelay or downdelay if one is in
137 progress, whether it is the active slave, the MAC hashes assigned to
138 the slave, and the MAC learning table entries that hash to each MAC.
139 .IP "\fBbond/migrate\fR \fIport\fR \fIhash\fR \fIslave\fR"
140 Assigns a given MAC hash to a new slave. \fIport\fR specifies the
141 bond port, \fIhash\fR either the MAC hash to be migrated (as a decimal
142 number between 0 and 255) or an Ethernet address to be hashed, and
143 \fIslave\fR the new slave to be assigned.
145 The reassignment is not permanent: rebalancing or fail-over will
146 cause the MAC hash to be shifted to a new slave in the usual
149 A MAC hash cannot be migrated to a disabled slave.
150 .IP "\fBbond/set-active-slave\fR \fIport\fR \fIslave\fR"
151 Sets \fIslave\fR as the active slave on \fIport\fR. \fIslave\fR must
152 currently be enabled.
154 The setting is not permanent: a new active slave will be selected
155 if \fIslave\fR becomes disabled.
156 .IP "\fBbond/enable-slave\fR \fIport\fR \fIslave\fR"
157 .IQ "\fBbond/disable-slave\fR \fIport\fR \fIslave\fR"
158 Enables (or disables) \fIslave\fR on the given bond \fIport\fR, skipping any
159 updelay (or downdelay).
161 This setting is not permanent: it persists only until the carrier
162 status of \fIslave\fR changes.
163 .IP "\fBbond/hash\fR \fImac\fR"
164 Returns the hash value which would be used for \fImac\fR.
166 .so lib/vlog-unixctl.man
169 .BR ovs\-brcompatd (8),
170 .BR ovsdb\-server (1),
171 \fBINSTALL.Linux\fR in the Open vSwitch distribution.