Virtual Networking Overview

PiVirt delivers versatile software-defined networking capabilities, enabling seamless layer-2 connectivity, isolated VLAN networks, multi-host VXLAN overlays, and line-rate hardware passthrough.

Bridge Networking

Basic Bridge

network:
  bridges:
    - name: "virbr0"
      type: "bridge"
      interface: "eth0"

VLAN-Aware Bridge

network:
  bridges:
    - name: "vlan-bridge"
      type: "bridge"
      interface: "eth0"
      vlan_aware: true
      vlans:
        - id: 10
          name: "management"
        - id: 20
          name: "storage"

VLAN Configuration

Create VLAN

pvcli network vlan create \
  --name vlan10 \
  --bridge virbr0 \
  --vlan-id 10

Attach VM to VLAN

spec:
  nics:
    - name: eth0
      network: virbr0
      vlan: 10

VXLAN Overlay

Create VXLAN Network

pvcli network create \
  --name vxlan-net \
  --type vxlan \
  --vni 1000 \
  --local-ip 10.0.1.10 \
  --remote-ips 10.0.1.11,10.0.1.12

VXLAN Configuration

network:
  vxlans:
    - name: "vxlan100"
      vni: 100
      local_ip: "10.0.1.10"
      remote_ips:
        - "10.0.1.11"
        - "10.0.1.12"
      port: 4789

SR-IOV Passthrough

Configure SR-IOV

network:
  sriov:
    - name: "sriov-net"
      pf: "eth2"
      vfs: 8

Attach VM to SR-IOV

spec:
  nics:
    - name: eth0
      network: sriov-net
      model: vfio-pci

Network Policies

Create Network Policy

apiVersion: pivirt.pilab.hu/v1
kind: NetworkPolicy
metadata:
  name: web-isolation
  namespace: production
spec:
  podSelector:
    matchLabels:
      app: web
  ingress:
    - from:
        - namespaceSelector:
            matchLabels:
              name: monitoring
      ports:
        - protocol: TCP
          port: 80

IP Address Management

DHCP

spec:
  nics:
    - name: eth0
      network: virbr0
      ipam:
        mode: dhcp

Static IP

spec:
  nics:
    - name: eth0
      network: virbr0
      ipam:
        mode: static
        address: "10.0.1.100/24"
        gateway: "10.0.1.1"

Best Practices

1. Use virtio Network Model

spec:
  nics:
    - name: eth0
      model: virtio  # Best performance

2. Enable Multi-Queue

spec:
  nics:
    - name: eth0
      queues: 2  # Match vCPU count

3. Set Bandwidth Limits

spec:
  nics:
    - name: eth0
      bandwidth:
        ingress:
          rate: "100Mbps"
        egress:
          rate: "50Mbps"

Troubleshooting

Network Not Working

# Check bridge
brctl show virbr0

# Check iptables
nft list ruleset | grep virbr0

# Check VM interface
pvcli vm get web-01 -o json | jq '.spec.nics'

VXLAN Issues

# Check VXLAN interface
ip link show vxlan100

# Check UDP connectivity
nc -zv 10.0.1.11 4789

SR-IOV Issues

# Check IOMMU
dmesg | grep -i iommu

# Check VF availability
ls /sys/class/net/eth2/device/virtfn*

Related

• Networking Concepts
• VXLAN Setup
• SR-IOV Configuration