Virtual Switch

A virtual switch (vsw) is a component running in a service domain and managed by the virtual switch driver. A virtual switch can be connected to some guest domains to enable network communications between those domains. In addition, if the virtual switch is also associated with a physical network interface, network communications is permitted between guest domains and the physical network over the physical network interface. A virtual switch also has a network interface, vswn, which permits the service domain to communicate with the other domains that are connected to that virtual switch. The virtual switch can be used like any regular network interface and configured with the Oracle Solaris 10 ifconfig command or the Oracle Solaris 11 ipadm command.

You can add a virtual switch to a domain, set options for a virtual switch, and remove a virtual switch by using the ldm add-vsw, ldm set-vsw, and ldm rm-vsw commands, respectively. See the ldm(1M) man page.

The following examples explain how to create a virtual switch on a physical network adapter:

• Oracle Solaris 10: The following command creates a virtual switch on a physical network adapter called nxge0:

  primary# ldm add-vsw net-dev=nxge0 primary-vsw0 primary

  For more information about configuring a virtual switch as a network interface, see Enabling Networking Between the Control/Service Domain and Other Domains.

• Oracle Solaris 11: The following command creates a virtual switch on a physical network adapter called net0:

  primary# ldm add-vsw net-dev=net0 primary-vsw0 primary