By default, you need not change the default EVB configuration. In most cases, you can install EVB and use the default EVB configuration to exchange the information about any VNIC that you configure on the system with the external switch. However, if you want to completely take control and manage EVB configuration on the host and the network, then you can change the default configuration.
When you use the default Oracle Solaris VSI Manager ID, ORACLE_VSIMGR_V1 the system automatically generates the VSI Type ID for the VNICs that you create. Therefore, there is no need to set the datalink properties, such as vsi-typeid and vsi-vers. However, if you are not using the default VSI Manager ID, you must set the datalink properties that are related to EVB by using the dladm set-linkprop command. To set datalink properties that are related to EVB, the external switch must be able to communicate with the system and retrieve properties for a given set of VSI Type ID and VSI Version.
Use the default Oracle VSI Manager ID when using EVB so that the Oracle VSI Manager can automatically generate VSI Type IDs and VSI Version for the VSI profiles of the system.
You can configure the following datalink properties that are related to EVB:
vsi-mgrid – Specifies the VSI Manager ID that is set for a physical link or a VNIC. If this property is not set for a VNIC, the default value, ORACLE_VSIMGR_V1, of the underlying physical link is used.
If you explicitly set the vsi-mgrid property, then you also need to explicitly set the VSI Type ID and VSI Version. In addition, you also need to explicitly configure these properties on the datalinks.
vsi-mgrid-enc – Indicates the encoding that is associated with the VSI Manager ID. By default, this property is set to oracle_v1. If you do not want to associate oracle_v1 with the VSI Manager ID, set this property value to none. When you set the value none, also make sure that you configure the VSI Manager ID, VSI Type ID, and VSI Version manually because they will not be automatically generated.
vsi-typeid – Specifies a VSI Type ID. A VSI Type ID pairs with a VSI Version to be associated with a VSI profile. This 3-byte value is automatically generated if you use the default values for vsi-mgrid and vsi-mgrid-enc. Otherwise, you must explicitly specify a value for this property.
vsi-vers – Specifies a VSI Version. The VSI Version pairs with a VSI Type ID to be associated with a VSI profile. This 1-byte value is automatically generated if you use the default values for vsi-mgrid and vsi-mgrid-enc. Otherwise, you must explicitly specify a value for this property.
You can display EVB-related properties by using the dladm show-linkprop command. You can obtain the effective values of the VNIC-related link properties from their respective EFFECTIVE field values of the properties. For more information, see Example 4–2.
For more information about the EVB components, see Exchanging VNIC Information by Using VDP. For more information about EVB, see the evb (7P) man page.