To manage resources, you set resource related datalink properties. Because you use the same commands to configure both traditional or physical and virtual networks, network administration is simplified.
In general, managing network resources enables you to accomplish the following:
Provision a network
Establish service level agreements
Bill clients
Diagnose security problems
Rings and flows are network features particularly designed for resource management.
NIC rings improve system performance and manage network resources. Receive (Rx) rings and Transmit (Tx) rings are hardware resources through which the system receives and sends network packets, respectively. If a NIC supports ring allocation, its transmit and receive rings can be dedicated for use by datalinks. By managing and allocating rings according to the network traffic, you can increase the efficiency of the system for processing packets.
Flows are a way of categorizing packets to further control how resources are used to process those packets. Network packets are categorized according to an attribute. Packets that share an attribute constitute a flow and are labeled with a specific flow name. You can then assign specific resources to the flow.
For instructions, see Chapter 7, Managing Network Resources in Managing Network Virtualization and Network Resources in Oracle Solaris 11.4. You can also see the dladm(8) and flowadm(8) man pages.