How to Create a Link Aggregation – Bonding on Solaris

A link aggregation consists of several interfaces on a system that are configured together as a single, logical unit. Link aggregation, also referred to as trunking

Basically link aggregation is like a bonding on server. Its work in active and passive mode. At a time one network device are up and other bonding device are in stand by mode.

Requirements for Link Aggregations:-

1. Your link aggregation configuration is bound by the following requirements:

2. You must use the dladm command to configure aggregations.

3. An interface that has been plumbed cannot become a member of an aggregation.

4. Interfaces must be of the GLDv3 type: xge, e1000g, and bge.

5. All interfaces in the aggregation must run at the same speed and in full-duplex mode.

If the solaris box matches these above requirement, after that we can only able to create a link aggregation.

How to create a link aggregation in Solaris operating system:-

1. As a root user please login on the solaris operating system so you have full administrative role to perform the action.

2. Determine which interfaces are currently installed on your system.

For this work you need to run the below command.

#dladm show-link

The above command show you the which interfaces are currently installed on your system.

#dladm show-link

ce0             type: legacy    mtu: 1500       device: ce0

ce1             type: legacy    mtu: 1500       device: ce1

bge0            type: non-vlan  mtu: 1500       device: bge0

bge1            type: non-vlan  mtu: 1500       device: bge1

As per link aggregation requirement, we can only use the interface which start from bge etc. here the device bge0, bge1 are currently installed on the server.

3. In this step now determine which interfaces have been plumbed. for this please run the below command.

#ifconfig -a

lo0: flags=2001000322 <UP,LOOPBACK,RUNNING,MULTICAST,IPv4,VIRTUAL> mtu 8232 index 1

        inet 127.0.0.1 netmask ff000000 

ce0: flags=1000420 <UP,BROADCAST,RUNNING,MULTICAST,IPv4> mtu 1500 index 2

        inet 192.168.1.43 netmask ffffff00 broadcast 192.168.1.255

        ether 0:4:7c:8:92:7d 

4. Now create a link aggregation using below command

#dladm create-aggr -d bge0 -d bge1 1

here 1 is the key number which identify the link aggreation , and it is lowest number.

5. now configure & plumb the newly created aggregation. Please use the below command to do this.

#ifconfig aggr1 plumb 192.168.1.56 up

6. To check the status of the aggregation you just created, please run the below command.

#dladm show-aggr

key: 1 (0x0001) policy: L4      address: 0:4:7c:8:92:7d (auto)

device   address           speed         duplex  link    state

bge0     0:4:7c:9:87:4e    1000  Mbps    full    up      attached

bge1     0:4:7c:9:32:9e    0     Mbps    unknown down    standby

7. For link aggregations with IPv4 addresses, create an /etc/hostname.aggrkey file.

#vi /etc/hostname.aggr1

92.168.1.56

8. perform a reboot.

#reboot -- -r

How to Create VNIC and Assign a IP Address on Solaris 11

For creating Virtual NIC and assigning fix static IP address in Solaris 11 we need to understand the basic difference between older version of Solaris and Solaris 11.

In Solaris 10, according to the NIC manufacturer,physical network interfaces are named as (Ex:bge,e1000g,nxge).But in Solaris 11 onwards,the names are hidden from the view and all the interfaces will be named as net0,net1…netx.

Before forward to main work we need to know that using which command we can check which interface has been mapped to physical interface. Using below command you can check all the network interface details.

sun01# dladm show-phys

LINK              MEDIA                STATE      SPEED  DUPLEX    DEVICE

net0              Ethernet             up         1000   full      bge001

net1              Ethernet             up         1000   full      bge002

If you want to show all dladm level devices,including VNIC’s & aggregation links,use the below command-

sun01# dladm show-link

LINK                CLASS     MTU    STATE    OVER

net0                phys      1500   up       --

net1                phys      1500   up       --

In Solaris 11,you can give a meaning full description(net1/oracle_VIP) to all the IP address on the system unlike Solaris 10. (e1000g1:2)

How to assigning new IP address to NIC:-

1. We can see how we assigned IP address to the physical interface, so in the first step we will check all the physical interface using below command.

sun01# dladm show-phys

LINK              MEDIA                STATE      SPEED  DUPLEX    DEVICE

net0              Ethernet             up         1000   full      bge001

net1              Ethernet             up         1000   full      bge002

2. In this step we would know how we will create a new interface so you can use the below command for this.

sun01# ipadm create-ip net1

3. This is the main step to assign the static ip address to the newly created interface net1. You can use below command or syntax to assign the fixed IP.

sun01#ipadm create-addr -T static -a local=10.135.0.2/24 net1

You can change your IP address accordingly. 

4. Now we will Verify whether IP address is configured or not which we assigned on above step.

sun01# ifconfig  net1

net1: flags=1000843 mtu 1500 index 7

        inet 10.135.0.2 netmask ffffff00 broadcast 10.135.0.255

        ether 0a:cB:12:8e:15:e2

If you see the above output, the new IP address is shown on net1 interface successfully. Using above all 4 steps you can know how we will assinged the static ip address to the sun solaris 11 operating system.

Now we will go for Virtual Network Interface creation steps.I can create N number of VNIC’s using single physical interface.These VNIC are treated as actual physical interface and possible to assign to local zones with  full access to it.

How to create a new VNIC using interface net2:-

1. In the initial steps I will run the same command to check out the all physical interface which is available on the Solaris 11 Server.

sun01# dladm show-phys

LINK              MEDIA                STATE      SPEED  DUPLEX    DEVICE

net0              Ethernet             up         1000   full      bge001

net1              Ethernet             up         1000   full      bge002

net2              Ethernet             unknown    1000   full      bge003

If you see the above command output network interface "net2" is in unknow state, So in the next step I will create a new VNIC using net2.

2. In this step we will create a new VNIC using net2. In my case i will suppose VNIC name “vnic01”, so for creating the new VNIC we will run the below command which describe below.

sun01#dladm create-vnic  -l net2 vnic01

3.Now, We will plumb the virtual interface and create a default IP to new VNIC.

sun01# dladm create-vnic  -l net2 vnic01

sun01# ipadm create-ip vnic01

sun01# ifconfig vnic01

vnic01: flags=1000842 mtu 1500 index 8

        inet 0.0.0.0 netmask 0

        ether 2c:18:10:Ce:1a:12

4. Now we will assign the new IP address to VNIC and verfif that new IP for vnic01 is configured or not.

sun01# ipadm create-addr -T static -a local=10.135.0.3/24 vnic01

sun01# ifconfig vnic01

vnic01: flags=1000843 mtu 1500 index 8

        inet 10.135.0.3 netmask ffffff00 broadcast 10.135.0.255

        ether 2c:18:10:Ce:1a:12

5. In the final step we will try to run snoop on VNIC which we have create now. You can verify through snooping is that VNIC01 is working fine or not.

sun01# snoop -d vnic01

The same way you can create a multiple VNIC and assign a new IP address to it. Hope you got some idea about Solaris 11 networking part after reading this post. Please let me know if you have any doubt regarding this post.

Solaris zone: error: net0: failed to create VNIC: operation not supported

In this post, I will discuss with you one of the most interesting error which I am facing when I boot the local zone on Solaris 11.3. The description of this interesting issue as describe below.

Description of error:

!-[solaris]# zoneadm -z sun01 boot

zone 'sun01': error: net0: failed to create VNIC: operation not supported

zoneadm: zone sun01: call to zoneadmd(1M) failed: zoneadmd(1M

I have try to create and configure the  VNIC on Solaris 11.3 operating server but it get failed with the same error.

!-[solaris]#dladm create-vnic -l net0 vnic01

dladm: vnic creation failed: operation not supported

If you are also facing a such error while booting the local zone on solaris 11 server, then please use the below solution to resolve such issues.

Solution of error:

➥ This error "failed to create VNIC: operation not supported" would normally come when there are not enough mac addresses to assign to the zone. So now we need to add alternate mac addresses to the network interface.So before adding the new mac address we will stop LDM.

!-[solaris]#ldm list-domain

NAME            STATE     FLAGS  CONS   VCPU MEMORY  UTIL NORM UPTIME

primary         active    -n-cv- UART   8    8G      2.0% 2.0% 41d 20h 14m

0004fb0000060000ff1d3d8336112f6f active    -n---- 5001   50   64G     0.1% 0.1% 18h 23m

➥ Now log in to the Solaris global zone and check if net0 have additional MAC addresses or not. Please use the below command to check the status.

!-[solaris]# dladm show-phys -m

LINK               SLOT    ADDRESS           INUSE CLIENT

net0               primary 0:21:f6:d6:d3:e5  yes  net0

                   1       0:14:4f:f9:6d:8d  no   --

                   2       0:14:4f:fb:10:2b  no   --

                   3       0:14:4f:f9:41:d6  no   --

                   4       0:14:4f:f8:dd:c8  no   --

net1               primary 0:21:f6:51:be:4d  yes  net1

➥ Now zone will start without any issue, as we have assigned the new mac address to this zone.

!-[solaris]# zoneadm -z sun01 start

Please let me know if you are facing any issue regarding this error.