Networking
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- Bruno Miretti (Deactivated)
- Kirill Nikolaev (Unlicensed)
Table of Contents
General description
CHARON-AXP supports emulation of the following network adapters:
- DE435
- DE450
- DE500AA
- DE500BA
- DE602
- DE602AA
Each of them is a PCI Ethernet adapter based on the DEC21040 (DE435, DE450, DE500AA and DE500BA) and the Intel i8255x (DE602 and DE602AA) PCI Ethernet adapter chips for the HP Alpha.
CHARON Virtual Machine (VM) maps the virtual adapter to a dedicated Ethernet adapter in the Windows host system.
All the emulated controllers are loaded and configured in the same way.
The Ethernet adapter in the Windows host system must support dynamic changes of its MAC address (i.e. no reboot of the host system is required to change the MAC address), which is the case with nearly all modern Ethernet adapters.
By default the PCI Ethernet adapters use first available PCI slot. If instead some particular slot is needed, refer to this section for details of specific placement of PCI peripherals on CHARON VM PCI bus.
Configuration steps
To configure CHARON VM networking, follow these 3 steps:
Load network adapter (if required)
Use the "load" command as shown below.
Example:For DEC21040 adapters For Intel i8255x adapters load DE500BA/dec21x4x NICload DE602/i8255x NIC By default each loaded virtual network adapter uses first available PCI slot. If instead some particular slot is neded, refer to this section for details of specific placement of PCI peripherals on CHARON VM PCI bus.In AlphaStation 400 configuration use the following syntax for network adapter loading:
load DE500AA/dec21x4x NIC irq_bus = isa
.Load "packet_port"
Load "packet_port" to connect network adapter to the host hardware network card (or to a virtual network interface).
Example:load packet_port/chnetwrk NDIS interface = "connection:Charon".
Connect the loaded "packet_port" to the loaded virtual network adapter
Connect the network adapter to the "packet_port" by setting the interface name.
Example:set NIC interface = NDIS.
The interface name can be either "(disabled)" for a disabled interface or "connection:<Windows network interface name>"
Examples:
load packet_port/chnetwrk NIC1 interface="(disabled)"load packet_port/chnetwrk
The AlphaServer DS15 and DS25 contain two built-in PCI Ethernet adapters. Models and names (EI* or EW*) of them depend on configuration addon. Choose one of the two or none, but not both. The first instantiates onboard network interfaces as EIA and EWA. While the second - EWA and EWB (enabled by default for backward compatibility)
Example:
#include ds25-onboard-nics.icfginclude ds25-onboard-nics-ew.icfg
Specification of "chnetwrk" is not mandatory, but it is still used for compatibility
Configuration parameters
Each virtual network controller has the following parameters that are specified with the "set" command:
interface
| Parameter | interface |
|---|---|
| Type | Text string. |
| Value | Name of the corresponding instance of the "packet_port" component |
station_address
| Parameter | station_address |
|---|---|
| Type | Text String |
| Value | The "station_address" provides the ability to configure the adapter’s permanent address. By default the adapter’s permanent address is read from the host system’s NIC. Format:
or
Example:
|
rx_fifo_size
| Parameter | rx_fifo_size |
|---|---|
| Type | Numeric |
| Value | "rx_fifo_size" sets the receive FIFO size. The value is specified in Kb and, by default, is pre-calculated from the connected port’s size of the receive queue. Typically, you do not need to change the "rx_fifo_size" parameter. It is available for extended tuning and debugging purposes. |
adapter_mode
| Parameter | adapter_mode |
|---|---|
| Type | Text String |
| Value | Assigns the link speed and the duplex settings of the virtual network adapter (except for DE602/DE602AA - see DE602 and DE602AA network adapters link speed and duplex settings). The values are:
Example:
Please note that this parameter controls only the setting which the emulated network adapter reports to the guest operating system running on CHARON VM. It does not change any settings of the host adapter mapped to the virtual adapter! In case if the settings of the host adapter have to be changed please refer to the host Operating System User's Guide for details on how to do it. In case if "Auto" value is set CHARON VM collects the settings from the mapped host network adapter directly, assuming that all speeds above 100Mbps are represented as 100Mbps (maximum value). The resulting duplex setting corresponds to the duplex setting of the mapped host network adapter. |
Example
|
DE602 and DE602AA network adapters link speed and duplex settings
Regardless of the "adapter_mode" setting in CHARON VM configuration file (see above), DE602 and DE602AA network adapters remains in "Auto-negotiation" mode, since the EIDRIVER of OpenVMS checks for EIx0_MODE environment variable when configuring the network card.
So mode propagation is implemented in CHARON-AXP via SRM console EIx0_MODE environment variable ("x" is A, B, C... depending on CHARON VM configuration), for example:
|
The EIx0_MODE variable name is case insensitive, while its values are case sensitive! This is feature of OpenVMS EIDRIVER.
The values are:
| Parameter | Description |
|---|---|
| "Auto" | Auto-negotiate (default) |
| "Twisted" | 10Mbps half duplex |
| "Full" | 10Mbps full duplex |
| "Fast" | 100Mbps half duplex |
| "FastFD" | 100Mbps full duplex |
Example:
>>>set eia0_mode FastFD |
Please note that EIx0_MODE environment variable controls only the setting which the emulated network adapter reports to the guest operating system running on CHARON VM. It does not change any settings of the host adapter mapped to the virtual adapter! In case if the settings of the host adapter have to be changed please refer to the host Operating System User's Guide for details on how to do it.
In case if "Auto" value is set CHARON VM collects the settings from the mapped host network adapter directly, assuming that all speeds above 100Mbps are represented as 100Mbps (maximum value). The resulting duplex setting corresponds to the duplex setting of the mapped host network adapter.
Packet Port
The CHARON-specific "packet_port" interface establishes a connection between an Ethernet adapter in the Windows host system and a network adapter in the virtual HP Alpha system.
For every virtual adapter instance loaded, one dedicated host Ethernet physical adapter is required.
To create instances of the "packet_port", use the “load” command in the configuration file as follows:
load packet_port/chnetwrk <instance-name> |
Example:
load packet_port/chnetwrk NDIS |
"packet_port" uses several configuration parameters to control its behavior.
interface
| Parameter | interface |
|---|---|
| Type | Text string |
| Value | This parameter identifies an Ethernet adapter of the host system dedicated to CHARON VM. The leading keyword " Syntax:
Example:
|
port_enable_mac_addr_change
| Parameter | port_enable_mac_addr_change |
|---|---|
| Type | Boolean |
| Value | If "true" is specified (default value), CHARON VM sets the appropriate Ethernet address automatically. If "false" is specified, set the Ethernet address manually. Example:
|
port_retry_on_tx
| Parameter | port_retry_on_tx |
|---|---|
| Type | Numeric |
| Value | The "port_retry_on_tx" parameter controls the number of times a port will attempt to transmit a packet before giving up. By default, the value is 3. Increasing this value may introduce problems in carrier loss logic, because not all NIC drivers support a carrier status query. Typically, you do not need to increase the value. Example:
|
port_pending_rx_number
| Parameter | port_pending_rx_number |
|---|---|
| Type | Numeric |
| Value | The "port_pending_rx_number" parameter sets the number of pending receive buffers. The default value is 63. The maximum value allowed is 195. You may want to increase the "port_pending_rx_number" when you have very busy networking and experience problems like losing connections not related to the carrier loss. Typically, you do not need to change this parameter. Example:
|
port_pending_tx_number
| Parameter | port_pending_tx_number |
|---|---|
| Type | Numeric |
| Value | The "port_pending_tx_number" parameter sets the number of buffers the port uses to transmit. The default value is 62. You may want to increase the "port_pending_tx_number" value if the log file indicates dropped TX packets due to TX queue overflow. Typically, you do not need to change this parameter. Example:
|
suspend_msg_on_mac_change
| Parameter | suspend_msg_on_mac_change |
|---|---|
| Type | Boolean |
| Value | To avoid confusion arising from non critical errors during a MAC address change, logging is by default suppressed (default value is "true"). To enable tracing during a MAC address change set this parameter to "false" Example:
|
log
| Parameter | log |
|---|---|
| Type | Text string |
| Value | If this parameter is set to some valid file name or a directory where the log files for each individual session will be stored CHARON VM logs Recv and Xmit packets at the emulated port layer. If an existing directory is specified, CHARON VM automatically enables creation of individual log files, one for each session using the same scheme as used for the generation of the rotating log files. If the "log" parameter is omitted, CHARON VM does not create log. In certain situations enabling this parameter may help to detect loss of packets. Example 1:
Example 2:
Only existing directory can be used as a value of the "log" parameter. |
log_flush_period
| Parameter | log_flush_period |
|---|---|
| Type | Numeric |
| Value |
Defines a period of flushing log to disk. Default period is 60 seconds (it means that every manite log file is flushed to disk) Examples:
|
legacy_mode
| Parameter | legacy_mode |
|---|---|
| Type | Boolean |
| Value | If this parameter is set to "true" CHARON VM tries to use very first implementation of "packet_port" having certain restrictions such as inability to automatically change MAC address on given interface etc. This setting may be needed if CHARON VM runs in VMware environment for example and you do not want to allow promiscuous mode. In other situations please do not change its default value ("false"). Example:
This parameter is required only if you do not want to allow promiscuous traffic for the VMware adapter/port. In this mode, CHARON VM uses legacy MAC address change logic, so use of this option is not desirable. Thus for ESXi networking configuration:
TruCluster alias vMAC option may not operate correctly in combination with "legacy_mode=true" when host is VMware virtual machine. This is because vMAC option sets adapter to promiscuous mode which does not seem operating correctly on VMware adapters. |
Example
CHARON-AXP supports VLAN adapters. If for some reasons you are going to use them, proceed with their installation and configuration according to the network adapter's vendor's User's Guide and then use the resulting VLAN interface the same way as the regular network interface.
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