Re: [Xen-users] I want to create a network for my Xen VM and need help.

[Simon Hobson <linux@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Just to add, since it seems a common problem getting round some of the concepts 
...

Just consider the network if the guest were not virtualised, but a real 
machine, and the bridge were a real switch sat on your desktop. You'd need a 
means of configuring the networking on the "guest" (eg static config or DHCP), 
and a means of getting it's traffic to-from the outside world (typically by 
means of a router).

Now you are going to take those separate pieces of hardware and roll them up 
into a virtualised setup. The switch turns into a virtual switch (a bridge* in 
Linux networking terminology), the computer turns into a virtualised guest, and 
the router turns into ? At home I run a separate guest as a two port router, 
but you can put it's functions into the Dom0 config.

So from the PoV of the guest, it's just connected to a network switch. Nothing 
magical changes, and it's IP config is managed in just the same way as the real 
machine.
From the PoV of the bridge, it's just a network switch with two devices 
connected (Dom0 and the guest when doing routing/NAT in Dom0).


* Over the years the terminology has changed a bit, a "switch" is (in 
1980s/1990s terminology) a "multiport network bridge", and back then such 
devices were a) very very expensive, and b) had very few ports, and ... c) few 
people had a clue what they did (myself included back then).


_______________________________________________
Xen-users mailing list
Xen-users@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
http://lists.xen.org/xen-users