Provided by: openvswitch-testcontroller_2.17.9-0ubuntu0.22.04.1_amd64 bug

NAME

       ovs-testcontroller - simple OpenFlow controller for testing

SYNOPSIS

       ovs-testcontroller [options] method [method]...

DESCRIPTION

       ovs-testcontroller  is  a  simple  OpenFlow controller that manages any number of switches
       over the OpenFlow protocol, causing them to function as L2 MAC-learning switches or  hubs.
       It  is  suitable  for  initial  testing  of  OpenFlow  networks.  It is not a necessary or
       desirable part of a production OpenFlow deployment.

       ovs-testcontroller controls one or more OpenFlow switches, specified as one or more of the
       following OpenFlow connection methods:

              pssl:[port][:host]
              ptcp:[port][:host]
                     Listens  for  OpenFlow  connections  on port.  The default port is 6653.  By
                     default, connections are allowed from any IPv4 address.  Specify host as  an
                     IPv4  address or a bracketed IPv6 address (e.g. ptcp:6653:[::1]).  On Linux,
                     use %device to  designate  a  scope  for  IPv6  link-level  addresses,  e.g.
                     ptcp:6653:[fe80::1234%eth0].   DNS  names  can be used if built with unbound
                     library.  For pssl, the --private-key,--certificate, and  --ca-cert  options
                     are mandatory.

              punix:file
                     Listens  for  OpenFlow  connections  on  the Unix domain server socket named
                     file.

              ssl:host[:port]
              tcp:host[:port]
                     The specified port on the given host, which can be expressed either as a DNS
                     name  (if  built  with  unbound  library)  or  an IP address in IPv4 or IPv6
                     address  format.    Wrap   IPv6   addresses   in   square   brackets,   e.g.
                     tcp:[::1]:6653.   On  Linux, use %device to designate a scope for IPv6 link-
                     level   addresses,   e.g.   tcp:[fe80::1234%eth0]:6653.    For   ssl,    the
                     --private-key, --certificate, and --ca-cert options are mandatory.

                     If port is not specified, it defaults to 6653.

              unix:file
                     On POSIX, a Unix domain server socket named file.

                     On  Windows,  connect  to  a  local named pipe that is represented by a file
                     created in the path file to mimic the behavior of a Unix domain socket.

OPTIONS

       -n
       --noflow
              By default, ovs-testcontroller sets up a flow in each OpenFlow switch  whenever  it
              receives a packet whose destination is known due through MAC learning.  This option
              disables flow setup, so that  every  packet  in  the  network  passes  through  the
              controller.

              This  option is most useful for debugging.  It reduces switching performance, so it
              should not be used in production.

       --max-idle=secs|permanent
              Sets secs as the number of seconds that a flow set up by the controller will remain
              in  the  switch's flow table without any matching packets being seen.  If permanent
              is specified, which is not recommended, flows will never expire.  The default is 60
              seconds.

              This  option  has no effect when -n (or --noflow) is in use (because the controller
              does not set up flows in that case).

       -H
       --hub  By default, the controller acts as an L2 MAC-learning switch.  This option  changes
              its behavior to that of a hub that floods packets on all but the incoming port.

              If -H (or --hub) and -n (or --noflow) are used together, then the cumulative effect
              is that every packet passes through the controller and every packet is flooded.

              This option is most useful for debugging.  It reduces switching performance, so  it
              should not be used in production.

       -w[wildcard_mask]
       --wildcards[=wildcard_mask]
              By default, ovs-testcontroller sets up exact-match flows.  This option allows it to
              set up wildcarded flows, which may  reduce  flow  setup  latency  by  causing  less
              traffic to be sent up to the controller.

              The  optional  wildcard_mask  is  an  OpenFlow wildcard bitmask in hexadecimal that
              specifies the fields to wildcard.  If no wildcard_mask is  specified,  the  default
              value  0x2820F0  is  used which specifies L2-only switching and wildcards L3 and L4
              fields.  Another interesting value is 0x2000EC, which specifies  L3-only  switching
              and wildcards L2 and L4 fields.

              This  option  has no effect when -n (or --noflow) is in use (because the controller
              does not set up flows in that case).

       -N
       --normal
              By default, ovs-testcontroller directs packets to a particular port or floods them.
              This  option  causes  it  to direct non-flooded packets to the OpenFlow OFPP_NORMAL
              port.  This allows the switch itself to make decisions about  packet  destinations.
              Support  for  OFPP_NORMAL is optional in OpenFlow, so this option may not well with
              some non-Open vSwitch switches.

       --mute Prevents ovs-testcontroller from replying to any OpenFlow messages sent  to  it  by
              switches.

              This  option is only for debugging the Open vSwitch implementation of ``fail open''
              mode.  It must not be used in production.

       -q id
       --queue=id
              By default, ovs-testcontroller uses the default OpenFlow queue for sending  packets
              and  setting up flows.  Use one of these options, supplying id as an OpenFlow queue
              ID as a decimal number, to instead use that specific queue.

              This option is incompatible with -N or --normal and with -H or --hub.  If more than
              one is specified then this option takes precedence.

              This option may be useful for testing or debugging quality of service setups.

       -Q port-name:queue-id

       --port-queue port-name:queue-id
              Configures packets received on the port named port-name (e.g. eth0) to be output on
              OpenFlow queue ID queue-id (specified as a  decimal  number).   For  the  specified
              port, this option overrides the default specified on -q or --queue.

              This  option  may  be  specified  any  number  of  times  with  different port-name
              arguments.

              This option is incompatible with -N or --normal and with -H or --hub.  If more than
              one is specified then this option takes precedence.

              This option may be useful for testing or debugging quality of service setups.

       --with-flows file
              When  a  switch connects, push the flow entries as described in file.  Each line in
              file is a flow entry in the format described for the add-flows command in the  Flow
              Syntax section of the ovs-ofctl(8) man page.

              Use this option more than once to add flows from multiple files.

   Public Key Infrastructure Options
       -p privkey.pem
       --private-key=privkey.pem
              Specifies  a  PEM  file  containing  the  private  key used as ovs-testcontroller's
              identity for outgoing SSL connections.

       -c cert.pem
       --certificate=cert.pem
              Specifies a PEM file containing  a  certificate  that  certifies  the  private  key
              specified on -p or --private-key to be trustworthy.  The certificate must be signed
              by the certificate authority (CA) that the peer in  SSL  connections  will  use  to
              verify it.

       -C cacert.pem
       --ca-cert=cacert.pem
              Specifies  a  PEM file containing the CA certificate that ovs-testcontroller should
              use to verify certificates presented to it by SSL peers.  (This  may  be  the  same
              certificate  that  SSL  peers  use  to  verify  the  certificate specified on -c or
              --certificate, or it may be a different one, depending on the PKI design in use.)

       -C none
       --ca-cert=none
              Disables verification of certificates presented by SSL peers.   This  introduces  a
              security risk, because it means that certificates cannot be verified to be those of
              known trusted hosts.

       --peer-ca-cert=peer-cacert.pem
              Specifies a PEM file that contains one or more additional certificates to  send  to
              SSL   peers.    peer-cacert.pem   should   be  the  CA  certificate  used  to  sign
              ovs-testcontroller's own certificate, that is, the certificate specified on  -c  or
              --certificate.    If   ovs-testcontroller's   certificate   is   self-signed,  then
              --certificate and --peer-ca-cert should specify the same file.

              This option is not useful in normal operation, because the SSL  peer  must  already
              have the CA certificate for the peer to have any confidence in ovs-testcontroller's
              identity.  However, this offers a way for a new installation to  bootstrap  the  CA
              certificate on its first SSL connection.

   Daemon Options
       The following options are valid on POSIX based platforms.

       --pidfile[=pidfile]
              Causes a file (by default, ovs-testcontroller.pid) to be created indicating the PID
              of the running process.  If the pidfile argument is not specified, or  if  it  does
              not begin with /, then it is created in /var/run/openvswitch.

              If --pidfile is not specified, no pidfile is created.

       --overwrite-pidfile
              By  default,  when  --pidfile is specified and the specified pidfile already exists
              and is locked by a running process, ovs-testcontroller refuses to  start.   Specify
              --overwrite-pidfile to cause it to instead overwrite the pidfile.

              When --pidfile is not specified, this option has no effect.

       --detach
              Runs  ovs-testcontroller  as  a  background process.  The process forks, and in the
              child it starts a new session, closes the standard file descriptors (which has  the
              side effect of disabling logging to the console), and changes its current directory
              to the root (unless --no-chdir  is  specified).   After  the  child  completes  its
              initialization, the parent exits.

       --monitor
              Creates  an  additional  process  to monitor the ovs-testcontroller daemon.  If the
              daemon dies due to a signal that indicates a programming error  (SIGABRT,  SIGALRM,
              SIGBUS,  SIGFPE,  SIGILL,  SIGPIPE,  SIGSEGV, SIGXCPU, or SIGXFSZ) then the monitor
              process starts a new copy of it.  If the daemon dies or exits for  another  reason,
              the monitor process exits.

              This option is normally used with --detach, but it also functions without it.

       --no-chdir
              By  default,  when  --detach  is  specified, ovs-testcontroller changes its current
              working directory to the root directory after  it  detaches.   Otherwise,  invoking
              ovs-testcontroller   from   a   carelessly   chosen  directory  would  prevent  the
              administrator from unmounting the file system that holds that directory.

              Specifying --no-chdir suppresses this behavior, preventing ovs-testcontroller  from
              changing  its  current  working  directory.  This may be useful for collecting core
              files, since it is common behavior to write core dumps  into  the  current  working
              directory and the root directory is not a good directory to use.

              This option has no effect when --detach is not specified.

       --no-self-confinement
              By  default  daemon  will try to self-confine itself to work with files under well-
              known directories determined during build.  It is better to stick with this default
              behavior  and  not  to  use  this  flag unless some other Access Control is used to
              confine daemon.  Note that in contrast to other access control implementations that
              are  typically  enforced  from  kernel-space (e.g. DAC or MAC), self-confinement is
              imposed from the user-space daemon itself and hence should not be considered  as  a
              full  confinement  strategy, but instead should be viewed as an additional layer of
              security.

       --user Causes ovs-testcontroller to run as a different  user  specified  in  "user:group",
              thus dropping most of the root privileges. Short forms "user" and ":group" are also
              allowed, with current user or group are assumed respectively. Only daemons  started
              by the root user accepts this argument.

              On  Linux,  daemons  will  be granted CAP_IPC_LOCK and CAP_NET_BIND_SERVICES before
              dropping  root  privileges.  Daemons  that  interact  with  a  datapath,  such   as
              ovs-vswitchd,  will be granted three additional capabilities, namely CAP_NET_ADMIN,
              CAP_NET_BROADCAST and CAP_NET_RAW.  The capability change will apply  even  if  the
              new user is root.

              On  Windows,  this  option  is  not  currently  supported.  For  security  reasons,
              specifying this option will cause the daemon process not to start.

       -v[spec]
       --verbose=[spec]
              Sets logging levels.  Without any spec, sets the log level  for  every  module  and
              destination  to  dbg.   Otherwise,  spec  is a list of words separated by spaces or
              commas or colons, up to one from each category below:

              •      A valid module name, as displayed by the vlog/list command on ovs-appctl(8),
                     limits the log level change to the specified module.

              •      syslog,  console,  or  file,  to  limit  the log level change to only to the
                     system log, to the console, or to a file,  respectively.   (If  --detach  is
                     specified,  ovs-testcontroller  closes  its  standard  file  descriptors, so
                     logging to the console will have no effect.)

                     On Windows platform, syslog is accepted as a word and is only  useful  along
                     with the --syslog-target option (the word has no effect otherwise).

              •      off,  emer,  err, warn, info, or dbg, to control the log level.  Messages of
                     the given severity or higher will be logged, and messages of lower  severity
                     will  be filtered out.  off filters out all messages.  See ovs-appctl(8) for
                     a definition of each log level.

              Case is not significant within spec.

              Regardless of the log levels set for file, logging to a file will  not  take  place
              unless --log-file is also specified (see below).

              For  compatibility with older versions of OVS, any is accepted as a word but has no
              effect.

       -v
       --verbose
              Sets the maximum logging verbosity level, equivalent to --verbose=dbg.

       -vPATTERN:destination:pattern
       --verbose=PATTERN:destination:pattern
              Sets the log pattern for destination to pattern.   Refer  to  ovs-appctl(8)  for  a
              description of the valid syntax for pattern.

       -vFACILITY:facility
       --verbose=FACILITY:facility
              Sets  the  RFC5424  facility of the log message. facility can be one of kern, user,
              mail, daemon, auth, syslog, lpr, news, uucp, clock, ftp, ntp, audit, alert, clock2,
              local0, local1, local2, local3, local4, local5, local6 or local7. If this option is
              not specified, daemon is used as the default for the local system syslog and local0
              is  used  while  sending  a  message to the target provided via the --syslog-target
              option.

       --log-file[=file]
              Enables logging to a file.  If file is specified, then it is used as the exact name
              for  the  log  file.   The  default  log  file  name  used  if  file  is omitted is
              /var/log/openvswitch/ovs-testcontroller.log.

       --syslog-target=host:port
              Send syslog messages to UDP port on host, in addition to the  system  syslog.   The
              host must be a numerical IP address, not a hostname.

       --syslog-method=method
              Specify  method  how  syslog  messages  should be sent to syslog daemon.  Following
              forms are supported:

              •      libc, use libc syslog() function.  Downside of using this  options  is  that
                     libc  adds  fixed  prefix to every message before it is actually sent to the
                     syslog daemon over /dev/log UNIX domain socket.

              •      unix:file, use UNIX domain socket  directly.   It  is  possible  to  specify
                     arbitrary  message format with this option.  However, rsyslogd 8.9 and older
                     versions use hard coded parser  function  anyway  that  limits  UNIX  domain
                     socket use.  If you want to use arbitrary message format with older rsyslogd
                     versions, then use UDP socket to localhost IP address instead.

              •      udp:ip:port, use UDP socket.   With  this  method  it  is  possible  to  use
                     arbitrary  message  format  also  with  older rsyslogd.  When sending syslog
                     messages over UDP socket extra precaution needs to be  taken  into  account,
                     for example, syslog daemon needs to be configured to listen on the specified
                     UDP port, accidental iptables rules could be interfering with  local  syslog
                     traffic  and  there  are  some  security  considerations  that  apply to UDP
                     sockets, but do not apply to UNIX domain sockets.

              •      null, discards all messages logged to syslog.

              The default is taken from the OVS_SYSLOG_METHOD  environment  variable;  if  it  is
              unset, the default is libc.

       --unixctl=socket
              Sets the name of the control socket on which ovs-testcontroller listens for runtime
              management commands (see RUNTIME MANAGEMENT COMMANDS, below).  If socket  does  not
              begin  with /, it is interpreted as relative to /var/run/openvswitch.  If --unixctl
              is      not      used      at      all,      the      default       socket       is
              /var/run/openvswitch/ovs-testcontroller.pid.ctl,  where pid is ovs-testcontroller's
              process ID.

              On Windows a local named pipe is used to listen for runtime management commands.  A
              file  is  created  in the absolute path as pointed by socket or if --unixctl is not
              used at all,  a  file  is  created  as  ovs-testcontroller.ctl  in  the  configured
              OVS_RUNDIR  directory.  The file exists just to mimic the behavior of a Unix domain
              socket.

              Specifying none for socket disables the control socket feature.

       -h
       --help Prints a brief help message to the console.

       -V
       --version
              Prints version information to the console.

       -O [version[,version]...]
       --protocols=[version[,version]...]
              Sets the OpenFlow protocol versions that are allowed when establishing an  OpenFlow
              session.

              These protocol versions are enabled by default:

              •      OpenFlow10, for OpenFlow 1.0.
       The  following protocol versions are generally supported, but for compatibility with older
       versions of Open vSwitch they are not enabled by default:

              •      OpenFlow11, for OpenFlow 1.1.

              •      OpenFlow12, for OpenFlow 1.2.

              •      OpenFlow13, for OpenFlow 1.3.

              •      OpenFlow14, for OpenFlow 1.4.

              •      OpenFlow15, for OpenFlow 1.5.

EXAMPLES

       To bind locally to port 6653 (the default) and wait for incoming connections from OpenFlow
       switches:

              % ovs-testcontroller ptcp:

BUGS

       Configuring  a  Citrix  XenServer  to  connect  to a particular controller only points the
       remote OVSDB management connection  to  that  controller.   It  does  not  also  configure
       OpenFlow  connections,  because  the  manager  is  expected to do that over the management
       protocol.  ovs-testcontroller is not an Open vSwitch manager and does not know how  to  do
       that.

       As  a  stopgap  workaround,  ovs-vsctl  can  wait  for  an  OVSDB  connection  and set the
       controller, e.g.:

              %    ovs-vsctl     -t0     --db=pssl:     --certificate=cert.pem     --ca-cert=none
              --private-key=privkey.pem --peer-ca-cert=cacert.pem set-controller ssl:ip

SEE ALSO

       ovs-appctl(8), ovs-ofctl(8), ovs-dpctl(8)