bridge/brctl/ip

bridge/brctl/ip

[Bert Vermeulen]

Hi all,

I'm wondering about the current userspace toolset to control bridging in
the Linux kernel. As far as I can determine, functionality is a bit
scattered right now between the iproute2 (ip, bridge) and bridge-utils
(brctl) tools:

- creating/deleting bridges: ip or brctl
- adding/deleting ports to/from bridge: brctl only
- showing bridge fdb: brctl (in-kernel fdb), bridge (hardware offloaded
  fdb) (!)
...and no doubt a few other things.

Also the brctl tool seems not to be getting updates, whereas the
iproute2 tools are of course updated regularly. Is brctl considered
obsolete?

If that is the case, would patches to add the missing functionality into
the bridge tool be welcome? I'm thinking primarily of creating/deleting
bridges, and adding/deleting ports in bridges.


-- 
Bert Vermeulen
bert@biot.com

Re: bridge/brctl/ip

[Andrew Lunn]

On Sat, Apr 02, 2016 at 09:26:55PM +0200, Bert Vermeulen wrote:
> Hi all,
> 
> I'm wondering about the current userspace toolset to control bridging in
> the Linux kernel. As far as I can determine, functionality is a bit
> scattered right now between the iproute2 (ip, bridge) and bridge-utils
> (brctl) tools:
> 
> - adding/deleting ports to/from bridge: brctl only

ip link set lan0 master br0

I think most of the normal operations can be done with iproute2.  What
might be missing is things like setting the forwarding delay, hello
time, etc.

   Andrew

Re: bridge/brctl/ip

[Nikolay Aleksandrov]

On 04/02/2016 09:26 PM, Bert Vermeulen wrote:
> Hi all,
> 
> I'm wondering about the current userspace toolset to control bridging in
> the Linux kernel. As far as I can determine, functionality is a bit
> scattered right now between the iproute2 (ip, bridge) and bridge-utils
> (brctl) tools:
> 
> - creating/deleting bridges: ip or brctl
> - adding/deleting ports to/from bridge: brctl only

ip link set dev ethX master bridgeY
ip link set dev ethX nomaster

> - showing bridge fdb: brctl (in-kernel fdb), bridge (hardware offloaded
>   fdb) (!)

bridge fdb show - shows all fdb entries, offloaded or not.

> ...and no doubt a few other things.
> 
> Also the brctl tool seems not to be getting updates, whereas the
> iproute2 tools are of course updated regularly. Is brctl considered
> obsolete?

iproute2 supports (almost, user-space stp?) everything now, there have been many recent
additions to the options that can be manipulated.
$ ip link set dev bridge0 type bridge help
Usage: ... bridge [ forward_delay FORWARD_DELAY ]
                  [ hello_time HELLO_TIME ]
                  [ max_age MAX_AGE ]
                  [ ageing_time AGEING_TIME ]
                  [ stp_state STP_STATE ]
                  [ priority PRIORITY ]
                  [ group_fwd_mask MASK ]
                  [ group_address ADDRESS ]
                  [ vlan_filtering VLAN_FILTERING ]
                  [ vlan_protocol VLAN_PROTOCOL ]
                  [ vlan_default_pvid VLAN_DEFAULT_PVID ]
                  [ mcast_snooping MULTICAST_SNOOPING ]
                  [ mcast_router MULTICAST_ROUTER ]
                  [ mcast_query_use_ifaddr MCAST_QUERY_USE_IFADDR ]
                  [ mcast_querier MULTICAST_QUERIER ]
                  [ mcast_hash_elasticity HASH_ELASTICITY ]
                  [ mcast_hash_max HASH_MAX ]
                  [ mcast_last_member_count LAST_MEMBER_COUNT ]
                  [ mcast_startup_query_count STARTUP_QUERY_COUNT ]
                  [ mcast_last_member_interval LAST_MEMBER_INTERVAL ]
                  [ mcast_membership_interval MEMBERSHIP_INTERVAL ]
                  [ mcast_querier_interval QUERIER_INTERVAL ]
                  [ mcast_query_interval QUERY_INTERVAL ]
                  [ mcast_query_response_interval QUERY_RESPONSE_INTERVAL ]
                  [ mcast_startup_query_interval STARTUP_QUERY_INTERVAL ]
                  [ nf_call_iptables NF_CALL_IPTABLES ]
                  [ nf_call_ip6tables NF_CALL_IP6TABLES ]
                  [ nf_call_arptables NF_CALL_ARPTABLES ]

Where: VLAN_PROTOCOL := { 802.1Q | 802.1ad }


> 
> If that is the case, would patches to add the missing functionality into
> the bridge tool be welcome? I'm thinking primarily of creating/deleting
> bridges, and adding/deleting ports in bridges.
> 
>