Configuring an additional network

As a cluster administrator, you can configure an additional network for your cluster. The following network types are supported:

• Bridge

• Host device

• IPVLAN

• MACVLAN

Approaches to managing an additional network

You can manage the life cycle of an additional network by two approaches. Each approach is mutually exclusive and you can only use one approach for managing an additional network at a time. For either approach, the additional network is managed by a Container Network Interface (CNI) plugin that you configure.

For an additional network, IP addresses are provisioned through an IP Address Management (IPAM) CNI plugin that you configure as part of the additional network. The IPAM plugin supports a variety of IP address assignment approaches including DHCP and static assignment.

• Modify the Cluster Network Operator (CNO) configuration: The CNO automatically creates and manages the NetworkAttachmentDefinition object. In addition to managing the object lifecycle the CNO ensures a DHCP is available for an additional network that uses a DHCP assigned IP address.

• Applying a YAML manifest: You can manage the additional network directly by creating an NetworkAttachmentDefinition object. This approach allows for the chaining of CNI plugins.

Configuration for an additional network attachment

An additional network is configured by using the NetworkAttachmentDefinition API in the k8s.cni.cncf.io API group.

The configuration for the API is described in the following table:

Configuration of an additional network through the Cluster Network Operator

The configuration for an additional network attachment is specified as part of the Cluster Network Operator (CNO) configuration.

The following YAML describes the configuration parameters for managing an additional network with the CNO:

Cluster Network Operator configuration

apiVersion: operator.openshift.io/v1
kind: Network
metadata:
  name: cluster
spec:
  # ...
  additionalNetworks: (1)
  - name: <name> (2)
    namespace: <namespace> (3)
    rawCNIConfig: |- (4)
      {
        ...
      }
    type: Raw

Configuration of an additional network from a YAML manifest

The configuration for an additional network is specified from a YAML configuration file, such as in the following example:

apiVersion: k8s.cni.cncf.io/v1
kind: NetworkAttachmentDefinition
metadata:
  name: <name> (1)
spec:
  config: |- (2)
    {
      ...
    }

Configurations for additional network types

The specific configuration fields for additional networks is described in the following sections.

Configuration for a bridge additional network

The following object describes the configuration parameters for the bridge CNI plugin:

bridge configuration example

The following example configures an additional network named bridge-net:

{
  "cniVersion": "0.3.1",
  "name": "work-network",
  "type": "bridge",
  "isGateway": true,
  "vlan": 2,
  "ipam": {
    "type": "dhcp"
    }
}

Configuration for a host device additional network

The following object describes the configuration parameters for the host-device CNI plugin:

host-device configuration example

The following example configures an additional network named hostdev-net:

{
  "cniVersion": "0.3.1",
  "name": "work-network",
  "type": "host-device",
  "device": "eth1"
}

Configuration for an IPVLAN additional network

The following object describes the configuration parameters for the IPVLAN CNI plugin:

ipvlan configuration example

The following example configures an additional network named ipvlan-net:

{
  "cniVersion": "0.3.1",
  "name": "work-network",
  "type": "ipvlan",
  "master": "eth1",
  "mode": "l3",
  "ipam": {
    "type": "static",
    "addresses": [
       {
         "address": "192.168.10.10/24"
       }
    ]
  }
}

Configuration for a MACVLAN additional network

The following object describes the configuration parameters for the macvlan CNI plugin:

macvlan configuration example

The following example configures an additional network named macvlan-net:

{
  "cniVersion": "0.3.1",
  "name": "macvlan-net",
  "type": "macvlan",
  "master": "eth1",
  "mode": "bridge",
  "ipam": {
    "type": "dhcp"
    }
}

Configuration of IP address assignment for an additional network

The IP address management (IPAM) Container Network Interface (CNI) plugin provides IP addresses for other CNI plugins.

You can use the following IP address assignment types:

• Static assignment.

• Dynamic assignment through a DHCP server. The DHCP server you specify must be reachable from the additional network.

• Dynamic assignment through the Whereabouts IPAM CNI plugin.

Static IP address assignment configuration

The following table describes the configuration for static IP address assignment:

The addresses array requires objects with the following fields:

Static IP address assignment configuration example

{
  "ipam": {
    "type": "static",
      "addresses": [
        {
          "address": "191.168.1.7/24"
        }
      ]
  }
}

Dynamic IP address (DHCP) assignment configuration

The following JSON describes the configuration for dynamic IP address address assignment with DHCP.

apiVersion: operator.openshift.io/v1
kind: Network
metadata:
  name: cluster
spec:
  additionalNetworks:
  - name: dhcp-shim
    namespace: default
    type: Raw
    rawCNIConfig: |-
      {
        “name”: “dhcp-shim”,
        “cniVersion”: “0.3.1”,
        “type”: “bridge”,
        “ipam”: {
          “type”: “dhcp”
        }
      }
  # …

Dynamic IP address (DHCP) assignment configuration example

{
  "ipam": {
    "type": "dhcp"
  }
}

Dynamic IP address assignment configuration with Whereabouts

The Whereabouts CNI plugin allows the dynamic assignment of an IP address to an additional network without the use of a DHCP server.

The following table describes the configuration for dynamic IP address assignment with Whereabouts:

Dynamic IP address assignment configuration example that uses Whereabouts

{
  "ipam": {
    "type": "whereabouts",
    "range": "192.0.2.192/27",
    "exclude": [
       "192.0.2.192/30",
       "192.0.2.196/32"
    ]
  }
}

Creating an additional network attachment with the Cluster Network Operator

The Cluster Network Operator (CNO) manages additional network definitions. When you specify an additional network to create, the CNO creates the NetworkAttachmentDefinition object automatically.

Prerequisites

• Install the OpenShift CLI (oc).

• Log in as a user with cluster-admin privileges.

Procedure

1. Optional: Create the namespace for the additional networks:

   $ oc create namespace <namespace_name>

2. To edit the CNO configuration, enter the following command:

   $ oc edit networks.operator.openshift.io cluster

3. Modify the CR that you are creating by adding the configuration for the additional network that you are creating, as in the following example CR.

   apiVersion: operator.openshift.io/v1
   kind: Network
   metadata:
     name: cluster
   spec:
     # ...
     additionalNetworks:
     - name: tertiary-net
       namespace: namespace2
       type: Raw
       rawCNIConfig: |-
         {
           "cniVersion": "0.3.1",
           "name": "tertiary-net",
           "type": "ipvlan",
           "master": "eth1",
           "mode": "l2",
           "ipam": {
             "type": "static",
             "addresses": [
               {
                 "address": "192.168.1.23/24"
               }
             ]
           }
         }

4. Save your changes and quit the text editor to commit your changes.

Verification

• Confirm that the CNO created the NetworkAttachmentDefinition object by running the following command. There might be a delay before the CNO creates the object.

  $ oc get network-attachment-definitions -n <namespace>

  where:

  <namespace>

  Specifies the namespace for the network attachment that you added to the CNO configuration.

  Example output

  NAME                 AGE
  test-network-1       14m

Creating an additional network attachment by applying a YAML manifest

Prerequisites

• Install the OpenShift CLI (oc).

• Log in as a user with cluster-admin privileges.

Procedure

1. Create a YAML file with your additional network configuration, such as in the following example:

   apiVersion: k8s.cni.cncf.io/v1
   kind: NetworkAttachmentDefinition
   metadata:
     name: next-net
   spec:
     config: |-
       {
         "cniVersion": "0.3.1",
         "name": "work-network",
         "type": "host-device",
         "device": "eth1",
         "ipam": {
           "type": "dhcp"
         }
       }

2. To create the additional network, enter the following command:

   $ oc apply -f <file>.yaml

   where:

   <file>

   Specifies the name of the file contained the YAML manifest.