Os-net-config is a simple tool to configure networking of Linux hosts. Combined with Cloud-init, it’s suitable for network configuration of virtual machines when booting in the cloud. Let’s take a closer look at os-net-config.

Os-net-config is developed as a part of the OpenStack TripleO project. Its modus operandi is simple: based on the YAML/JSON configuration file, the os-net-config configures the network interfaces of the machine. Currently, the tool supports configuration of Debian based distributions using /etc/network/interfaces and configuration of distributions using scripts in /etc/sysconfig/network directory, e.g. Red Hat. Os-net-config allows the user to:

1. Assign IP addresses to interfaces
2. Define static routes
3. Create VLAN subinterfaces
4. Create OVS bridges
5. Create OVS bonds (not implemented on Debian)

Using os-net-config on Red Hat

In the following examples we’ll use RHEL7 and os-net-config version 0.1.4. By default, os-net-config reads the configuration file at /etc/os-net-config/config.yaml. However, you can specify a different location using the -c parameter. The first example shows a configuration of machine with two network interfaces. The first interface is dynamically configured using DHCP. The second interface has been assigned an IP address and netmask statically:

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network_config:
  - type: interface
    name: nic1
    use_dhcp: true

  - type: interface
    name: nic2
    addresses:
      - ip_netmask: 192.168.1.1/24

To apply the above network configuration to your machine you can run:

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$ os-net-config -c example1.yaml

On my machine, os-net-config created four configuration files in the /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts directory:

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# This file is autogenerated by os-net-config
DEVICE=eth0
ONBOOT=yes
HOTPLUG=no
NM_CONTROLLED=no
BOOTPROTO=dhcp

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# This file is autogenerated by os-net-config
DEVICE=eth1
ONBOOT=yes
HOTPLUG=no
NM_CONTROLLED=no
BOOTPROTO=static
IPADDR=192.168.1.1
NETMASK=255.255.255.0

In addition to the above interface configuration files, two empty files route-eth0 and route-eth1 have been created. These files would be populated in the case that I would define some static routes in my network configuration.

In the second example, we’ll bond two network interfaces and plug this bond into an OVS bridge. The os-net-config YAML configuration looks like this:

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network_config:
  - type: ovs_bridge
    name: bridge1
    use_dhcp: true
    members:
       - type: ovs_bond
         name: bond1
         members:
           - type: interface
             name: nic1
           - type: interface
             name: nic2

And here is the listing of the network configuration files generated by os-net-config based on the above input:

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# This file is autogenerated by os-net-config
DEVICE=eth0
ONBOOT=yes
HOTPLUG=no
NM_CONTROLLED=no
BOOTPROTO=none

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# This file is autogenerated by os-net-config
DEVICE=eth1
ONBOOT=yes
HOTPLUG=no
NM_CONTROLLED=no
BOOTPROTO=none

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# This file is autogenerated by os-net-config
DEVICE=bond1
ONBOOT=yes
HOTPLUG=no
NM_CONTROLLED=no
DEVICETYPE=ovs
TYPE=OVSPort
OVS_BRIDGE=bridge1
DEVICETYPE=ovs
TYPE=OVSBond
BOND_IFACES="eth0 eth1"

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# This file is autogenerated by os-net-config
DEVICE=bridge1
ONBOOT=yes
HOTPLUG=no
NM_CONTROLLED=no
DEVICETYPE=ovs
TYPE=OVSBridge
OVSBOOTPROTO=dhcp
OVSDHCPINTERFACES="bond1"

Activating the network configuration

When activating the network configuration, os-net-config executes several steps in the following order:

1. Ifdown interfaces
2. Ifdown bridges
3. Generate/modify the configuration files in /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts directory
4. Ifup bridges
5. Ifup interfaces

Os-net-config executes the aforementioned steps only on interfaces/bridges whose configuration has been updated. If the interface/bridge configuration hasn’t changed os-net-config will not touch the respective configuration files in the /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts directory and will not restart the respective interface/bridge. This way, os-net-config minimizes the number of changes done to your system.

Network interface names

The names of the network interfaces are platform dependent. In the os-net-config configuration file, you can refer to your interfaces using symbolic names nic1, nic2, nic3, … Os-net-config will automatically associate these symbolic names with the real network interfaces like em, eth, eno.

Conclusion

Os-net-config is a useful configuration tool you might want to include on your virtual machine images.