Bare Metal Server supports OVS bonding for Transport Node configuration in NSX-T

Products

• VMware NSX

Issue/Introduction

This article provides insights on the supportability of Linux OS bonding as well as Open vSwitch (OVS) bonding for BM Server Transport Nodes.

Symptoms:
When you create a bond interface in the Linux OS and then use this interface in the NSX uplink profile, you see this symptom:

Transport Node creation may fail.

Environment

VMware NSX-T Data Center 2.x
VMware NSX-T Data Center

Cause

This issue occurs because VMware does not support Linux OS bonding. VMware does support Open vSwitch (OVS) bonding for BM Server Transport Nodes.

Resolution

This is a known issue affecting VMware NSX-T Data Center 2.4.x.

Currently, there is no resolution.

Workaround:
To resolve this issue, use an OVS bond for pnic redundancy:

1. In the Uplink Profile use either Default Teaming failover_order with uplink-1 as Active Uplinks and uplink-2 as Standbye Uplinks.
2. In the Transport Node config, map your management interface to uplink-1 and your other non-IPd interface to uplink-2. During Transport Node creation, ovs will create the bond and you can verify by running ovs commands. 
   
   Note: VMware also supports LAG/LACP mode.