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Private networks

  • 3 February 2021
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I have a question regarding private networks.  I have an NFS share that resides in the 192.168.20.x network, however my Nutanix public (Internet access) network is in the 10.10.2.x.  I need to create a network where my VM can talk to the NFS server.  I’ve reviewed some YouTube videos but they’re not very helpful.  Any better documentation out there?

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Best answer by Nupur.Sakhalkar 6 February 2021, 19:05

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Userlevel 6
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This is guide from Nutanix employees hopefully it will be helpful: AHV Networking

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I’ve run out of ideas and I hope someone here can help.  I deployed Nutanix CE on one node.  I will add 2 more nodes later.  For now I want to get a very basic deployment of a virtual machine running Centos.

  • Question 1: When I create a network where the VMs will run that need to access to the internet, do I assign IPs that are in the same IP range as the CVM or AHV?  Or do I use a private IP network and Nutanix will handle the routing for me?
  • Question 2: Do I need to create a virtual switch as well?  Many of the videos I’ve seen don’t do that so I’m confused.
  • Question3: Do I need to create a network, a switch and a bridge for all of it to work?  Again the videos don’t mention any of that.
  • Question 4: Is deploying a VM in Nutanix as easy is it looks?  I have not had any luck emulating all the videos I’ve seen.  If it is easy and the VMs can get out to the Internet with very little configuration on my part then perhaps my problem resides in the physical switch.

Any help or suggestions to get a very basic working VM would be greatly appreciated. I have reviewed the Nutanix Bible but I can’t even get passed basic networking for it to mean anything.

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Follow up question: Does the Vlan number in the Nutanix have to match the Vlan number on the physical switch?

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Problem solved! If assign a VLAN other than 0 I’m not able to communicate with the outside world.

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Hey @PSLAdmin , to answer your questions:

  1. You don’t need to use the same IP range as the CVM or AHV for your user VMs -  use different IP range for your user VMs’ network. Just make sure to create those networks in Prism first with appropriate VLAN tags and then add these networks to the VMs accordingly. In order to create a VM Network via Prism, see the steps mentioned in Network Configuration on VM interfaces section on Nutanix Support Portal
  2. If you are using AHV as your hypervisor, then we already have a default bridge - br0 present in the AHV host. If you are ok with using this default bridge br0 for user VM traffic as well, then there is no need to create a separate bridge for user VM traffic. However, if you wish to use a separate bridge/vswitch for user VM traffic, then you can do so by creating a new bridge in the AHV host. Then, you will need to simply configure the VM Network associated with this user VM to use the new bridge instead of using the default bridge - br0. To create a separate vswitch for user VM networks, refer to Creating a virtual switch section on Nutanix Support Portal
  3. Create VM Network first (using associated VLAN tags) which you want to use for the user VM and then while creating the user VM, add this VM network to it. Whenever you create a new VM Network via Prism, it will use the default bridge -br0 by default (for AHV hosts). As mentioned in (2), if you wish to use a separate bridge in AHV host for this VM network, this can be done as well.
  4. If you are using any VLAN for your user VM network which is different than the VLAN which is used by CVM/host traffic(default - VLAN 0), then you will need to make sure that those VLANs are configured on the physical switches as well so that once the user VM traffic reaches the switch, switch can handle it accordingly. Also, make sure to use VLAN trunking for these AHV host interfaces on the physical switch so that it can carry multiple VLAN traffic. 
  5. When you mark the AHV host interfaces as trunk ports on switch side, it can carry multiple VLAN traffic. So, VLANs used by VMs doesn’t need to be on the same native VLAN which is being used by the trunk interface configured on switch side. As mentioned in (4), you will need to make sure that these VLANs (used during VM network creation) are also configured on physical switches. Moreover, if you want the user VMs to have access to the internet, then you will need to have appropriate network configuration done on your uplink switches so that the user VM traffic can reach to the internet once it reaches these uplink switches. 

Also, here are some documentation guides which will be useful in the this scenario:

  1. Nutanix Tech TopX Video on AHV VM Networking Enhancements: VLAN Trunking
  2. AHV Networking recommendations 
  3. Create a VM in AHV via Prism 

The AHV Networking Blueprint mentioned by @Primzy earlier is also super helpful. 

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Hi PSLAdmin,You seem to rely on videos but have you tried reading Nutanix documentation like AHV and Prism guides? They would help you with the set up much better and improve your understanding of the system.