Network NIC Teaming can be described as the aggregation of multiple network links into a single logical link. This is mainly done to boost redundancy and bandwidth. The team interface created provides an alternative link when the one physical link is down thus providing an uninterrupted connection to your server.
There are a couple of concepts you might need to understand before we proceed:
- teamd – the nic teaming daemon that uses the libteam library to communicate with team devices via the Linux kernel.
- teamdctl – a utility that allows one control teamd instances. Using it, you can check and change the port status, as well as switch between backup and active states.
- runners – units written in JSON format to implement of various NIC teaming concepts. There are several runners(Team running modes) that include:
- broadcast – here, data is transmitted accross all interfaces.
- round-robin – data is transmitted over all ports in turn
- active-backup – one port or link is used at a time while others are kept as a backup
- lacp – this one implements the 802.3ad Link Aggregation Control Protocol
- loadbalance – With active Tx load balancing and BPF-based Tx port selectors. Traffic is transmitted across all NICs.
This guide offers a detailed illustration of how to configure Network NIC Teaming on Rocky Linux 8| Alma Linux 8.
Setup Pre-requisites
For this guide, you need the following:
- A user with sudo access.
- Two/more interface adapters attached to your system.
Step 1 – Install the Teaming Daemon on Rocky Linux 8| Alma Linux 8
The teaming daemon is available in the default Rocky Linux 8| Alma Linux 8 repositories and can be installed as below.
sudo dnf -y install teamdOnce installed, check the installed version.
$ rpm -qi teamd
Name : teamd
Version : 1.31
Release : 2.el8
Architecture: x86_64
Install Date: Wed 29 Sep 2021 04:01:14 AM EDT
Group : System Environment/Daemons
Size : 282950
License : LGPLv2+
Signature : RSA/SHA256, Sun 11 Apr 2021 11:14:13 PM EDT, Key ID 15af5dac6d745a60
Source RPM : libteam-1.31-2.el8.src.rpm
Build Date : Sun 14 Mar 2021 06:12:27 PM EDT
Build Host : ord1-prod-x86build003.svc.aws.rockylinux.org
Relocations : (not relocatable)
Packager : [email protected]
Vendor : Rocky
URL : http://www.libteam.org
Summary : Team network device control daemon
Description :
The teamd package contains team network device control daemon.
Step 2 – Configure NIC Teaming on Rocky Linux 8| Alma Linux 8
For this guide, we will cover two methods on how to configure NIC Teaming on Rocky Linux 8| Alma Linux 8 namely:
- Using NMCLI
- Using Ansible system roles
- Using nmstatectl
Method 1 – Configure NIC Teaming on Rocky Linux 8| Alma Linux 8 using NMCLI
It is possible to use Network Manager’s nmcli tool to configure bonds. First, check the network interfaces on your system.
nmcli device status
Sample output:
From the above output, there are two interface devices enp1s0 and enp9s0 connected to my system. You can as well gather more information using the command below.
nmcli connection showSample output:
Disconnect the two devices using the UUID as below.
sudo nmcli connection delete 93a375cc-3c29-4a52-9fb9-0f6940ea4c2a
sudo nmcli connection delete 6c574fa3-98eb-40f1-a463-6b9271397d55
Once deleted, the devices should be disconnected as below.
Now let us create a team with the name team1 with a preferred runner say active-backup where one port or link is used at a time while others are kept as a backup. You can also use any of the runners broadcast, lacp, round-robin and random.
sudo nmcli connection add type team con-name team1 ifname team1 config '{"runner": {"name": "activebackup"}}'Show the created team.
$ nmcli connection show team1
connection.id: team1
connection.uuid: dad0b991-fd00-45ca-9e3b-8f7843498f47
connection.stable-id: --
connection.type: team
connection.interface-name: team1
connection.autoconnect: yes
connection.autoconnect-priority: 0
connection.autoconnect-retries: -1 (default)
connection.multi-connect: 0 (default)
connection.auth-retries: -1
connection.timestamp: 0
connection.read-only: no
connection.permissions: --
connection.zone: --
connection.master: --
connection.slave-type: --
connection.autoconnect-slaves: -1 (default)
connection.secondaries: --
......
Now set the IP address, DNS, and auto-connection for the new team.
sudo nmcli con mod team1 ipv4.addresses 192.168.205.100/24
sudo nmcli con mod team1 ipv4.gateway 192.168.205.1
sudo nmcli con mod team1 ipv4.dns 8.8.8.8
sudo nmcli con mod team1 ipv4.method manual
sudo nmcli con mod team1 connection.autoconnect yesNow add the slave networks and link them to the team.
sudo nmcli con add type team-slave con-name team1-slave0 ifname enp1s0 master team1
sudo nmcli con add type team-slave con-name team1-slave1 ifname enp9s0 master team1Once added, check the status of the links.
$ nmcli connection show
NAME UUID TYPE DEVICE
enp10so 77ae630c-8940-4b6d-9ae2-09f358296b41 ethernet enp10s0
team1 dad0b991-fd00-45ca-9e3b-8f7843498f47 team team1
virbr0 2219ff25-c5f7-486c-9d2d-7a585be22cfe bridge virbr0
team1-slave0 9cdf0f6f-d6d4-45e5-bb8a-8ff7365fcd7a ethernet enp1s0
team1-slave1 67a57ddf-4595-4be2-b6ae-f5b481083d47 ethernet enp9s0
For the changes made to apply, restart the team.
$ sudo nmcli connection down team1 && sudo nmcli connection up team1
Connection 'team1' successfully deactivated (D-Bus active path: /org/freedesktop/NetworkManager/ActiveConnection/6)
Connection successfully activated (master waiting for slaves) (D-Bus active path: /org/freedesktop/NetworkManager/ActiveConnection/9)View the status of the team interface.
ip addr show dev team1Output:
You can as well use the teamdctltool to view more information.
sudo teamdctl team1 stateSample output:
Test the Team functionality.
With the active backup runner used, we want to see if it is working correctly. So we will try and bring down the active port enp1s0
sudo nmcli device disconnect enp1s0Check the status of the team.
sudo teamdctl team1 stateSample output:
From the above output, we see the active port switched to enp9s0 and that proves that the active backup runner is working perfectly.
Delete Team with nmcli
If at some point you want to delete a team, worry not. This is so easy and can be accomplished using the nmcli utility with the steps below:
Show the connection details.
$ nmcli connection show
NAME UUID TYPE DEVICE
enp10so 77ae630c-8940-4b6d-9ae2-09f358296b41 ethernet enp10s0
team1 dad0b991-fd00-45ca-9e3b-8f7843498f47 team team1
virbr0 2219ff25-c5f7-486c-9d2d-7a585be22cfe bridge virbr0
team1-slave1 67a57ddf-4595-4be2-b6ae-f5b481083d47 ethernet enp9s0
team1-slave0 9cdf0f6f-d6d4-45e5-bb8a-8ff7365fcd7a ethernet -- Deactivate the team you intend to delete.
sudo nmcli connection down team1Now delete slaves on the team.
$ sudo nmcli connection delete team1-slave0 team1-slave1
Connection 'team1-slave0' (9cdf0f6f-d6d4-45e5-bb8a-8ff7365fcd7a) successfully deleted.
Connection 'team1-slave1' (67a57ddf-4595-4be2-b6ae-f5b481083d47) successfully deleted.Now delete the team:
$ sudo nmcli connection delete team1
Connection 'team1' (dad0b991-fd00-45ca-9e3b-8f7843498f47) successfully deleted.Verify if the team has been deleted successfully.
$ nmcli connection show
NAME UUID TYPE DEVICE
enp10so 77ae630c-8940-4b6d-9ae2-09f358296b41 ethernet enp10s0
virbr0 2219ff25-c5f7-486c-9d2d-7a585be22cfe bridge virbr0 Method 2 – Create a Network Team On Rocky Linux 8| Alma Linux 8 Using Ansible system roles.
This is yet another method to create a network bond using ansible. I assume that you already have Ansible is installed and configured on your system.
Install the rhel-system-roles package.
sudo yum install rhel-system-rolesAdd the host on which you want to configure the team in the Inventory file.
$ sudo vi /etc/ansible/hosts
192.168.205.2You may also be needed to add SSH keys of this managed host to your control node.
Now create the playbook YAML for the network team as below.
vi ~/bond-ethernet.ymlIn the file, add the lines below.
---
- name: Configure a network bond that uses two Ethernet ports
hosts: 192.168.205.2
become: true
tasks:
- include_role:
name: rhel-system-roles.network
vars:
network_connections:
# Define the bond profile
- name: bond0
type: bond
interface_name: bond0
ip:
address:
- "192.168.205.100/24"
gateway4: 192.168.205.1
dns:
- 8.8.8.8
dns_search:
- example.com
bond:
mode: active-backup
state: up
# Add an Ethernet profile to the bond
- name: bond0-port1
interface_name: enp9s0
type: ethernet
controller: bond0
state: up
# Add a second Ethernet profile to the bond
- name: bond0-port2
interface_name: enp10s0
type: ethernet
controller: bond0
state: upHere, I have configured a network team using two devices enp9s0 and enp10s0, set the Ip address for the bond as 192.168.205.100 with the gateway 192.168.205.1.
Now with the right details set, run the playbook as the root user of the managed host.
ansible-playbook -u root ~/bond-ethernet.ymlSample output:
Verify the bond status.
sudo cat /proc/net/bonding/bond0Sample Output:
Method 3 – Create a Network Team On Rocky Linux 8| Alma Linux 8 Using nmstatectl
With this method, ensure that the nmstate package is installed.
sudo yum install nmstateThen create a YAML file as below.
vi ~/create-bond.ymlIn the file, set the Team preferences as below.
---
interfaces:
- name: bond0
type: bond
state: up
ipv4:
enabled: true
address:
- ip: 192.168.205.100
prefix-length: 24
dhcp: false
link-aggregation:
mode: active-backup
port:
- enp9s0
- enp10s0
- name: enp9s0
type: ethernet
state: up
- name: enp10s0
type: ethernet
state: up
routes:
config:
- destination: 0.0.0.0/0
next-hop-address: 192.168.205.1
next-hop-interface: bond0
dns-resolver:
config:
search:
- example.com
server:
- 8.8.8.8In the file, replace:
- ip: 192.168.205.100 with the preferred network bond
- next-hop-address: 192.168.205.1 with the Pv4 default gateway
Save the file and apply the settings to your system.
sudo nmstatectl apply ~/create-bond.ymlSample output:
Verify if the bond exists.
$ sudo nmcli device status
DEVICE TYPE STATE CONNECTION
enp1s0 ethernet connected enp1s0
bond0 bond connected bond0
virbr0 bridge connected (externally) virbr0
enp10s0 ethernet connected enp10s0
enp9s0 ethernet connected enp9s0
lo loopback unmanaged --
virbr0-nic tun unmanaged -- You can also view detailed information about the bond.
sudo nmcli connection show bond0Output:
Conclusion
That is it!
We have triumphantly configured Network NIC Teaming on Rocky Linux 8| Alma Linux 8 using NMCLI, ansible system roles, and nmstatectl. I hope this was significant to you.
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