Introduction to OVS

OpenVSwitch (OVS) is a production-quality open source virtual switch application that can be run on any Unix-based systems. Typically, OVS is used in a virtualization environment to provide communication between the virtual machines/containers that are running inside the servers. OVS acts as a software switch that provides layer2 connectivity between the VMs running inside a server. Linux Bridge can also be used for providing communication between the VMs inside the server. However, OVS provides all the bells and whistles that are required in a typical server virtualization environment. The following diagram depicts how OVS provides connectivity across the VMs running inside the server:

In the diagram, there are three VMs that are running in a server. One end of the VM's virtual NIC is connected to Open vSwitch. Here, Open vSwitch provides connectivity across all the VMs in the server. Open vSwitch is also connected to the physical NIC to provide communication to and...