3 - The "tutorial" directory contains a new tutorial for some advanced
5 - Stable bond mode has been removed.
6 - The autopath action has been removed.
7 - New support for the data encapsulation format of the LISP tunnel
8 protocol (RFC 6830). An external control plane or manual flow
9 setup is required for EID-to-RLOC mapping.
11 * The "dec_mpls_ttl" and "set_mpls_ttl" actions from OpenFlow
12 1.1 and later are now implemented.
13 * New "stack" extension for use in actions, to push and pop from
16 * New debugging commands "add-flow", "mod-flow", "del-flow".
17 - New syslog format, prefixed with "ovs|", to be easier to filter.
18 - RHEL: Removes the default firewall rule that allowed GRE traffic to
19 pass through. Any users that relied on this automatic firewall hole
20 will have to manually configure it. The ovs-ctl(8) manpage documents
21 the "enable-protocol" command that can be used as an alternative.
25 - Bridge compatibility support has been removed. Any uses that
26 rely on ovs-brcompatd will have to stick with Open vSwitch 1.9.x
27 or adapt to native Open vSwitch support (e.g. use ovs-vsctl instead
29 - The maximum size of the MAC learning table is now configurable.
30 - With the Linux datapath, packets for new flows are now queued
31 separately on a per-port basis, so it should no longer be
32 possible for a large number of new flows arriving on one port to
33 prevent new flows from being processed on other ports.
35 * Previously ovs-vsctl would retry connecting to the database forever,
36 causing it to hang if ovsdb-server was not running. Now, ovs-vsctl
37 only tries once by default (use --retry to try forever). This change
38 means that you may want to remove uses of --timeout to avoid hangs
40 * Many "ovs-vsctl" database commands now accept an --if-exists option.
41 Please refer to the ovs-vsctl manpage for details.
43 - Experimental support for newer versions of OpenFlow. See
44 the "What versions of OpenFlow does Open vSwitch support?"
45 question in the FAQ for more details.
46 - The OpenFlow "dp_desc" may now be configured by setting the
47 value of other-config:dp-desc in the Bridge table.
48 - It is possible to request the OpenFlow port number with the
49 "ofport_request" column in the Interface table.
50 - The NXM flow_removed message now reports the OpenFlow table ID
51 from which the flow was removed.
53 - New support for the VXLAN tunnel protocol (see the IETF draft here:
54 http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-mahalingam-dutt-dcops-vxlan-03).
55 - Tunneling requires the version of the kernel module paired with
56 Open vSwitch 1.9.0 or later.
57 - Inheritance of the Don't Fragment bit in IP tunnels (df_inherit)
58 is no longer supported.
59 - Path MTU discovery is no longer supported.
60 - CAPWAP tunneling support removed.
61 - Tunnels with multicast destination ports are no longer supported.
63 - The "dump-flows" and "del-flows" no longer require an argument
64 if only one datapath exists.
66 - New "vlog/disable-rate-limit" and "vlog/enable-rate-limit"
67 commands available allow control over logging rate limits.
68 - New "dpif/dump-dps", "dpif/show", and "dpif/dump-flows" command
69 that mimic the equivalent ovs-dpctl commands.
70 - The ofproto library is now responsible for assigning OpenFlow port
71 numbers. An ofproto implementation should assign them when
72 port_construct() is called.
73 - All dpif-based bridges of a particular type share a common
74 datapath called "ovs-<type>", e.g. "ovs-system". The ovs-dpctl
75 commands will now return information on that shared datapath. To
76 get the equivalent bridge-specific information, use the new
77 "ovs-appctl dpif/*" commands.
78 - Backward-incompatible changes:
79 - Earlier Open vSwitch versions treated ANY as a wildcard in flow
80 syntax. OpenFlow 1.1 adds a port named ANY, which introduces a
81 conflict. ANY was rarely used in flow syntax, so we chose to
82 retire that meaning of ANY in favor of the OpenFlow 1.1 meaning.
83 - Patch ports no longer require kernel support, so they now work
84 with FreeBSD and the kernel module built into Linux 3.3 and later.
88 ------------------------
90 - Support for ipv6 set action.
91 - SKB mark matching and setting.
92 - support for Linux kernels up to 3.8
93 - FreeBSD is now a supported platform, thanks to code contributions from
94 Gaetano Catalli, Ed Maste, and Giuseppe Lettieri.
95 - ovs-bugtool: New --ovs option to report only OVS related information.
96 - New %t and %T log escapes to identify the subprogram within a
97 cooperating group of processes or threads that emitted a log message.
98 The default log patterns now include this information.
100 - Allow bitwise masking for SHA and THA fields in ARP, SLL and TLL
101 fields in IPv6 neighbor discovery messages, and IPv6 flow label.
102 - Adds support for writing to the metadata field for a flow.
104 - The tunneling code no longer assumes input and output keys are
105 symmetric. If they are not, PMTUD needs to be disabled for
106 tunneling to work. Note this only applies to flow-based keys.
107 - New support for a nonstandard form of GRE that supports a 64-bit key.
108 - Tunnel Path MTU Discovery default value was set to 'disabled'.
109 This feature is deprecated and will be removed soon.
110 - Tunnel header caching removed.
112 - Commands and actions that accept port numbers now also accept keywords
113 that represent those ports (such as LOCAL, NONE, and ALL). This is
114 also the recommended way to specify these ports, for compatibility
115 with OpenFlow 1.1 and later (which use the OpenFlow 1.0 numbers
116 for these ports for different purposes).
118 - Support requesting the port number with the "port_no" option in
119 the "add-if" command.
120 - ovs-pki: The "online PKI" features have been removed, along with
121 the ovs-pki-cgi program that facilitated it, because of some
122 alarmist insecurity claims. We do not believe that these claims
123 are true, but because we do not know of any users for this
124 feature it seems better on balance to remove it. (The ovs-pki-cgi
125 program was not included in distribution packaging.)
126 - ovsdb-server now enforces the immutability of immutable columns. This
127 was not enforced in earlier versions due to an oversight.
128 - The following features are now deprecated. They will be removed no
129 earlier than February 2013. Please email dev@openvswitch.org with
131 - Bridge compatibility.
133 - The autopath action.
134 - Interface type "null".
135 - Numeric values for reserved ports (see "ovs-ofctl" note above).
136 - Tunnel Path MTU Discovery.
137 - CAPWAP tunnel support.
138 - The data in the RARP packets can now be matched in the same way as the
143 ------------------------
144 *** Internal only release ***
145 - New FAQ. Please send updates and additions!
146 - Authors of controllers, please read the new section titled "Action
147 Reproduction" in DESIGN, which describes an Open vSwitch change in
148 behavior in corner cases that may affect some controllers.
150 - A new test utility that can create L3 tunnel between two Open
151 vSwitches and detect connectivity issues.
153 - New --sort and --rsort options for "dump-flows" command.
154 - "mod-port" command can now control all OpenFlow config flags.
156 - Allow general bitwise masking for IPv4 and IPv6 addresses in
157 IPv4, IPv6, and ARP packets. (Previously, only CIDR masks
159 - Allow support for arbitrary Ethernet masks. (Previously, only
160 the multicast bit in the destination address could be individually
162 - New field OXM_OF_METADATA, to align with OpenFlow 1.1.
163 - The OFPST_QUEUE request now reports an error if a specified port or
164 queue does not exist, or for requests for a specific queue on all
165 ports, if the specified queue does not exist on any port. (Previous
166 versions generally reported an empty set of results.)
167 - New "flow monitor" feature to allow controllers to be notified of
168 flow table changes as they happen.
169 - Additional protocols are not mirrored and dropped when forward-bpdu is
170 false. For a full list, see the ovs-vswitchd.conf.db man page.
171 - Open vSwitch now sends RARP packets in situations where it previously
172 sent a custom protocol, making it consistent with behavior of QEMU and
174 - All Open vSwitch programs and log files now show timestamps in UTC,
175 instead the local timezone, by default.
179 ------------------------
180 - kernel modules are renamed. openvswitch_mod.ko is now
181 openvswitch.ko and brcompat_mod.ko is now brcompat.ko.
182 - Increased the number of NXM registers to 8.
183 - Added ability to configure DSCP setting for manager and controller
184 connections. By default, these connections have a DSCP value of
185 Internetwork Control (0xc0).
186 - Added the granular link health statistics, 'cfm_health', to an
189 - Added support to mask nd_target for ICMPv6 neighbor discovery flows.
190 - Added support for OpenFlow 1.3 port description (OFPMP_PORT_DESC)
193 - Added the "dump-ports-desc" command to retrieve port
194 information using the new port description multipart messages.
196 - Added support for spawning ovs-test server from the client.
197 - Now ovs-test is able to automatically create test bridges and ports.
198 - "ovs-dpctl dump-flows" now prints observed TCP flags in TCP flows.
199 - Tripled flow setup performance.
200 - The "coverage/log" command previously available through ovs-appctl
201 has been replaced by "coverage/show". The new command replies with
202 coverage counter values, instead of logging them.
206 ------------------------
207 - Allow OFPP_CONTROLLER as the in_port for packet-out messages.
211 ------------------------
212 *** Internal only release ***
214 - LACP bonds no longer fall back to balance-slb when negotiations fail.
215 Instead they drop traffic.
216 - The default bond_mode changed from SLB to active-backup, to protect
217 unsuspecting users from the significant risks of SLB bonds (which are
218 documented in vswitchd/INTERNALS).
219 - Load balancing can be disabled by setting the bond-rebalance-interval
222 - Added support for bitwise matching on TCP and UDP ports.
223 See ovs-ofctl(8) for more information.
224 - NXM flow dumps now include times elapsed toward idle and hard
226 - Added an OpenFlow extension NXT_SET_ASYNC_CONFIG that allows
227 controllers more precise control over which OpenFlow messages they
228 receive asynchronously.
229 - New "fin_timeout" action.
230 - Added "fin_timeout" support to "learn" action.
231 - New Nicira action NXAST_CONTROLLER that offers additional features
232 over output to OFPP_CONTROLLER.
233 - When QoS settings for an interface do not configure a default queue
234 (queue 0), Open vSwitch now uses a default configuration for that
235 queue, instead of dropping all packets as in previous versions.
237 - Logging to console and file will have UTC timestamp as a default for
238 all the daemons. An example of the default format is
239 2012-01-27T16:35:17Z. ovs-appctl can be used to change the default
241 - The syntax of commands and options to set log levels was simplified,
242 to make it easier to remember.
243 - New support for limiting the number of flows in an OpenFlow flow
244 table, with configurable policy for evicting flows upon
245 overflow. See the Flow_Table table in ovs-vswitch.conf.db(5)
246 for more information.
247 - New "enable-async-messages" column in the Controller table. If set to
248 false, OpenFlow connections to the controller will initially have all
249 asynchronous messages disabled, overriding normal OpenFlow behavior.
250 - ofproto-provider interface:
251 - "struct rule" has a new member "used" that ofproto implementations
252 should maintain by updating with ofproto_rule_update_used().
254 - The new option --timestamp causes the "monitor" command to print
255 a timestamp with every update.
256 - CFM module CCM broadcasts can now be tagged with an 802.1p priority.
260 ------------------------
262 - Added support for querying, modifying, and deleting flows
263 based on flow cookie when using NXM.
264 - Added new NXM_PACKET_IN format.
265 - Added new NXAST_DEC_TTL action.
267 - Added daemonization support to the monitor and snoop commands.
269 - The "find" command supports new set relational operators
270 {=}, {!=}, {<}, {>}, {<=}, and {>=}.
271 - ovsdb-tool now uses the typical database and schema installation
272 directories as defaults.
273 - The default MAC learning timeout has been increased from 60 seconds
274 to 300 seconds. The MAC learning timeout is now configurable.
278 ------------------------
279 - Compatible with Open vSwitch kernel module included in Linux 3.3.
280 - New "VLAN splinters" feature to work around buggy device drivers
281 in old Linux versions. (This feature is deprecated. When
282 broken device drivers are no longer in widespread use, we will
283 delete this feature.) See ovs-vswitchd.conf.db(5) for more
286 - Added ability to match on IPv6 flow label through NXM.
287 - Added ability to match on ECN bits in IPv4 and IPv6 through NXM.
288 - Added ability to match on TTL in IPv4 and IPv6 through NXM.
289 - Added ability to modify ECN bits in IPv4.
290 - Added ability to modify TTL in IPv4.
292 - Don't require the "normal" action to use mirrors. Traffic will
293 now be properly mirrored for any flows, regardless of their
295 - Track packet and byte statistics sent on mirrors.
296 - The sFlow implementation can now usually infer the correct agent
297 device instead of having to be told explicitly.
299 - New "fdb/flush" command to flush bridge's MAC learning table.
301 - A new distributed testing tool that allows one to diagnose performance
302 and connectivity issues. This tool currently is not included in RH or
304 - RHEL packaging now supports integration with Red Hat network scripts.
306 - Post 1.4.*, OVS will be changing the default bond mode from balance-slb
307 to active-backup. SLB bonds carry significant risks with them
308 (documented vswitchd/INTERNALS) which we want to prevent unsuspecting
309 users from running into. Users are advised to update any scripts or
310 configuration which may be negatively impacted by explicitly setting
311 the bond mode which they want to use.
315 ------------------------
317 - Added an OpenFlow extension which allows the "output" action to accept
319 - Added an OpenFlow extension for flexible learning.
320 - Bumped number of NXM registers from four to five.
322 - New "version" command to determine version of running daemon.
323 - If no argument is provided for "cfm/show", displays detailed
324 information about all interfaces with CFM enabled.
325 - If no argument is provided for "lacp/show", displays detailed
326 information about all ports with LACP enabled.
328 - New "set-if" command to modify a datapath port's configuration.
330 - The software switch now supports 255 OpenFlow tables, instead
331 of just one. By default, only table 0 is consulted, but the
332 new NXAST_RESUBMIT_TABLE action can look up in additional
333 tables. Tables 128 and above are reserved for use by the
334 switch itself; please use only tables 0 through 127.
335 - Add support for 802.1D spanning tree (STP).
336 - Fragment handling extensions:
337 - New OFPC_FRAG_NX_MATCH fragment handling mode, in which L4
338 fields are made available for matching in fragments with
340 - New NXM_NX_IP_FRAG match field for matching IP fragments (usable
341 via "ip_frag" in ovs-ofctl).
342 - New ovs-ofctl "get-frags" and "set-frags" commands to get and set
343 fragment handling policy.
344 - CAPWAP tunneling now supports an extension to transport a 64-bit key.
345 By default it remains compatible with the old version and other
346 standards-based implementations.
347 - Flow setups are now processed in a round-robin manner across ports
348 to prevent any single client from monopolizing the CPU and conducting
349 a denial of service attack.
350 - Added support for native VLAN tagging. A new "vlan_mode"
351 parameter can be set for "port". Possible values: "access",
352 "trunk", "native-tagged" and "native-untagged".
353 - test-openflowd has been removed. Please use ovs-vswitchd instead.
356 ------------------------
357 - New "ofproto" abstraction layer to ease porting to hardware
359 - Packaging for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.6 and 6.0.
360 - Datapath support for Linux kernels up to 3.0.
362 - New "bundle" and "bundle_load" action extensions.
364 - Implement table unique constraints.
365 - Support cooperative locking between callers.
367 - New "-s" option for "show" command prints packet and byte
368 counters for each port.
370 - New "--readd" option for "replace-flows".
372 - New "show" command to print an overview of configuration.
373 - New "comment" command to add remark that explains intentions.
374 - ovs-brcompatd has been rewritten to fix long-standing bugs.
375 - ovs-openflowd has been renamed test-openflowd and moved into the
376 tests directory. Its presence confused too many users. Please
377 use ovs-vswitchd instead.
378 - New ovs-benchmark utility to test flow setup performance.
379 - A new log level "off" has been added. Configuring a log facility
380 "off" prevents any messages from being logged to it. Previously,
381 "emer" was effectively "off" because no messages were ever logged at
382 level "emer". Now, errors that cause a process to exit are logged
384 - "configure" option --with-l26 has been renamed --with-linux, and
385 --with-l26-source has been renamed --with-linux-source. The old
386 names will be removed after the next release, so please update
388 - The "-2.6" suffix has been dropped from the datapath/linux-2.6 and
389 datapath/linux-2.6/compat-2.6 directories.
391 - Dropped support for "tun_id_from_cookie" OpenFlow extension.
392 Please use the extensible match extensions instead.
393 - Removed the Maintenance_Point and Monitor tables in an effort
394 to simplify 802.1ag configuration.
395 - Performance and scalability improvements
399 ------------------------
400 - Ability to define policies over IPv6
403 - Support for extensible match extensions to OpenFlow
405 - Support for HFSC qdisc.
406 - Queue used by in-band control can now be configured.
408 - Kernel<->userspace interface has been reworked and should be
409 close to a stable ABI now.
410 - "Port group" concept has been dropped.
411 - GRE over IPSEC tunnels
413 - New active backup bonding mode.
414 - New L4 hashing support when LACP is enabled.
415 - Source MAC hash now includes VLAN field also.
417 - Greatly improved handling of large flow tables
419 - "show" command now prints full vport configuration.
420 - "dump-groups" command removed since kernel support for
421 port groups was dropped.
423 - New commands for working with the new Managers table.
424 - "list" command enhanced with new formatting options and --columns
426 - "get" command now accepts new --id option.
427 - New "find" command.
429 - New "queue-stats" command for printing queue stats.
430 - New commands "replace-flows" and "diff-flows".
431 - Commands to add and remove flows can now read from files.
432 - New --flow-format option to enable or disable NXM.
433 - New --more option to increase OpenFlow message verbosity.
434 - Removed "tun-cookie" command, which is no longer useful.
435 - ovs-controller enhancements for testing various features.
436 - New ovs-vlan-test command for testing for Linux kernel driver VLAN
437 bugs. New ovs-vlan-bug-workaround command for enabling and
438 disabling a workaround for these driver bugs.
440 - "Resubmit" actions now update flow statistics.
441 - New "register" extension for use in matching and actions, via NXM.
442 - New "multipath" experimental action extension.
443 - New support for matching multicast Ethernet frames, via NXM.
444 - New extension for OpenFlow vendor error codes.
445 - New extension to set the QoS output queue without actually
446 sending to an output port.
447 - Open vSwitch now reports a single flow table, instead of
448 separate hash and wildcard tables. This better models the
449 current implementation.
450 - New experimental "note" action.
451 - New "ofproto/trace" ovs-appctl command and associated utilities
452 to ease debugging complex flow tables.
454 - Schema documentation now includes an entity-relationship diagram.
455 - The database is now garbage collected. In most tables,
456 unreferenced rows will be deleted automatically.
457 - Many tables now include statistics updated periodically by
458 ovs-vswitchd or ovsdb-server.
459 - Every table now has an "external-ids" column for use by OVS
461 - There is no default controller anymore. Each bridge must have its
462 controller individually specified.
463 - The "fail-mode" is now a property of a Bridge instead of a Controller.
464 - New versioning and checksum features.
465 - New Managers table and manager_options column in Open_vSwitch table
466 for specifying managers. The old "managers" column in the
467 Open_vSwitch table has been removed.
468 - Many "name" columns are now immutable.
470 - Dropped support for XenServer pre-5.6.100.
471 - Dropped support for Linux pre-2.6.18.
472 - Dropped controller discovery support.
473 - Dropped "ovs-ofctl status" and the OpenFlow extension that it used.
474 Statistics reporting in the database is a rough equivalent.
475 - Dropped the "corekeeper" package (now separate, at
476 http://openvswitch.org/cgi-bin/gitweb.cgi?p=corekeeper).
477 - Performance and scalability improvements
480 v1.1.0pre2 - 13 Sep 2010
481 ------------------------
484 v1.1.0pre1 - 31 Aug 2010
485 ------------------------
486 - OpenFlow 1.0 slicing (QoS) functionality
487 - Python bindings for configuration database (no write support)
488 - Performance and scalability improvements
493 - New "patch" interface type
498 - Configuration database with remote management
501 - Support for XenServer 5.5 and 5.6
502 - Performance and scalability improvements
505 v0.99.2 - 18 Feb 2010
506 ---------------------
509 v0.99.1 - 25 Jan 2010
510 ---------------------
511 - Add support for sFlow(R)
512 - Make headers compatible with C++
515 v0.99.0 - 14 Jan 2010
516 ---------------------
517 - User-space forwarding engine
520 v0.90.7 - 29 Nov 2009
521 ---------------------
522 - Add support for NetFlow active timeouts
529 v0.90.5 - 21 Sep 2009
530 ---------------------
531 - Generalize in-band control to more diverse network setups