Arista vEOS on KVM

Topology

Convert vEOS vmdk to qcow2

Download a copy of vEOS-lab HERE, however registered account is required.
Once the image(vEOS-lab-4.20.1F-combine.vmdk) is downloaded we can start converting it to qcow2

#qemu-img convert -o compat=1.1 -f vmdk -O qcow2 -c -p vEOS-lab-4.20.1F-combined.vmdk

Create a new OVS bridge

In this example I’m creating two OVS bridge called brMGMT & brLAB

[root@vhost1 ~]# ovs-vsctl add-br brMGMT
[root@vhost1 ~]# ovs-vsctl add-br brLAB

Verify

[root@vhost1 ~]# ovs-vsctl list-br
brLAB
brMGMT

Create a new vEOS instance

I ran the following virt-install command

NOTE:
I made a new copy of the image named vEOS01.qcow2 and associate the OVS bridges

virt-install \
--connect=qemu:///system \
--name=vEOS01 \
--os-type=linux \
--arch=x86_64 \
--cpu host-model \
--vcpus=1,sockets=1,cores=1,threads=1 \
--hvm \
--ram=2048 \
--disk path=/var/lib/libvirt/images/veos01.qcow2,bus=ide,size=8,sparse=false,cache=none,format=qcow2 \
--network bridge=brMGMT,model=e1000,target=virtualport_type=openvswitch \
--network bridge=brLAB,model=e1000,virtualport_type=openvswitch \
--boot hd \
--graphics none \
--console pty,target_type=serial \
-d

After virt-install completes, we should be able to see the vEOS01 is running

[root@vhost1 ~]# virsh list
 Id    Name                           State
----------------------------------------------------
 21    vEOS01                         running

Run virsh console command to console to the veos

[root@vhost1 ~]# virsh console vEOS01
Connected to domain vEOS01
Escape character is ^]

localhost login: admin
Password:
Last login: Wed Jul 11 16:22:19 on ttyS0
localhost>
localhost> enable
localhost#show interfaces status
Port       Name        Status       Vlan     Duplex Speed  Type            Flags
Et1                    connected    routed   full   unconf EbraTestPhyPort
Ma1                    connected    routed   a-full a-1G   10/100/1000

Additional setup and validation on the OVS

To check which vnet interface assigns to the vEOS

virsh dumpxml vEOS01

Since the default OVS port is in trunk mode and Arista Ma1 interface doesn’t support dot1q, we will need to tag the vlan id on the vEOS port belongs to OVS bridge brMGMT

[root@vhost1 ~]# virsh dumpxml vEOS01 | grep bridge -A 6
    <interface type='bridge'>
      <mac address='52:54:00:2b:ed:50'/>
      <source bridge='brMGMT'/>
      <virtualport type='openvswitch'>
        <parameters interfaceid='fd0c900a-01a1-4437-98a1-7bfac1e7687a'/>
      </virtualport>
      <target dev='vnet0'/>
      <model type='e1000'/>
      <alias name='net0'/>
--
    <interface type='bridge'>
      <mac address='52:54:00:b9:88:70'/>
      <source bridge='brLAB'/>
      <virtualport type='openvswitch'>
        <parameters interfaceid='4f98706d-33eb-4241-9853-ebcca447399d'/>
      </virtualport>
      <target dev='vnet1'/>
      <model type='e1000'/>
      <alias name='net1'/>

vnet0 and vnet1 are generated for the vEOS

To verify under the OVS

[root@vhost1 ~]# ovs-vsctl list-ifaces brMGMT
vnet0

[root@vhost1 ~]# ovs-vsctl list-ifaces brLAB
vnet1

Set vnet0 port (which is assigned to the ma1 on the vEOS) with a vlan tag

[root@vhost1 ~]# ovs-vsctl set port vnet0 tag=101

Verify it’s setup correctly

ovs-vsctl show 
    Bridge brMGMT
        Port brMGMT
            Interface brMGMT
                type: internal
        Port "vnet0"
            tag: 101
            Interface "vnet0"

To enable layer2 protocols like LLDP/SPT/LACP between the different vEOS thru the OVS, for example in our case it will be the brLAB bridge. This will allows two vEOS to setup LACP port-channels or/and MLAG.

[root@vhost1 ~]#ovs-vsctl set bridge brMGMT other-config:forward-bpdu=true