ovn-sbctl(8) — Linux manual page

NAME | SYNOPSIS | DESCRIPTION | DAEMON MODE | OPTIONS | COMMANDS | ENVIRONMENT | EXIT STATUS | SEE ALSO | COLOPHON

ovn-sbctl(8)                   OVN Manual                   ovn-sbctl(8)

NAME         top

       ovn-sbctl - Open Virtual Network southbound db management utility

SYNOPSIS         top

       ovn-sbctl [options] command [arg...]

DESCRIPTION         top

       The ovn-sbctl program configures the OVN_Southbound database by
       providing a high-level interface to its configuration database.
       See ovn-sb(5) for comprehensive documentation of the database
       schema.

       ovn-sbctl connects to an ovsdb-server process that maintains an
       OVN_Southbound configuration database. Using this connection, it
       queries and possibly applies changes to the database, depending
       on the supplied commands.

       ovn-sbctl can perform any number of commands in a single run,
       implemented as a single atomic transaction against the database.

       The ovn-sbctl command line begins with global options (see
       OPTIONS below for details). The global options are followed by
       one or more commands. Each command should begin with -- by itself
       as a command-line argument, to separate it from the following
       commands. (The -- before the first command is optional.) The
       command itself starts with command-specific options, if any,
       followed by the command name and any arguments.

DAEMON MODE         top

       When it is invoked in the most ordinary way, ovn-sbctl connects
       to an OVSDB server that hosts the southbound database, retrieves
       a partial copy of the database that is complete enough to do its
       work, sends a transaction request to the server, and receives and
       processes the server’s reply. In common interactive use, this is
       fine, but if the database is large, the step in which ovn-sbctl
       retrieves a partial copy of the database can take a long time,
       which yields poor performance overall.

       To improve performance in such a case, ovn-sbctl offers a "daemon
       mode," in which the user first starts ovn-sbctl running in the
       background and afterward uses the daemon to execute operations.
       Over several ovn-sbctl command invocations, this performs better
       overall because it retrieves a copy of the database only once at
       the beginning, not once per program run.

       Use the --detach option to start an ovn-sbctl daemon. With this
       option, ovn-sbctl prints the name of a control socket to stdout.
       The client should save this name in environment variable
       OVN_SB_DAEMON. Under the Bourne shell this might be done like
       this:

             export OVN_SB_DAEMON=$(ovn-sbctl --pidfile --detach)

       When OVN_SB_DAEMON is set, ovn-sbctl automatically and
       transparently uses the daemon to execute its commands.

       When the daemon is no longer needed, kill it and unset the
       environment variable, e.g.:

             kill $(cat $OVN_RUNDIR/ovn-sbctl.pid)
             unset OVN_SB_DAEMON

       When using daemon mode, an alternative to the OVN_SB_DAEMON
       environment variable is to specify a path for the Unix socket.
       When starting the ovn-sbctl daemon, specify the -u option with a
       full path to the location of the socket file. Here is an exmple:

             ovn-sbctl --detach -u /tmp/mysock.ctl

       Then to connect to the running daemon, use the -u option with the
       full path to the socket created when the daemon was started:

             ovn-sbctl -u /tmp/mysock.ctl show

     Daemon Commands

       Daemon mode is internally implemented using the same mechanism
       used by ovn-appctl. One may also use ovn-appctl directly with the
       following commands:

              run [options] command [arg...] [-- [options] command
              [arg...] ...]
                     Instructs the daemon process to run one or more
                     ovn-sbctl commands described above and reply with
                     the results of running these commands. Accepts the
                     --no-wait, --wait, --timeout, --dry-run, --oneline,
                     and the options described under Table Formatting
                     Options in addition to the the command-specific
                     options.

              exit   Causes ovn-sbctl to gracefully terminate.

OPTIONS         top

       The options listed below affect the behavior of ovn-sbctl as a
       whole. Some individual commands also accept their own options,
       which are given just before the command name. If the first
       command on the command line has options, then those options must
       be separated from the global options by --.

       ovn-sbctl also accepts options from the OVN_SBCTL_OPTIONS
       environment variable, in the same format as on the command line.
       Options from the command line override those in the environment.

              --db database
                     The OVSDB database remote to contact. If the
                     OVN_SB_DB environment variable is set, its value is
                     used as the default. Otherwise, the default is
                     unix:/ovnsb_db.sock, but this default is unlikely
                     to be useful outside of single-machine OVN test
                     environments.

              --leader-only
              --no-leader-only
                   By default, or with --leader-only, when the database
                   server is a clustered database, ovn-sbctl will avoid
                   servers other than the cluster leader. This ensures
                   that any data that ovn-sbctl reads and reports is up-
                   to-date. With --no-leader-only, ovn-sbctl will use
                   any server in the cluster, which means that for read-
                   only transactions it can report and act on stale data
                   (transactions that modify the database are always
                   serialized even with --no-leader-only). Refer to
                   Understanding Cluster Consistency in ovsdb(7) for
                   more information.

              --shuffle-remotes
              --no-shuffle-remotes
                   By default, or with --shuffle-remotes, when there are
                   multiple remotes specified in the OVSDB connection
                   string specified by --db or the OVN_SB_DB environment
                   variable, the order of the remotes will be shuffled
                   before the client tries to connect. The remotes will
                   be shuffled only once to a new order before the first
                   connection attempt. The following retries, if any,
                   will follow the same new order. The default behavior
                   is to make sure clients of a clustered database can
                   distribute evenly to all members of the cluster. With
                   --no-shuffle-remotes, ovn-sbctl will use the original
                   order specified in the connection string to connect.
                   This allows user to specify the preferred order,
                   which is particularly useful for testing.

              --no-syslog
                   By default, ovn-sbctl logs its arguments and the
                   details of any changes that it makes to the system
                   log. This option disables this logging.

                   This option is equivalent to
                   --verbose=sbctl:syslog:warn.

              --oneline
                   Modifies the output format so that the output for
                   each command is printed on a single line. New-line
                   characters that would otherwise separate lines are
                   printed as \fB\\n\fR, and any instances of \fB\\\fR
                   that would otherwise appear in the output are
                   doubled. Prints a blank line for each command that
                   has no output. This option does not affect the
                   formatting of output from the list or find commands;
                   see Table Formatting Options below.

              --dry-run
                   Prevents ovn-sbctl from actually modifying the
                   database.

              -t secs
              --timeout=secs
                   By default, or with a secs of 0, ovn-sbctl waits
                   forever for a response from the database. This option
                   limits runtime to approximately secs seconds. If the
                   timeout expires, ovn-sbctl will exit with a SIGALRM
                   signal. (A timeout would normally happen only if the
                   database cannot be contacted, or if the system is
                   overloaded.)

   Daemon Options
       --pidfile[=pidfile]
              Causes a file (by default, program.pid) to be created
              indicating the PID of the running process. If the pidfile
              argument is not specified, or if it does not begin with /,
              then it is created in .

              If --pidfile is not specified, no pidfile is created.

       --overwrite-pidfile
              By default, when --pidfile is specified and the specified
              pidfile already exists and is locked by a running process,
              the daemon refuses to start. Specify --overwrite-pidfile
              to cause it to instead overwrite the pidfile.

              When --pidfile is not specified, this option has no
              effect.

       --detach
              Runs this program as a background process. The process
              forks, and in the child it starts a new session, closes
              the standard file descriptors (which has the side effect
              of disabling logging to the console), and changes its
              current directory to the root (unless --no-chdir is
              specified). After the child completes its initialization,
              the parent exits.

       --monitor
              Creates an additional process to monitor this program. If
              it dies due to a signal that indicates a programming error
              (SIGABRT, SIGALRM, SIGBUS, SIGFPE, SIGILL, SIGPIPE,
              SIGSEGV, SIGXCPU, or SIGXFSZ) then the monitor process
              starts a new copy of it. If the daemon dies or exits for
              another reason, the monitor process exits.

              This option is normally used with --detach, but it also
              functions without it.

       --no-chdir
              By default, when --detach is specified, the daemon changes
              its current working directory to the root directory after
              it detaches. Otherwise, invoking the daemon from a
              carelessly chosen directory would prevent the
              administrator from unmounting the file system that holds
              that directory.

              Specifying --no-chdir suppresses this behavior, preventing
              the daemon from changing its current working directory.
              This may be useful for collecting core files, since it is
              common behavior to write core dumps into the current
              working directory and the root directory is not a good
              directory to use.

              This option has no effect when --detach is not specified.

       --no-self-confinement
              By default this daemon will try to self-confine itself to
              work with files under well-known directories determined at
              build time. It is better to stick with this default
              behavior and not to use this flag unless some other Access
              Control is used to confine daemon. Note that in contrast
              to other access control implementations that are typically
              enforced from kernel-space (e.g. DAC or MAC), self-
              confinement is imposed from the user-space daemon itself
              and hence should not be considered as a full confinement
              strategy, but instead should be viewed as an additional
              layer of security.

       --user=user:group
              Causes this program to run as a different user specified
              in user:group, thus dropping most of the root privileges.
              Short forms user and :group are also allowed, with current
              user or group assumed, respectively. Only daemons started
              by the root user accepts this argument.

              On Linux, daemons will be granted CAP_IPC_LOCK and
              CAP_NET_BIND_SERVICES before dropping root privileges.
              Daemons that interact with a datapath, such as
              ovs-vswitchd, will be granted three additional
              capabilities, namely CAP_NET_ADMIN, CAP_NET_BROADCAST and
              CAP_NET_RAW. The capability change will apply even if the
              new user is root.

              On Windows, this option is not currently supported. For
              security reasons, specifying this option will cause the
              daemon process not to start.

   Logging options
       -v[spec]
       --verbose=[spec]
            Sets logging levels. Without any spec, sets the log level
            for every module and destination to dbg. Otherwise, spec is
            a list of words separated by spaces or commas or colons, up
            to one from each category below:

            •      A valid module name, as displayed by the vlog/list
                   command on ovs-appctl(8), limits the log level change
                   to the specified module.

            •      syslog, console, or file, to limit the log level
                   change to only to the system log, to the console, or
                   to a file, respectively. (If --detach is specified,
                   the daemon closes its standard file descriptors, so
                   logging to the console will have no effect.)

                   On Windows platform, syslog is accepted as a word and
                   is only useful along with the --syslog-target option
                   (the word has no effect otherwise).

            •      off, emer, err, warn, info, or dbg, to control the
                   log level. Messages of the given severity or higher
                   will be logged, and messages of lower severity will
                   be filtered out. off filters out all messages. See
                   ovs-appctl(8) for a definition of each log level.

            Case is not significant within spec.

            Regardless of the log levels set for file, logging to a file
            will not take place unless --log-file is also specified (see
            below).

            For compatibility with older versions of OVS, any is
            accepted as a word but has no effect.

       -v
       --verbose
            Sets the maximum logging verbosity level, equivalent to
            --verbose=dbg.

       -vPATTERN:destination:pattern
       --verbose=PATTERN:destination:pattern
            Sets the log pattern for destination to pattern. Refer to
            ovs-appctl(8) for a description of the valid syntax for
            pattern.

       -vFACILITY:facility
       --verbose=FACILITY:facility
            Sets the RFC5424 facility of the log message. facility can
            be one of kern, user, mail, daemon, auth, syslog, lpr, news,
            uucp, clock, ftp, ntp, audit, alert, clock2, local0, local1,
            local2, local3, local4, local5, local6 or local7. If this
            option is not specified, daemon is used as the default for
            the local system syslog and local0 is used while sending a
            message to the target provided via the --syslog-target
            option.

       --log-file[=file]
            Enables logging to a file. If file is specified, then it is
            used as the exact name for the log file. The default log
            file name used if file is omitted is
            /usr/local/var/log/ovn/program.log.

       --syslog-target=host:port
            Send syslog messages to UDP port on host, in addition to the
            system syslog. The host must be a numerical IP address, not
            a hostname.

       --syslog-method=method
            Specify method as how syslog messages should be sent to
            syslog daemon. The following forms are supported:

            •      libc, to use the libc syslog() function. Downside of
                   using this options is that libc adds fixed prefix to
                   every message before it is actually sent to the
                   syslog daemon over /dev/log UNIX domain socket.

            •      unix:file, to use a UNIX domain socket directly. It
                   is possible to specify arbitrary message format with
                   this option. However, rsyslogd 8.9 and older versions
                   use hard coded parser function anyway that limits
                   UNIX domain socket use. If you want to use arbitrary
                   message format with older rsyslogd versions, then use
                   UDP socket to localhost IP address instead.

            •      udp:ip:port, to use a UDP socket. With this method it
                   is possible to use arbitrary message format also with
                   older rsyslogd. When sending syslog messages over UDP
                   socket extra precaution needs to be taken into
                   account, for example, syslog daemon needs to be
                   configured to listen on the specified UDP port,
                   accidental iptables rules could be interfering with
                   local syslog traffic and there are some security
                   considerations that apply to UDP sockets, but do not
                   apply to UNIX domain sockets.

            •      null, to discard all messages logged to syslog.

            The default is taken from the OVS_SYSLOG_METHOD environment
            variable; if it is unset, the default is libc.

   Table Formatting Options
       These options control the format of output from the list and find
       commands.

              -f format
              --format=format
                   Sets the type of table formatting. The following
                   types of format are available:

                   table  2-D text tables with aligned columns.

                   list (default)
                          A list with one column per line and rows
                          separated by a blank line.

                   html   HTML tables.

                   csv    Comma-separated values as defined in RFC 4180.

                   json   JSON format as defined in RFC 4627. The output
                          is a sequence of JSON objects, each of which
                          corresponds to one table. Each JSON object has
                          the following members with the noted values:

                          caption
                                 The table’s caption. This member is
                                 omitted if the table has no caption.

                          headings
                                 An array with one element per table
                                 column. Each array element is a string
                                 giving the corresponding column’s
                                 heading.

                          data   An array with one element per table
                                 row. Each element is also an array with
                                 one element per table column. The
                                 elements of this second-level array are
                                 the cells that constitute the table.
                                 Cells that represent OVSDB data or data
                                 types are expressed in the format
                                 described in the OVSDB specification;
                                 other cells are simply expressed as
                                 text strings.

              -d format
              --data=format
                   Sets the formatting for cells within output tables
                   unless the table format is set to json, in which case
                   json formatting is always used when formatting cells.
                   The following types of format are available:

                   string (default)
                          The simple format described in the Database
                          Values section of ovs-vsctl(8).

                   bare   The simple format with punctuation stripped
                          off: [] and {} are omitted around sets, maps,
                          and empty columns, items within sets and maps
                          are space-separated, and strings are never
                          quoted. This format may be easier for scripts
                          to parse.

                   json   The RFC 4627 JSON format as described above.

              --no-headings
                   This option suppresses the heading row that otherwise
                   appears in the first row of table output.

              --pretty
                   By default, JSON in output is printed as compactly as
                   possible. This option causes JSON in output to be
                   printed in a more readable fashion. Members of
                   objects and elements of arrays are printed one per
                   line, with indentation.

                   This option does not affect JSON in tables, which is
                   always printed compactly.

              --bare
                   Equivalent to --format=list --data=bare
                   --no-headings.

   PKI Options
       PKI configuration is required to use SSL for the connection to
       the database.

              -p privkey.pem
              --private-key=privkey.pem
                   Specifies a PEM file containing the private key used
                   as identity for outgoing SSL connections.

              -c cert.pem
              --certificate=cert.pem
                   Specifies a PEM file containing a certificate that
                   certifies the private key specified on -p or
                   --private-key to be trustworthy. The certificate must
                   be signed by the certificate authority (CA) that the
                   peer in SSL connections will use to verify it.

              -C cacert.pem
              --ca-cert=cacert.pem
                   Specifies a PEM file containing the CA certificate
                   for verifying certificates presented to this program
                   by SSL peers. (This may be the same certificate that
                   SSL peers use to verify the certificate specified on
                   -c or --certificate, or it may be a different one,
                   depending on the PKI design in use.)

              -C none
              --ca-cert=none
                   Disables verification of certificates presented by
                   SSL peers. This introduces a security risk, because
                   it means that certificates cannot be verified to be
                   those of known trusted hosts.

              --bootstrap-ca-cert=cacert.pem
                     When cacert.pem exists, this option has the same
                     effect as -C or --ca-cert. If it does not exist,
                     then the executable will attempt to obtain the CA
                     certificate from the SSL peer on its first SSL
                     connection and save it to the named PEM file. If it
                     is successful, it will immediately drop the
                     connection and reconnect, and from then on all SSL
                     connections must be authenticated by a certificate
                     signed by the CA certificate thus obtained.

                     This option exposes the SSL connection to a man-in-
                     the-middle attack obtaining the initial CA
                     certificate, but it may be useful for
                     bootstrapping.

                     This option is only useful if the SSL peer sends
                     its CA certificate as part of the SSL certificate
                     chain. The SSL protocol does not require the server
                     to send the CA certificate.

                     This option is mutually exclusive with -C and
                     --ca-cert.

   Other Options
       -h
       --help
            Prints a brief help message to the console.

       -V
       --version
            Prints version information to the console.

COMMANDS         top

       The following sections describe the commands that ovn-sbctl
       supports.

   OVN_Southbound Commands
       These commands work with an OVN_Southbound database as a whole.

              init   Initializes the database, if it is empty. If the
                     database has already been initialized, this command
                     has no effect.

              show   Prints a brief overview of the database contents.

   Chassis Commands
       These commands manipulate OVN_Southbound chassis.

              [--may-exist] chassis-add chassis encap-type encap-ip
                     Creates a new chassis named chassis. encap-type is
                     a comma-separated list of tunnel types. The chassis
                     will have one encap entry for each specified tunnel
                     type with encap-ip as the destination IP for each.

                     Without --may-exist, attempting to create a chassis
                     that exists is an error. With --may-exist, this
                     command does nothing if chassis already exists.

              [--if-exists] chassis-del chassis
                     Deletes chassis and its encaps and gateway_ports.

                     Without --if-exists, attempting to delete a chassis
                     that does not exist is an error. With --if-exists
                     attempting to delete a chassis that does not exist
                     has no effect.

   Port Binding Commands
       These commands manipulate OVN_Southbound port bindings.

              [--may-exist] lsp-bind logical-port chassis
                     Binds the logical port named logical-port to
                     chassis.

                     Without --may-exist, attempting to bind a logical
                     port that has already been bound is an error. With
                     --may-exist, this command does nothing if logical-
                     port has already been bound to a chassis.

              [--if-exists] lsp-unbind logical-port
                     Removes the binding of logical-port.

                     Without --if-exists, attempting to unbind a logical
                     port that is not bound is an error. With
                     --if-exists, attempting to unbind logical port that
                     is not bound has no effect.

   Logical Flow Commands
       [--uuid] [--ovs[=remote]] [--stats] [--vflows] lflow-list
       [logical-datapath] [lflow...]
              List logical flows. If logical-datapath is specified, only
              list flows for that logical datapath. The logical-datapath
              may be given as a UUID or as a datapath name (reporting an
              error if multiple datapaths have the same name).

              If at least one lflow is given, only matching logical
              flows, if any, are listed. Each lflow may be specified as
              a UUID or the first few characters of a UUID, optionally
              prefixed by 0x. (Because ovn-controller sets OpenFlow flow
              cookies to the first 32 bits of the corresponding logical
              flow’s UUID, this makes it easy to look up the logical
              flow that generated a particular OpenFlow flow.)

              If --uuid is specified, the output includes the first 32
              bits of each logical flow’s UUID. This makes it easier to
              find the OpenFlow flows that correspond to a given logical
              flow.

              If --ovs is included, ovn-sbctl attempts to obtain and
              display the OpenFlow flows that correspond to each OVN
              logical flow. To do so, ovn-sbctl connects to remote (by
              default, unix:/br-int.mgmt) over OpenFlow and retrieves
              the flows. If remote is specified, it must be an active
              OpenFlow connection method described in ovsdb(7). Please
              see the discussion of the similar --ovs option in
              ovn-trace(8) for more information about the OpenFlow flow
              output.

              By default, OpenFlow flow output includes only match and
              actions. Add --stats to include all OpenFlow information,
              such as packet and byte counters, duration, and timeouts.

              If --vflows is included, other southbound database records
              directly used for generating OpenFlow flows are also
              listed. This includes: port-bindings, mac-bindings,
              multicast-groups, chassis. The --ovs and --stats can also
              be used in conjunction with --vflows.

       [--uuid] dump-flows [logical-datapath]
              Alias for lflow-list.

       count-flows [logical-datapath]
              prints numbers of logical flows per table and per
              datapath.

   Remote Connectivity Commands
       These commands manipulate the connections column in the SB_Global
       table and rows in the Connection table. When ovsdb-server is
       configured to use the connections column for OVSDB connections,
       this allows the administrator to use \fBovn\-sbctl\fR to
       configure database connections.

              get-connection
                     Prints the configured connection(s).

              del-connection
                     Deletes the configured connection(s).

              [--inactivity-probe=msecs] set-connection target...
                     Sets the configured manager target or targets. Use
                     --inactivity-probe=msecs to override the default
                     idle connection inactivity probe time. Use 0 to
                     disable inactivity probes.

   SSL Configuration Commands
       When ovsdb-server is configured to connect using SSL, the
       following parameters are required:

              private-key
                     Specifies a PEM file containing the private key
                     used for SSL connections.

              certificate
                     Specifies a PEM file containing a certificate,
                     signed by the certificate authority (CA) used by
                     the connection peers, that certifies the private
                     key, identifying a trustworthy peer.

              ca-cert
                     Specifies a PEM file containing the CA certificate
                     used to verify that the connection peers are
                     trustworthy.

       These SSL settings apply to all SSL connections made by the
       southbound database server.

              get-ssl
                     Prints the SSL configuration.

              del-ssl
                     Deletes the current SSL configuration.

              [--bootstrap] set-ssl private-key certificate ca-cert
              [ssl-protocol-list [ssl-cipher-list]]
                     Sets the SSL configuration.

   Database Commands
       These commands query and modify the contents of ovsdb tables.
       They are a slight abstraction of the ovsdb interface and as such
       they operate at a lower level than other ovn-sbctl commands.

       Identifying Tables, Records, and Columns

       Each of these commands has a table parameter to identify a table
       within the database. Many of them also take a record parameter
       that identifies a particular record within a table. The record
       parameter may be the UUID for a record, which may be abbreviated
       to its first 4 (or more) hex digits, as long as that is unique.
       Many tables offer additional ways to identify records. Some
       commands also take column parameters that identify a particular
       field within the records in a table.

       For a list of tables and their columns, see ovn-sb(5) or see the
       table listing from the --help option.

       Record names must be specified in full and with correct
       capitalization, except that UUIDs may be abbreviated to their
       first 4 (or more) hex digits, as long as that is unique within
       the table. Names of tables and columns are not case-sensitive,
       and - and _ are treated interchangeably. Unique abbreviations of
       table and column names are acceptable, e.g. d or dhcp is
       sufficient to identify the DHCP_Options table.

       Database Values

       Each column in the database accepts a fixed type of data. The
       currently defined basic types, and their representations, are:

              integer
                     A decimal integer in the range -2**63 to 2**63-1,
                     inclusive.

              real   A floating-point number.

              Boolean
                     True or false, written true or false, respectively.

              string An arbitrary Unicode string, except that null bytes
                     are not allowed. Quotes are optional for most
                     strings that begin with an English letter or
                     underscore and consist only of letters,
                     underscores, hyphens, and periods. However, true
                     and false and strings that match the syntax of
                     UUIDs (see below) must be enclosed in double quotes
                     to distinguish them from other basic types. When
                     double quotes are used, the syntax is that of
                     strings in JSON, e.g. backslashes may be used to
                     escape special characters. The empty string must be
                     represented as a pair of double quotes ("").

              UUID   Either a universally unique identifier in the style
                     of RFC 4122, e.g.
                     f81d4fae-7dec-11d0-a765-00a0c91e6bf6, or an @name
                     defined by a get or create command within the same
                     ovs-vsctl invocation.

       Multiple values in a single column may be separated by spaces or
       a single comma. When multiple values are present, duplicates are
       not allowed, and order is not important. Conversely, some
       database columns can have an empty set of values, represented as
       [], and square brackets may optionally enclose other non-empty
       sets or single values as well.

       A few database columns are ``maps’’ of key-value pairs, where the
       key and the value are each some fixed database type. These are
       specified in the form key=value, where key and value follow the
       syntax for the column’s key type and value type, respectively.
       When multiple pairs are present (separated by spaces or a comma),
       duplicate keys are not allowed, and again the order is not
       important. Duplicate values are allowed. An empty map is
       represented as {}. Curly braces may optionally enclose non-empty
       maps as well (but use quotes to prevent the shell from expanding
       other-config={0=x,1=y} into other-config=0=x other-config=1=y,
       which may not have the desired effect).

       Database Command Syntax

              [--if-exists] [--columns=column[,column]...] list table
              [record]...
                     Lists the data in each specified record. If no
                     records are specified, lists all the records in
                     table.

                     If --columns is specified, only the requested
                     columns are listed, in the specified order.
                     Otherwise, all columns are listed, in alphabetical
                     order by column name.

                     Without --if-exists, it is an error if any
                     specified record does not exist. With --if-exists,
                     the command ignores any record that does not exist,
                     without producing any output.

              [--columns=column[,column]...] find table
              [column[:key]=value]...
                     Lists the data in each record in table whose column
                     equals value or, if key is specified, whose column
                     contains a key with the specified value. The
                     following operators may be used where = is written
                     in the syntax summary:

                     = != < > <= >=
                            Selects records in which column[:key]
                            equals, does not equal, is less than, is
                            greater than, is less than or equal to, or
                            is greater than or equal to value,
                            respectively.

                            Consider column[:key] and value as sets of
                            elements. Identical sets are considered
                            equal. Otherwise, if the sets have different
                            numbers of elements, then the set with more
                            elements is considered to be larger.
                            Otherwise, consider a element from each set
                            pairwise, in increasing order within each
                            set. The first pair that differs determines
                            the result. (For a column that contains key-
                            value pairs, first all the keys are
                            compared, and values are considered only if
                            the two sets contain identical keys.)

                     {=} {!=}
                            Test for set equality or inequality,
                            respectively.

                     {<=}   Selects records in which column[:key] is a
                            subset of value. For example,
                            flood-vlans{<=}1,2 selects records in which
                            the flood-vlans column is the empty set or
                            contains 1 or 2 or both.

                     {<}    Selects records in which column[:key] is a
                            proper subset of value. For example,
                            flood-vlans{<}1,2 selects records in which
                            the flood-vlans column is the empty set or
                            contains 1 or 2 but not both.

                     {>=} {>}
                            Same as {<=} and {<}, respectively, except
                            that the relationship is reversed. For
                            example, flood-vlans{>=}1,2 selects records
                            in which the flood-vlans column contains
                            both 1 and 2.

                     The following operators are available only in Open
                     vSwitch 2.16 and later:

                     {in}   Selects records in which every element in
                            column[:key] is also in value. (This is the
                            same as {<=}.)

                     {not-in}
                            Selects records in which every element in
                            column[:key] is not in value.

                     For arithmetic operators (= != < > <= >=), when key
                     is specified but a particular record’s column does
                     not contain key, the record is always omitted from
                     the results. Thus, the condition
                     other-config:mtu!=1500 matches records that have a
                     mtu key whose value is not 1500, but not those that
                     lack an mtu key.

                     For the set operators, when key is specified but a
                     particular record’s column does not contain key,
                     the comparison is done against an empty set. Thus,
                     the condition other-config:mtu{!=}1500 matches
                     records that have a mtu key whose value is not 1500
                     and those that lack an mtu key.

                     Don’t forget to escape < or > from interpretation
                     by the shell.

                     If --columns is specified, only the requested
                     columns are listed, in the specified order.
                     Otherwise all columns are listed, in alphabetical
                     order by column name.

                     The UUIDs shown for rows created in the same
                     ovs-vsctl invocation will be wrong.

              [--if-exists] [--id=@name] get table record
              [column[:key]]...
                     Prints the value of each specified column in the
                     given record in table. For map columns, a key may
                     optionally be specified, in which case the value
                     associated with key in the column is printed,
                     instead of the entire map.

                     Without --if-exists, it is an error if record does
                     not exist or key is specified, if key does not
                     exist in record. With --if-exists, a missing record
                     yields no output and a missing key prints a blank
                     line.

                     If @name is specified, then the UUID for record may
                     be referred to by that name later in the same
                     ovs-vsctl invocation in contexts where a UUID is
                     expected.

                     Both --id and the column arguments are optional,
                     but usually at least one or the other should be
                     specified. If both are omitted, then get has no
                     effect except to verify that record exists in
                     table.

                     --id and --if-exists cannot be used together.

              [--if-exists] set table record column[:key]=value...
                     Sets the value of each specified column in the
                     given record in table to value. For map columns, a
                     key may optionally be specified, in which case the
                     value associated with key in that column is changed
                     (or added, if none exists), instead of the entire
                     map.

                     Without --if-exists, it is an error if record does
                     not exist. With --if-exists, this command does
                     nothing if record does not exist.

              [--if-exists] add table record column [key=]value...
                     Adds the specified value or key-value pair to
                     column in record in table. If column is a map, then
                     key is required, otherwise it is prohibited. If key
                     already exists in a map column, then the current
                     value is not replaced (use the set command to
                     replace an existing value).

                     Without --if-exists, it is an error if record does
                     not exist. With --if-exists, this command does
                     nothing if record does not exist.

              [--if-exists] remove table record column value...

                     [--if-exists] remove table record column key...

                     [--if-exists] remove table record column
                     key=value...  Removes the specified values or key-
                     value pairs from column in record in table. The
                     first form applies to columns that are not maps:
                     each specified value is removed from the column.
                     The second and third forms apply to map columns: if
                     only a key is specified, then any key-value pair
                     with the given key is removed, regardless of its
                     value; if a value is given then a pair is removed
                     only if both key and value match.

                     It is not an error if the column does not contain
                     the specified key or value or pair.

                     Without --if-exists, it is an error if record does
                     not exist. With --if-exists, this command does
                     nothing if record does not exist.

              [--if-exists] clear table record column...
                     Sets each column in record in table to the empty
                     set or empty map, as appropriate. This command
                     applies only to columns that are allowed to be
                     empty.

                     Without --if-exists, it is an error if record does
                     not exist. With --if-exists, this command does
                     nothing if record does not exist.

              [--id=(@name|uuid)] create table column[:key]=value...
                     Creates a new record in table and sets the initial
                     values of each column. Columns not explicitly set
                     will receive their default values. Outputs the UUID
                     of the new row.

                     If @name is specified, then the UUID for the new
                     row may be referred to by that name elsewhere in
                     the same \*(PN invocation in contexts where a UUID
                     is expected. Such references may precede or follow
                     the create command.

                     If a valid uuid is specified, then it is used as
                     the UUID of the new row.

                     Caution (ovs-vsctl as example)
                            Records in the Open vSwitch database are
                            significant only when they can be reached
                            directly or indirectly from the Open_vSwitch
                            table. Except for records in the QoS or
                            Queue tables, records that are not reachable
                            from the Open_vSwitch table are
                            automatically deleted from the database.
                            This deletion happens immediately, without
                            waiting for additional ovs-vsctl commands or
                            other database activity. Thus, a create
                            command must generally be accompanied by
                            additional commands within the same
                            ovs-vsctl invocation to add a chain of
                            references to the newly created record from
                            the top-level Open_vSwitch record. The
                            EXAMPLES section gives some examples that
                            show how to do this.

              [--if-exists] destroy table record...
                     Deletes each specified record from table. Unless
                     --if-exists is specified, each records must exist.

              --all destroy table
                     Deletes all records from the table.

                     Caution (ovs-vsctl as example)
                            The destroy command is only useful for
                            records in the QoS or Queue tables. Records
                            in other tables are automatically deleted
                            from the database when they become
                            unreachable from the Open_vSwitch table.
                            This means that deleting the last reference
                            to a record is sufficient for deleting the
                            record itself. For records in these tables,
                            destroy is silently ignored. See the
                            EXAMPLES section below for more information.

              wait-until table record [column[:key]=value]...
                     Waits until table contains a record named record
                     whose column equals value or, if key is specified,
                     whose column contains a key with the specified
                     value. This command supports the same operators and
                     semantics described for the find command above.

                     If no column[:key]=value arguments are given, this
                     command waits only until record exists. If more
                     than one such argument is given, the command waits
                     until all of them are satisfied.

                     Caution (ovs-vsctl as example)
                            Usually wait-until should be placed at the
                            beginning of a set of ovs-vsctl commands.
                            For example, wait-until bridge br0 -- get
                            bridge br0 datapath_id waits until a bridge
                            named br0 is created, then prints its
                            datapath_id column, whereas get bridge br0
                            datapath_id -- wait-until bridge br0 will
                            abort if no bridge named br0 exists when
                            ovs-vsctl initially connects to the
                            database.

                     Consider specifying --timeout=0 along with
                     --wait-until, to prevent ovs-vsctl from terminating
                     after waiting only at most 5 seconds.

              comment [arg]...
                     This command has no effect on behavior, but any
                     database log record created by the command will
                     include the command and its arguments.

ENVIRONMENT         top

       OVN_SB_DAEMON
              If set, this should name the Unix domain socket for an
              ovn-sbctl server process. See Daemon Mode, above, for more
              information.

       OVN_SBCTL_OPTIONS
              If set, a set of options for ovn-sbctl to apply
              automatically, in the same form as on the command line.

       OVN_SB_DB
              If set, the default database to contact when the --db
              option is not used.

EXIT STATUS         top

       0      Successful program execution.

       1      Usage, syntax, or network error.

SEE ALSO         top

       ovn-sb(5), ovn-appctl(8).

COLOPHON         top

       This page is part of the Open Virtual Network (Daemons for Open
       vSwitch that translate virtual network configurations into
       OpenFlow) project.  Information about the project can be found at
       ⟨https://www.ovn.org/⟩.  If you have a bug report for this manual
       page, send it to [email protected].  This page was obtained
       from the project's upstream Git repository
       ⟨https://github.com/ovn-org/ovn⟩ on 2023-12-22.  (At that time,
       the date of the most recent commit that was found in the
       repository was 2023-12-18.)  If you discover any rendering
       problems in this HTML version of the page, or you believe there
       is a better or more up-to-date source for the page, or you have
       corrections or improvements to the information in this COLOPHON
       (which is not part of the original manual page), send a mail to
       [email protected]

OVN 23.06.90                    ovn-sbctl                   ovn-sbctl(8)

Pages that refer to this page: ovn-detrace(1)ovsdb(7)