Chapter 1. Planning your migration of the ML2 mechanism driver from OVS to OVN Red Hat chose ML2/OVN as the default mechanism driver for all new deployments starting with RHOSP 15.0 because it offers immediate advantages over the ML2/OVS mechanism driver for most customers today. Those advantages multiply with each release while we continue to enhance and improve the ML2/OVN feature set. The ML2/OVS mechanism driver is deprecated in RHOSP 17.0. Over several releases, Red Hat is replacing ML2/OVS with ML2/OVN. Support is available for the deprecated ML2/OVS mechanism driver through the RHOSP 17 releases. During this time, the ML2/OVS driver remains in maintenance mode, receiving bug fixes and normal support, and most new feature development happens in the ML2/OVN mechanism driver. In RHOSP 18.0, Red Hat plans to completely remove the ML2/OVS mechanism driver and stop supporting it. If your existing Red Hat OpenStack Platform (RHOSP) deployment uses the ML2/OVS mechanism driver, start now to evaluate the benefits and feasibility of replacing the ML2/OVS mechanism driver with the ML2/OVN mechanism driver. Migration is supported in RHOSP 16.2 and will be supported in RHOSP 17.1. Migration tools are available in RHOSP 17.0 for test purposes only. Note Red Hat requires that you file a proactive support case before attempting a migration from ML2/OVS to ML2/OVN. Red Hat does not support migrations without the proactive support case. See How to submit a Proactive Case . Engage your Red Hat Technical Account Manager or Red Hat Global Professional Services early in this evaluation. In addition to helping you file the required proactive support case if you decide to migrate, Red Hat can help you plan and prepare, starting with the following basic questions. When should you migrate? Timing depends on many factors, including your business needs and the status of our continuing improvements to the ML2/OVN offering. For instance, security groups logging is planned for a future RHOSP release. If you need that feature, you might plan for a migration after the feature is available. See Limitations of the ML2/OVN mechanism driver and ML2/OVS to ML2/OVN in-place migration: validated and prohibited scenarios . In-place migration or parallel migration? Depending on a variety of factors, you can choose between the following basic approaches to migration. Parallel migration. Create a new, parallel deployment that uses ML2/OVN and then move your operations to that deployment. In-place migration. Use the ovn_migration.sh script as described in this document. Note that Red Hat supports the ovn_migration.sh script only in deployments that are managed by RHOSP director. Warning An ML2/OVS to ML2/OVN migration alters the environment in ways that might not be completely reversible. A failed or interrupted migration can leave the OpenStack environment inoperable. Before migrating in a production environment, file a proactive support case. Then work with your Red Hat Technical Account Manager or Red Hat Global Professional Services to create a backup and migration plan and test the migration in a stage environment that closely resembles your production environment. 1.1. Limitations of the ML2/OVN mechanism driver Some features available with the ML2/OVS mechanism driver are not yet supported with the ML2/OVN mechanism driver. 1.1.1. ML2/OVS features not yet supported by ML2/OVN Feature Notes Track this Feature Provisioning Baremetal Machines with OVN DHCP The built-in DHCP server on OVN presently can not provision baremetal nodes. It cannot serve DHCP for the provisioning networks. Chainbooting iPXE requires tagging ( --dhcp-match in dnsmasq), which is not supported in the OVN DHCP server. https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1622154 1.1.2. Core OVN limitations North/south routing on VF(direct) ports on VLAN tenant networks does not work with SR-IOV because the external ports are not colocated with the logical router's gateway ports. See https://bugs.launchpad.net/neutron/+bug/1875852 . 1.2. ML2/OVS to ML2/OVN in-place migration: validated and prohibited scenarios Red Hat continues to test and refine in-place migration scenarios. Work with your Red Hat Technical Account Manager or Global Professional Services to determine whether your OVS deployment meets the criteria for a valid in-place migration scenario. 1.2.1. ML2/OVS to ML2/OVN in-place migration scenarios that have not been verified You cannot perform an in-place ML2/OVS to ML2/OVN migration in the following scenarios until Red Hat announces that the underlying issues are resolved. OVS uses trunk ports If your ML2/OVS deployment uses trunk ports, do not perform an ML2/OVS to ML2/OVN migration. The migration does not properly set up the trunked ports in the OVN environment. To track progress on this issue, see https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1857652 . DVR with VLAN project (tenant) networks Do not migrate to ML2/OVN with DVR and VLAN project networks. You can migrate to ML2/OVN with centralized routing. To track progress on this issue, see https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1766930 . 1.2.2. ML2/OVS to ML2/OVN in-place migration and security group rules Ensure that any custom security group rules in your originating ML2/OVS deployment are compatible with the target ML2/OVN deployment. For example, the default security group includes rules that allow egress to the DHCP server. If you deleted those rules in your ML2/OVS deployment, ML2/OVS automatically adds implicit rules that allow egress to the DHCP server. Those implicit rules are not supported by ML2/OVN, so in your target ML2/OVN environment, DHCP and metadata traffic would not reach the DHCP server and the instance would not boot. In this case, to restore DHCP access, you could add the following rules:

Commands:
Allow VM to contact dhcp server (ipv4) openstack security group rule create --egress --ethertype IPv4 --protocol udp --dst-port 67 USD{SEC_GROUP_ID} # Allow VM to contact metadata server (ipv4) openstack security group rule create --egress --ethertype IPv4 --protocol tcp --remote-ip 169.254.169.254 USD{SEC_GROUP_ID} # Allow VM to contact dhcp server (ipv6, non-slaac). Be aware that the remote-ip may vary depending on your use case! openstack security group rule create --egress --ethertype IPv6 --protocol udp --dst-port 547 --remote-ip ff02::1:2 USD{SEC_GROUP_ID} # Allow VM to contact metadata server (ipv6) openstack security group rule create --egress --ethertype IPv6 --protocol tcp --remote-ip fe80::a9fe:a9fe USD{SEC_GROUP_ID}