HP FlexFabric Virtual Switch 5900v FAQ

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• VCE—Acts as the control plane of the virtual switch and controls VFEs. It runs protocols such as OpenFlow
and EVB. You configure EVB, VLAN, Private VLAN (PVLAN), and link aggregation features on the VCE for
the 5900v.
• VFE—Deployed on multiple ESXi servers to act as the data forwarding plane to forward traffic for the Virtual
Distributed Switch (VDS).
• VMware plug-in—Registered with the VMware vCenter through VCE. It communicates with VMware and
IMC. You can set traffic policy control functions and display the running status of port groups, link
aggregation, and VDP on a VMware plug-in.
Q. What is the relationship between VSO and VCE?
A. VSO is the short for HP FlexFabric Virtual Switch Orchestrati
on Software. Virtual control engine (VCE) is the
role that VSO plays in the 5900v virtual switch.
Q. What types of VLANs does a PVLAN include? What are their functions?
A. PVLAN includes primary VLAN and secondary VLAN.
• Pr
imary VLAN has the following features:
{ A PVLAN can only have one primary VLAN.
{ All ports in a PVLAN belong to the primary VLAN.
{ A primary VLAN transmits gateway to host traffic.
• Secondary VLAN (community VLAN and isolated VLAN) has the following features:
{ Hosts in different secondary VLANs are isolated from one another.
{ Hosts in different secondary VLANs can use the same Layer 3 interface in a primary VLAN.
{ A secondary VLAN transmits host to host and host to gateway traffic.
{ Multiple community VLANs can exist in a secondary VLAN, and ports in a community VLAN can
communicate with one another.
{ Multiple isolated VLANs can exist in a secondary VLAN, and all ports in an isolated VLAN are isolated
from one another.
Q. What are the primary differences between an HP 5
900v virtual switch and a physical switch?
A. The following are the primary differences:
Item
5900v virtual switch
Ph
y
sical switch
Product form Software Hardware
Location
Located at the Hypervisor layer of the ESXi
host.
Separated from the server.
Forwarding table
OpenFlow compliant, and flow-based.
The forwarding table includes more
information than the conventional MAC
address table. For example, the table also
includes the action to take on a flow.
Conventional MAC address table,
including MAC, VLAN, and outgoing port
information.
Control and data
planes
The control plane and the data plane are
located on different devices.
The control plane and the data plane are
co-located on the physical switch.