Network configuration

Overview

The chart below displays the blueprint network architecture for the vPLC solution. The network between the Virtual Gateway VM and the vPLC VMs can be separated via a separate software defined network through a virtual Switch (vSwitch). In this case the vPLC VMs are located in a separate network and not directly accessible from the LAN.

Preparation in vCenter

Create a vSwitch for all non-I/O networks and link to respective physical Ethernet NICs (e.g., onboard network adapter). Use the following VMware manual for creating a vSwitch Create a vSphere Standard Switch.

I/O network configuration

Network options

VMs can be either connected to physical NICs via a vSwitch (i.e., virtual switch) or SR-IOV. We recommend using SR-IOV for any I/O module connection. SR-IOV enables virtualization of multiple “vNICs” on the network card level and allows attaching VMs directly to those vNICs which enables faster real-time response times.

VMware Network Terminology

VMs are attached to so-called port groups, which in turn are attached to a vSwitch and physical NICs are connected to vSwitches (see figure below). We recommend to create a single vSwitch per physical NIC (incl. SR-IOV capable physical NICs). Note that in case of using SR-IOV you still need to create a vSwitch in vCenter, even though it does not use an actual virtualised switch, but connects the vPLC directly with the physical NIC. vCenter just uses the same terminology for SR-IOV and non-SR-IOV networks.

A port group is a virtual group of ports of a vSwitch that share the same VLAN ID. In case you need VLAN (e.g., for EtherCAT) each VM (i.e., PLC runtime) needs its own port group. We recommend creating a dedicated port group for each VM even if you don’t need VLAN. Port groups can be created remotely from the SDA Console (see below). In case of using SR-IOV you will need to create a port group as well, even though the traffic will be directly tunnelled from the VM to the vNIC that is simulated on the network card level.

I/O Network Configuration

1. If SR-IOV capable NICs are present: Activate SR-IOV in BIOS and within vCenter for each respective NIC following these instructions:Enable SR-IOV on a Host Physical Adapter

2. Create a vSwitch for each physical NIC following these instructions: Create a vSphere Standard Switch

3. All further steps (e.g., create port group) can be done from the SDA console (see below)