Testing

It is possible to test OVN using both tooling provided with Open vSwitch and using a variety of third party tooling.

Built-in Tooling

OVN provides a number of different test suites and other tooling for validating basic functionality of OVN. Before running any of the tests described here, you must bootstrap, configure and build OVN as described in OVN on Linux, FreeBSD and NetBSD. You do not need to install OVN, Open vSwitch or to build or load the kernel module to run these test suites.You do not need supervisor privilege to run these test suites.

Unit Tests

OVN includes a suite of self-tests. Before you submit patches upstream, we advise that you run the tests and ensure that they pass. If you add new features to OVN, then adding tests for those features will ensure your features don’t break as developers modify other areas of OVN.

To run all the unit tests in OVN, one at a time, run:

$ make check

This takes under 5 minutes on a modern desktop system.

To run all the unit tests in OVN in parallel, run:

$ make check TESTSUITEFLAGS=-j8

You can run up to eight threads. This takes under a minute on a modern 4-core desktop system.

To see a list of all the available tests, run:

$ make check TESTSUITEFLAGS=--list

To run only a subset of tests, e.g. test 123 and tests 477 through 484, run:

$ make check TESTSUITEFLAGS='123 477-484'

Tests do not have inter-dependencies, so you may run any subset.

To run tests matching a keyword, e.g. ovsdb, run:

$ make check TESTSUITEFLAGS='-k ovsdb'

To see a complete list of test options, run:

$ make check TESTSUITEFLAGS=--help

The results of a testing run are reported in tests/testsuite.log. Report report test failures as bugs and include the testsuite.log in your report.

Note

Sometimes a few tests may fail on some runs but not others. This is usually a bug in the testsuite, not a bug in OVN itself. If you find that a test fails intermittently, please report it, since the developers may not have noticed. You can make the testsuite automatically rerun tests that fail, by adding RECHECK=yes to the make command line, e.g.:

$ make check TESTSUITEFLAGS=-j8 RECHECK=yes

Debugging unit tests

To initiate debugging from artifacts generated from make check run, set the OVS_PAUSE_TEST environment variable to 1. For example, to run test case 139 and pause on error:

$ OVS_PAUSE_TEST=1 make check TESTSUITEFLAGS='-v 139'

When error occurs, above command would display something like this:

Set environment variable to use various ovs utilities
export OVS_RUNDIR=<dir>/ovs/_build-gcc/tests/testsuite.dir/0139
Press ENTER to continue:

And from another window, one can execute ovs-xxx commands like:

export OVS_RUNDIR=/opt/vdasari/Developer/ovs/_build-gcc/tests/testsuite.dir/0139
$ ovs-ofctl dump-ports br0
.
.

Once done with investigation, press ENTER to perform cleanup operation.

OVS_PAUSE_TEST=1 only pauses failed tests when run with ‘-v’ option. Tests run without ‘-v’, or successful tests, are not paused.

Coverage

If the build was configured with --enable-coverage and the lcov utility is installed, you can run the testsuite and generate a code coverage report by using the check-lcov target:

$ make check-lcov

All the same options are available via TESTSUITEFLAGS. For example:

$ make check-lcov TESTSUITEFLAGS='-j8 -k ovn'

Valgrind

If you have valgrind installed, you can run the testsuite under valgrind by using the check-valgrind target:

$ make check-valgrind

When you do this, the “valgrind” results for test <N> are reported in files named tests/testsuite.dir/<N>/valgrind.*.

To test the testsuite of kernel datapath under valgrind, you can use the check-kernel-valgrind target and find the “valgrind” results under directory tests/system-kmod-testsuite.dir/.

All the same options are available via TESTSUITEFLAGS.

Hint

You may find that the valgrind results are easier to interpret if you put -q in ~/.valgrindrc, since that reduces the amount of output.

Static Code Analysis

Static Analysis is a method of debugging Software by examining code rather than actually executing it. This can be done through ‘scan-build’ commandline utility which internally uses clang (or) gcc to compile the code and also invokes a static analyzer to do the code analysis. At the end of the build, the reports are aggregated in to a common folder and can later be analyzed using ‘scan-view’.

OVN includes a Makefile target to trigger static code analysis:

$ ./boot.sh
$ ./configure CC=clang  # clang
# or
$ ./configure CC=gcc CFLAGS="-std=gnu99"  # gcc
$ make clang-analyze

You should invoke scan-view to view analysis results. The last line of output from clang-analyze will list the command (containing results directory) that you should invoke to view the results on a browser.

Datapath testing

OVN includes a suite of tests specifically for datapath functionality. The datapath tests make some assumptions about the environment. They must be run under root privileges on a Linux system with support for network namespaces. Make sure no other Open vSwitch instance is running the test suite. These tests may take several minutes to complete, and cannot be run in parallel.

To invoke the datapath testsuite with the OVS userspace datapath, run:

$ make check-system-userspace

The results of the userspace testsuite appear in tests/system-userspace-testsuite.dir.

To invoke the datapath testsuite with the OVS kernel datapath, run:

$ make check-kernel

The results of the kernel testsuite appear in tests/system-kmod-testsuite.dir.

The tests themselves must run as root. If you do not run make as root, then you can specify a program to get superuser privileges as SUDO=<program>, e.g. the following uses sudo (the -E option is needed to pass through environment variables):

$ make check-system-userspace SUDO='sudo -E'

The testsuite creates and destroys tap devices named ovs-netdev and br0. If it is interrupted during a test, then before it can be restarted, you may need to destroy these devices with commands like the following:

$ ip tuntap del dev ovs-netdev mode tap
$ ip tuntap del dev br0 mode tap

All the features documented under Unit Tests are available for the datapath testsuites, except that the datapath testsuites do not support running tests in parallel.

It is also possible to run retis capture along with the check-kernel tests by setting OVS_TEST_WITH_RETIS environment variable to ‘yes’. This can be useful for debugging the test cases. For example, the following command can be used to run the test 168 under retis:

$ make check-kernel OVS_TEST_WITH_RETIS=yes TESTSUITEFLAGS='168 -d'

After the test is completed, the following data will be available in the test directory:

  • retis.err - standard error stream of the retis collect.

  • retis.log - standard output of the retis collect, contains all captured events in the order they appeared.

  • retis.data - raw events collected by retis, retis sort or other commands can be used on this file for further analysis.

  • retis.sorted - text file containing the output of retis sort executed on the retis.data, for convenience.

Requires retis version 1.5 or newer. And this also requires OVS submodule to be built with –enable-usdt-probes.

Performance testing

OVN includes a suite of micro-benchmarks to aid a developer in understanding the performance impact of any changes that they are making. They can be used to help to understand the relative performance between two test runs on the same test machine, but are not intended to give the absolute performance of OVN.

To invoke the performance testsuite, run:

$ make check-perf

This will run all available performance tests. Some of these tests may be long-running as they need to build complex logical network topologies. In order to speed up subsequent test runs, some objects (e.g. the Northbound DB) may be cached. In order to force the tests to rebuild all these objects, run:

$ make check-perf TESTSUITEFLAGS="--rebuild"

A typical workflow for a developer trying to improve the performance of OVN would be the following:

  1. Optional: Modify/add a performance test to buld the topology that you are benchmarking, if required.

  2. Run make check-perf TESTSUITEFLAGS="--rebuild" to generate cached databases (and complete a test run). The results of each test run are displayed on the screen at the end of the test run but are also saved in the file tests/perf-testsuite.dir/results.

Note

This step may take some time depending on the number of tests that are being rebuilt, the complexity of the tests and the performance of the test machine. If you are only using one test, you can specify the test to run by adding the test number to the make command. (e.g. make check-perf TESTSUITEFLAGS="--rebuild <test number>")

  1. Run make check-perf to measure the performance metric that you are benchmarking against. If you are only using one test, you can specify the test to run by adding the test number to the make command. (e.g. make check-perf TESTSUITEFLAGS="--rebuild <test number>")

  2. Modify OVN code to implement the change that you believe will improve the performance.

  3. Go to Step 2. to continue making improvements.

If, as a developer, you modify a performance test in a way that may change one of these cached objects, be sure to rebuild the test.

The cached objects are stored under the relevant folder in tests/perf-testsuite.dir/cached.

OVN Upgrade Testing

Overview

OVN upgrade tests validate that the system continues to function correctly during rolling upgrades, specifically testing the intermediate state where ovn-controller is upgraded before ovn-northd and the databases.

The upgrade tests run the system test suite from an older OVN version using binaries (ovn-controller, ovs-vswitchd, etc.) from the current development version, ensuring backward compatibility.

Running Upgrade Tests Locally

Basic usage:

$ make check-upgrade

This will test upgrades from branch-24.03 (the default base version).

Specify a different base version:

$ make check-upgrade BASE_VERSION=branch-24.09

Run a specific range of tests:

$ make check-upgrade BASE_VERSION=branch-25.03 TESTSUITEFLAGS="1-100"

Run only unstable tests:

$ make check-upgrade UNSTABLE=1 TESTSUITEFLAGS="-k unstable"

Environment Variables

BASE_VERSION

Git branch to use as the base version (default: branch-24.03)

  • branch-24.03: the local repo will be used as the source repo.

  • origin/branch-24.03: the local repo origin is used as the source repo.

  • If branch is not found in local repo, it will be searched in its origin (e.g. private github repo or ovn_org repo). If not found in private github repo, it will be searched in ovn_org repo.

TESTSUITEFLAGS

Test range to run, using autotest syntax (default: 1-, meaning all tests)

  • 1-100 - Run tests 1 through 100

  • 50- - Run tests 50 and above

  • -k unstable - Run tests with ‘unstable’ keyword

Additional flags to pass to the testsuite. Use -d to keep test directories on success for debugging.

UNSTABLE

Set to 1 to run unstable tests (default: disabled)

How Upgrade Tests Work

The upgrade test workflow:

  1. Save Current Binaries

    The test framework saves binaries from your current working tree:

    • ovn-controller

    • ovs-vswitchd, ovsdb-server

    • ovs-vsctl, ovs-ofctl, ovs-appctl, ovs-dpctl

    • Flow table definitions from controller/lflow.h

  2. Clone and Checkout Base Version

    Creates upgrade-testsuite.dir/ovn-upgrade-base/ and checks out the specified base version.

  3. Patch Old Tests

    • Updates hardcoded flow table numbers if tables were renumbered

    • Adds schema compatibility filters to suppress expected warnings

    • Replaces OFTABLE_* m4 macros with current values

  4. Build Base Version

    Builds the base version twice:

    • With patched lflow.h to create hybrid ovn-debug tool

    • With original lflow.h for proper ovn-northd and ovn-nbctl

  5. Swap Binaries

    Replaces the base version’s binaries with current versions:

    • Base version: ovn-northd, ovn-nbctl (test infrastructure)

    • Current version: ovn-controller, ovs-vswitchd, ovsdb-server

  6. Run Tests

    Executes the system test suite from the base version with the mixed binary set.

Interpreting Test Failures

Test failures during upgrade testing can indicate:

Backward Compatibility Issues

The new ovn-controller is incompatible with the old northd/databases. This is a critical issue that must be fixed before release.

Flow Generation Changes

If flow table contents changed intentionally, the (old) test may need the TAG_TEST_NOT_UPGRADABLE tag.

Debugging Failed Tests

On failure, the test directory is preserved in upgrade-testsuite.dir/.

Check the logs:

$ upgrade-testsuite.dir/git.log  # Git operations
$ upgrade-testsuite.dir/build-base.log  # Build output
$ upgrade-testsuite.dir/ovn-upgrade-base/tests/system-kmod-testsuite.log

Keep test directory for debugging:

$ make check-upgrade TESTSUITEFLAGS="-d"

Marking Tests as Non-Upgradable

Some tests cannot run in upgrade scenarios: tests for features not yet fully present in the base version.

Mark these tests with the TAG_TEST_NOT_UPGRADABLE keyword:

AT_SETUP([test that checks flow details])
AT_KEYWORDS([TAG_TEST_NOT_UPGRADABLE])
# ... test code ...
AT_CLEANUP

These tests will be skipped during upgrade testing but run normally otherwise.

CI Integration

Upgrade tests run automatically in GitHub Actions:

On Schedule (Weekly)

  • Tests all supported versions (24.03, 24.09, 25.03, 25.09)

Implementation Details

Test are run locally through check-upgrade Makefile target. The flow for make check-upgrade is:

  • Makefile

  • ci/ovn_upgrade_test.py: run_upgrade_workflow, run_tests

  • ci/linux-build.sh(TESTSUITE=system-test)

  • execute_system_tests “check-kernel” “system-kmod-testsuite.log”

  • run_system_tests check-kernel

Through the ci the flow is:

  • ci.sh: run_in_container ./.ci/linux-build.sh (TESTSUITE=upgrade-test)

  • execute_system_tests “check-upgrade” “system-kmod-testsuite.log”

  • run_system_tests check-upgrade

  • Back to make check-upgrade-flow.