About SPAN Sessions
The Switched Port Analyzer (SPAN) or Port Mirroring feature helps you analyze network traffic passing through interfaces or VLANs by using SPAN sessions. The SPAN sessions send a copy (mirror) of the traffic to another interface or VLAN on the switch that has been connected to a network analyzer or monitoring device. SPAN does not affect the switching of network traffic on the source interfaces.
Note |
You must dedicate a destination port for SPAN use. Except for traffic that is required for the SPAN session, destination ports do not receive or forward traffic. When the SPAN is configured on the system, there might be some performance hit. |
SPAN Session Interfaces
The interface can be:
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Physical interface
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LAN SRIOV
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VM's vNIC (virtio net)
In the case of virtio net or SRIOV VF, you have to specify the VM group name and NIC ID of the VM interface. If the VM vNIC is virtio net type, then the SPAN session is applied on the OVS bridge. If VM vNIC is SRIOV VF, then the mirror is applied to the hardware bridge. The interface name is specified for a physical interface, for example, GE0-0 or eth0.