Clicking the interfaces tab will give you six subnavigation options: Physical, VLAN, Dummy, Bridge, ARP, and Shared Networks.
Physical
The physical navigation option will show a list of physical interfaces in the BMU. This page will update in real time to show the operational state (whether the port is physically up or down) and the administrative state (whether the port is enabled or disabled by the BMU software/an administrator).
Clicking the pencil icon will allow you to edit the interface. You can set the administrative state, the direction, the speed/duplex and MTU. The direction of the interface is directly related to Powercode. When an interface direction is Outside, this means that customer traffic is leaving the BMU through this interface. When an interface is Inside, this means that customer traffic is entering the BMU through this interface. When a direction is Excluded, this means that no rules or rate limiting should be applied on this interface.
For example, if the BMU is in a ring and both eth0 and eth1 are part of the ring, both eth0 and eth1 should be Outside. If customers are plugged into eth2 then eth2 should be Inside. Outside interfaces never respond to DHCP. Setting the interface direction incorrectly will also result in incorrect rate limiting.
The pie chart icon will allow you to see detailed, real time statistics on the interface including bytes transferred, collisions, CRC errors and more. The line graph icon will allow you to see a graph showing the interface throughput in real time.
VLAN
The VLAN tab will allow you to create VLAN interfaces on the BMU. Please note that these are purely subinterfaces on a physical interface – the BMU will not separate or segregate traffic based on the VLAN tag. Click the Add VLAN button to add a subinterface. You will be prompted to select the physical interface to attach to and to enter the VLAN tag.
VLAN interfaces will inherit direction from the parent interface. You can click the pencil icon to edit the interface and VLAN tag, the cross icon to delete the interface, the pie chart to view real time statistics and the line chart icon to view real time bandwidth usage.
Dummy
Dummy interfaces are used when you require a virtual management interface that is not associated with a specific physical interface. These are sometimes referred to as loopback or virtual interfaces. A common use for these interfaces is when running a dynamic routing protocol, so that you have a management interface that is accessible regardless of the physical interfaces that are up. The only action you can perform on this screen is to modify the administrative state of a dummy interface and to rename it. By default, the BMU has five dummy interfaces named dummy0 through dummy4 and they are all administratively down.
Bridge
Creating a bridge allows you to bond multiple physical interfaces together into a single transparent bridge. When bonding interfaces into the bridge, the physical interfaces will maintain their original direction so that, for example, if you wish to make the BMU as a transparent bridge, you can bond together eth0 and eth1, set eth0 to Outside and eth1 to Inside and have customers pass through transparently.
When adding a bridge, you can enable or disable the spanning tree protocol. Enabling the spanning tree protocol will allow you to modify settings like the forward delay and hello interval. The BMU does not support any advanced spanning tree protocols such as rapid spanning tree or per-vlan spanning tree.
After adding a bridge, you can add members to the bridge using the Add Member button. Please note that when adding a member to a bridge, all IP addresses on the interface become unroutable until the IP addresses are moved to the actual bridge interface. Take care you do not lock yourself out of your BMU!
The bridge is treated as a Layer 2 switch. The bridge is implemented in software so running bridges with significant throughput on them will negatively impact the BMU CPU. It is not recommended that you utilize bridges for networks with a large amount of traffic – use a dedicated switch instead and treat the BMU as a router.
ARP
The ARP screen shows the ARP table of the BMU in real time. You can add static ARP entries by clicking the Add ARP Entry button. Static ARP entries will have a red cross in the action column which will allow you to delete the entry. Dynamic ARP entries will have a trash can icon which will allow you to forcibly flush the ARP entry from the table.
Shared Networks
This page should generally not be used unless directed by Powercode support. You will define all your DHCP shared networks within Powercode.