Advanced networks

Virtual machine image:

Few exercises need to be done locally on your own machine. You can either run them directly on your machine (after perhaps installing the tools needed by each exercise), or you can run them via a virtual machine that you need to install locally. In the latter case, please check whether one of the virtual machines below works on your laptop and let us know about any difficulties you may experience. The offered virtual machines have most tools already pre-installed.

You need to access the links from your EPFL Google account.

Please note that the password for these VMs is: lca2

VininetVM for x86 (for Windows, Linux and old Mac processor)

VininetVM for arm (for Mac with M1 or M2 processor)

Installation Guide

If your host machine runs on Windows or Linux, download VMware Workstation Player for your operating system. The labs were tested on version 17.0.2. Then, download the virtual HD image MininetVM-x86.ova from the link above.

If your host machine runs on Mac, download VMware Fusion Player. You will need to register for a personal use license, which is free. The labs were tested on version 13.

If you have a Mac with M1 processor, download MininetVM-arm.zip from the link above and unzip it. If you have an older Mac, download MininetVM-x86.ova.

Installation Instructions

If you have an x86 processor, open VMware, click on ”file” and ”Open a Virtual Machine”. Select the MininetVM-x86.ova file, name your VM as ”MininetVM” and click ”import”. You might get an error message that the import did not pass OVF specification. Click ”Retry” and it should work.

If you have an ARM processor, open VMware, click on ”file” and ”Open”, and select the file MininetVM-arm.

VM Configuration

Now that the machine is created, we need to add some features to it. First, we create a shared folder between the guest machine and the host machine (i.e., your computer). With this folder, you can easily backup and transfer configuration scripts, snapshots, and any file you might find useful during your labs.

Right-click on your VM and click on ”Virtual Machine Settings”, in the ”Options” tab, select ”shared Folders” and select the option ”Always enabled”. Then, click on ”Add”, name the folder ”shared”, and click on ”Browse” to select a folder from your host machine. Note that the shared folder is not yet available on the VM. To do this, we need to mount the shared folder to the VM. To mount the shared folder, create the /mnt/hgfs directory if it does not exist: sudo mkdir -p /mnt/hgfs 

Then, you can mount the shared folder using the command: sudo mount -t fuse.vmhgfs-fuse .host:/ /mnt/hgfs -o allow_other

Now you should be able to access the shared folder (it will appear as a subdirectory of /mnt/hgfs). The shared folder will only be available during this session: you need to mount the shared folder every time you restart the VM. To make the shared folder persist across sessions, add the following line at the end of the /etc/fstab file:

.host:/ /mnt/hgfs fuse.vmhgfs-fuse auto,allow_other 0 0

We also need to attach a NAT to the VM for it to be able to access the internet via the host connection. This should be done by default, but in case it is not, follow the steps below.

If you are on Windows or Linux, right-click on your VM, and select ”Virtual Machine Settings”. Select the ”Network Adapter” tab and make sure the options ”Connect at power on” and ”NAT: Used to share the host’s IP address” are connected.

If you are on a Mac, click on your VM, then click on the ”Virtual Machine” tab from the VMware menu (top of the screen), and under ”Network Adapter”, select the option ”NAT”.