a5213f145a
The tap driver is used to present a virtual Ethernet interface to the system. Packets presented by the network stack to the interface are made available to a character device in /dev. With tap and the bridge code, you can make remote bridge configurations where both sides of the bridge are separated by userland daemons. This driver also has a special naming hack to allow it to serve a similar purpose to the vmware port. Submitted by: myevmenkin@att.com, vsilyaev@mindspring.com
218 lines
5.0 KiB
Groff
218 lines
5.0 KiB
Groff
.\" $FreeBSD$
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.\" Based on PR#2411
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.\"
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.Dd July 9, 2000
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.Os
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.Dt TAP 4
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.Sh NAME
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.Nm tap
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.Nd Ethernet tunnel software network interface
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.Sh SYNOPSIS
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.Cd pseudo-device tap
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.Sh DESCRIPTION
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The
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.Nm tap
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interface is a software loopback mechanism that can be loosely
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described as the network interface analog of the
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.Xr pty 4 ,
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that is,
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.Nm tap
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does for network interfaces what the
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.Nm pty
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driver does for terminals.
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.Pp
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The
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.Nm tap
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driver, like the
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.Nm pty
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driver, provides two interfaces: an interface like the usual facility
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it is simulating
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.Po
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an Ethernet network interface in the case of
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.Nm tap ,
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or a terminal for
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.Nm pty
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.Pc ,
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and a character-special device
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.Dq control
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interface.
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.Pp
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The network interfaces are named
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.Sy tap Ns Ar 0 ,
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.Sy tap Ns Ar 1 ,
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etc, as many as were made by
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.Xr MAKEDEV 8 .
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Each one supports the usual Ethernet network-interface
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.Xr ioctl 2 Ns s ,
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such as
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.Dv SIOCSIFADDR
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and
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.Dv SIOCSIFNETMASK ,
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and thus can be used with
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.Xr ifconfig 8
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like any other Ethernet interface. When the system chooses to transmit
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an Ethernet frame on the network interface, the frame can be read from
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the control device
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.Po
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it appears as
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.Dq input
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there
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.Pc ;
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writing an Ethernet frame to the control device generates an input frame on
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the network interface, as if the
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.Pq non-existent
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hardware had just received it.
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.Pp
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The Ethernet tunnel device, normally
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.Pa /dev/tap Ns Sy N ,
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is exclusive-open
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.Po
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it cannot be opened if it is already open
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.Pc
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and is restricted to the super-user.
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A
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.Fn read
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call will return an error
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.Pq Er EHOSTDOWN
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if the interface is not
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.Dq ready .
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Once the interface is ready,
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.Fn read
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will return an Ethernet frame if one is available; if not, it will
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either block until one is or return
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.Er EWOULDBLOCK ,
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depending on whether non-blocking I/O has been enabled. If the frame
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is longer than is allowed for in the buffer passed to
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.Fn read ,
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the extra data will be silently dropped.
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.Pp
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A
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.Xr write 2
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call passes an Ethernet frame in to be
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.Dq received
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on the pseudo-interface. Each
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.Fn write
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call supplies exactly one frame; the frame length is taken from the
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amount of data provided to
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.Fn write .
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Writes will not block; if the frame cannot be accepted
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for a transient reason
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.Pq e.g., no buffer space available ,
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it is silently dropped; if the reason is not transient
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.Pq e.g., frame too large ,
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an error is returned.
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The following
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.Xr ioctl 2
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calls are supported
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.Pq defined in Aq Pa net/if_tap.h Ns :
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.Bl -tag -width VMIO_SIOCSETMACADDR
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.It Dv TAPSDEBUG
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The argument should be a pointer to an
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.Va int ;
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this sets the internal debugging variable to that value. What, if
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anything, this variable controls is not documented here; see the source
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code.
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.It Dv TAPGDEBUG
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The argument should be a pointer to an
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.Va int ;
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this stores the internal debugging variable's value into it.
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.It Dv FIONBIO
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Turn non-blocking I/O for reads off or on, according as the argument
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.Va int Ns 's
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value is or isn't zero
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.Pq Writes are always nonblocking .
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.It Dv FIOASYNC
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Turn asynchronous I/O for reads
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.Po
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i.e., generation of
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.Dv SIGIO
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when data is available to be read
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.Pc
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off or on, according as the argument
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.Va int Ns 's
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value is or isn't zero.
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.It Dv FIONREAD
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If any frames are queued to be read, store the size of the first one into the argument
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.Va int ;
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otherwise, store zero.
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.It Dv TIOCSPGRP
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Set the process group to receive
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.Dv SIGIO
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signals, when asynchronous I/O is enabled, to the argument
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.Va int
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value.
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.It Dv TIOCGPGRP
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Retrieve the process group value for
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.Dv SIGIO
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signals into the argument
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.Va int
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value.
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.It SIOCGIFADDR
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Retrieve the Media Access Control
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.Pq MAC
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address. This command should be executed on descriptor, associated with
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control device
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.Pq Pa /dev/tap Ns Sy N .
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The
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.Va buffer ,
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which is passed as argument, is expected to have enought space to store
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.Pq MAC
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address.
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.It SIOCSIFADDR
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Set the Media Access Control
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.Pq MAC
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address. This command should be executed on a descriptor, associated with
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control device
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.Pq Pa /dev/tap Ns Sy N .
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.El
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.Pp
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The control device also supports
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.Xr select 2
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for read; selecting for write is pointless, and always succeeds, since
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writes are always non-blocking.
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.Pp
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On the last close of the data device, by default, the interface is
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brought down
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.Po
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as if with
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.Dq ifconfig tap Ns Sy N No down
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.Pc .
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All queued frames are thrown away. If the interface is up when the data
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device is not open output frames are always thrown away rather than
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letting them pile up.
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.Pp
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The
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.Nm tap
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device is also can be used with VMware port as a replacement
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of VMnet device driver. The driver uses minor number to select between
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.Nm tap
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and
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.Nm vmnet
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devices. VMnet minor numbering is
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.Va 0x10000
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+
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.Va N .
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Where
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.Va N
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is a VMnet unit number. In this case control device is expected to be
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.Pa /dev/vmnet Ns Sy N ,
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and network interface will be
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.Sy vmnet Ns Ar N .
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Everything else is the same.
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.Pp
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In addition to mentioned above
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.Xr ioctl 2
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there are additional one for VMware port.
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.Bl -tag -width VMIO_SIOCSETMACADDR
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.It VMIO_SIOCSIFFLAGS
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VMware
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.Dv SIOCSIFFLAGS .
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.El
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.Sh SEE ALSO
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.Xr inet 4 ,
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.Xr intro 4
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.\" .Sh BUGS
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.Sh AUTHORS
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This man page has been obtained from
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.Bx Free .
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