Configurations to use the Precision Time Protocol (PTP).

You can configure the PTP in VMware Telco Cloud Automation in two modes:
  • PTP in Passthrough mode.
  • PTP over virtual function (VF) mode.

PTP in Passthrough Mode

VMware Telco Cloud Automation supports PTP in Passthrough mode on XXV710 and E810 cards. To use PTP in Passthrough mode, set Device Type to NIC when configuring the PTP using Infrastructure Designer. For details, see Infrastructure Requirements Designer.

The diagram shows how the PTP works in the passthrough mode.
Figure 1. PTP in Passthrough Mode
PTP in Passthrough Mode
Note:
  • For XXV710 card, you can use any Physical Function (PF) port for PTP.
  • For E810 card, you can use only Physical Function 0 (PF0) port for PTP.

PTP over VF Mode

VMware Telco Cloud Automation supports PTP over VF only for Intel E810 NICs. You can use any port of the E810 card for PTP over VF.

The diagram shows how the PTP over VF works.
Figure 2. PTP over VF
PTP over VF
You can create a host profile to use the PTP over VF. For details, see Add a Host Profile.
Note: Before you create the host profile for PTP over VF, ensure that you use a PTP-enabled port connected to PTP-enabled switch.

Creating a host profile enables you to control VF assignment from PF for a PTP.

For PTP over VF, the default VF assignment can happen from any of the SRIOV-enabled PFs.

Driver and Firmware versions for PTP over VF

The table provides information on the minimum versions of the driver and firmware that supports PTP over VF. For more information, see TCP RAN and TCA Software and Driver Version Compatibility Matrix.
NIC Type VendorID DeviceID Firmware ESXi Driver SR-IOV driver
Intel E810 8086 0x1591, 0x1592, 0x1593, 0x1599, 0x159A, 0x159B 3.0 icen 1.6.5 iavf 4.2.7

Verifying PTP configuration

  • Verify that PTP interface has hardware timestamp and PTP Hardware clock.
    capv@wc-ptpvf-test4-np1-5b485945fb-dphl4 [ ~ ]$ ethtool -T ptp
Time stamping parameters for ptp:
Capabilities:
hardware-transmit (SOF_TIMESTAMPING_TX_HARDWARE)
software-transmit (SOF_TIMESTAMPING_TX_SOFTWARE)
hardware-receive (SOF_TIMESTAMPING_RX_HARDWARE)
software-receive (SOF_TIMESTAMPING_RX_SOFTWARE)
software-system-clock (SOF_TIMESTAMPING_SOFTWARE)
hardware-raw-clock (SOF_TIMESTAMPING_RAW_HARDWARE)
PTP Hardware Clock: 0
Hardware Transmit Timestamp Modes:
off (HWTSTAMP_TX_OFF)
on (HWTSTAMP_TX_ON)
Hardware Receive Filter Modes:
none (HWTSTAMP_FILTER_NONE)
all (HWTSTAMP_FILTER_ALL)
capv@wc-ptpvf-test4-np1-5b485945fb-dphl4 [ ~ ]$
  • Verify the running of the ptp4l service.
    capv@wc-ptpvf-test4-np1-5b485945fb-dphl4 [ ~ ]$ systemctl status ptp4l
ptp4l.service - Precision Time Protocol (PTP) service
Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/ptp4l.service; enabled; vendor preset: enabled)
Active: active (running) since Wed 2022-01-26 00:39:10 UTC; 5 days ago
Main PID: 27668 (ptp4l)
Tasks: 1 (limit: 4915)
Memory: 168.0K
CGroup: /system.slice/ptp4l.service
└─27668 /usr/sbin/ptp4l -f /etc/ptp4l.conf
capv@wc-ptpvf-test4-np1-5b485945fb-dphl4 [ ~ ]$