deploying-network-operator

name	deploying-network-operator
description	Deploy NVIDIA Network Operator to a Kubernetes cluster via netop-tools. Use when installing network operator, setting up RDMA networking, deploying SR-IOV, running ins-network-operator.sh, generating Helm values, applying network CRDs, or troubleshooting deployment failures.

Deploying Network Operator

Guide the full deployment pipeline from config generation through Helm install and CRD application.

Prerequisites

source NETOP_ROOT_DIR.sh
# global_ops_user.cfg must exist and be edited for the target platform
source global_ops.cfg

Deployment Pipeline

# 1. Set use case
./setuc.sh ${USECASE}

# 2. Generate all config (dry run by default: CREATE_CONFIG_ONLY=1)
cd usecase/${USECASE}
${NETOP_ROOT_DIR}/ops/mk-config.sh

# 3. Review generated YAML before deploying
ls -la *.yaml

# 4. Deploy (set CREATE_CONFIG_ONLY=0 to actually run helm/kubectl)
export CREATE_CONFIG_ONLY=0
${NETOP_ROOT_DIR}/install/ins-network-operator.sh

What mk-config.sh generates

Script	Output	Purpose
ops/mk-values.sh	values.yaml	Helm values (feature flags, images)
ops/mk-nic-cluster-policy.sh	NicClusterPolicy.yaml	NicClusterPolicy CRD
ops/mk-network-cr.sh	network.yaml + ippool-*.yaml	Network + IPAM CRDs per device
ops/mk-sriov-node-pool.sh	sriov-node-pool-config.yaml	SR-IOV VF allocation
ops/mk-nic-config.sh	nic-config-crd-{type}.yaml	NIC firmware config (if NIC_CONFIG_ENABLE=true)

Python CLI alternative

python3 python_tools/netop_tools.py install helm
python3 python_tools/netop_tools.py install chart
python3 python_tools/netop_tools.py install network-operator
python3 python_tools/netop_tools.py install calico
python3 python_tools/netop_tools.py install crds

Post-Deploy Verification

kubectl get pods -n ${NETOP_NAMESPACE}
./ops/getnetwork.sh
./ops/checksriovstate.sh
./ops/syncsriov.sh              # Wait for SR-IOV sync (can take 10+ min)
./ops/checkipam.sh

Common Failures

Symptom	Cause	Fix
"User configuration file not found"	Missing global_ops_user.cfg	Copy from config/{platform}/
Helm chart not found	Wrong NETOP_VERSION	Check available versions: 24.7.0 through 26.1.0
No VFs created	CREATE_CONFIG_ONLY=1 (default)	Set CREATE_CONFIG_ONLY=0 before deploy
SR-IOV sync stuck	Normal — can take 10 min	Run ./ops/syncsriov.sh to wait
Pod network not attached	Wrong namespace	Ensure pod and network CRD are in same namespace
IP pool exhausted	NETOP_PERNODE_BLOCKSIZE too small	Increase blocksize or NETOP_NETWORK_RANGE

Key Config Variables

• CREATE_CONFIG_ONLY — 1 (dry run) or 0 (deploy). Default is 1.
• NETOP_VERSION — Helm chart version (default 26.1.0)
• USECASE — Use case name (default sriovnet_rdma)
• NETOP_NETLIST — Device list (critical, format varies by use case)
• IPAM_TYPE — nv-ipam (large clusters) or whereabouts (<60 nodes)