KVM: How to configure a bridge connection in Ubuntu 11.10 2

Make the file : /etc/network/interfaces  look something like this (make changes only to br0, add it if not there and to the device that you want to bridge with, we used eth1):

# This file describes the network interfaces available on your system
# and how to activate them. For more information, see interfaces(5).

# The loopback network interface
auto lo
iface lo inet loopback

# The primary network interface
auto eth0
iface eth0 inet dhcp

auto eth1
iface eth1 inet dhcp

# Building a bridge to be used by the Virtual Machines
auto br0
iface br0 inet static
        address 192.168.0.10
        network 192.168.0.0
        netmask 255.255.255.0
        broadcast 192.168.0.255
        gateway 192.168.0.1
        bridge_ports eth1
        bridge_fd 9
        bridge_hello 2
        bridge_maxage 12
        bridge_stp off

Then issue: sudo /etc/init.d/networking restart
If you get:

* Running /etc/init.d/networking restart is deprecated because it may not enable again some interfaces
 * Reconfiguring network interfaces...                                                                                                                                                    RTNETLINK answers: File exists
ssh stop/waiting
ssh start/running, process 11489

Waiting for br0 to get ready (MAXWAIT is 20 seconds).
RTNETLINK answers: File exists
Failed to bring up br0.                        [ OK ]

Try bringing down the device to be bridged (eth1) like this: sudo  ifdown eth1 and then issue sudo /etc/init.d/networking restart again.
After that enable it the device again again like this: sudo  ifup eth1
If this doesn’t worked try restarting the machine, worked for us.

When properly configured ifconfig should result to something similar as this:

br0       Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr 00:1a:64:67:d3:86  
          inet addr:192.168.0.10  Bcast:192.168.0.255  Mask:255.255.255.0
          inet6 addr: fe80::21a:64ff:fe67:d386/64 Scope:Link
          UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
          RX packets:1752 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:18 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0 txqueuelen:0
          RX bytes:136973 (136.9 KB)  TX bytes:1500 (1.5 KB)

eth0      Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr 00:1a:64:67:d3:84  
          inet addr:10.16.20.60  Bcast:10.16.20.63  Mask:255.255.255.224
          inet6 addr: fe80::21a:64ff:fe67:d384/64 Scope:Link
          UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
          RX packets:91218 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:51796 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
          RX bytes:123551183 (123.5 MB)  TX bytes:4754458 (4.7 MB)
          Interrupt:16 Memory:ce000000-ce012800

eth1      Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr 00:1a:64:67:d3:86  
          inet addr:10.16.20.33  Bcast:10.16.20.63  Mask:255.255.255.224
          UP BROADCAST RUNNING PROMISC MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
          RX packets:2605 errors:0 dropped:48 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:38 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
          RX bytes:321878 (321.8 KB)  TX bytes:3490 (3.4 KB)
          Interrupt:17 Memory:ca000000-ca012800

lo        Link encap:Local Loopback  
          inet addr:127.0.0.1  Mask:255.0.0.0
          inet6 addr: ::1/128 Scope:Host
          UP LOOPBACK RUNNING  MTU:16436  Metric:1
          RX packets:129 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:129 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0 txqueuelen:0
          RX bytes:17588 (17.5 KB)  TX bytes:17588 (17.5 KB)

virbr0    Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr b6:ae:8d:e0:06:c3  
          inet addr:192.168.122.1  Bcast:192.168.122.255  Mask:255.255.255.0
          UP BROADCAST MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
          RX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0 txqueuelen:0
          RX bytes:0 (0.0 B)  TX bytes:0 (0.0 B)

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