Setting up a network bridge on Debian 7

I need to setup a network bridge br0 to connect my virtual machines under KVM to the wired network eth0 without DHCP. I do not use Network Manager, but the /etc/network/interfaces configuration file.

Install the prerequisites as root user

aptitude install bridge-utils

Disable eth0 as root user

ifdown eth0

Setting up the network interfaces

Edit /etc/network/interfaces

auto lo br0
iface lo inet loopback

allow-hotplug eth0
iface eth0 inet manual

iface br0 inet static
    address 192.168.1.3
    netmask 255.255.255.0
    network 192.168.1.0
    broadcast 192.168.1.255
    gateway 192.168.1.1
    bridge_ports eth0
    # I use the OpenDNS nameservers
    dns-nameserver 208.67.222.222
    dns-nameserver 208.67.220.220

Activate interfaces as root user

ifup eth0 br0

Tags : linux debian réseau kvm